The EU Just Killed Mass Surveillance of Your DMs. Most Developers Missed It.

The EU has prevented mass surveillance of your DMs. And most developers are not aware of the near miss. The European Parliament voted to reject Chat Control today, March 26. The regulation, which would have allowed platforms such as Instagram and LinkedIn to voluntarily monitor your private messages for illegal content? It will expire on April 4. No extension. No substitute. Finished. It wasn't even close. The EPP has tried to compel a re-vote to overturn an earlier decision. They were defeated. Here's the backstory you should know Since 2021, a temporary EU law called Chat Control 1.0 has allowed tech companies to monitor private messaging for child sexual abuse material voluntarily. Meta and similar platforms have conducted pre-encryption message automation detection. The EU Commission wanted to make the legislation permanent and compulsory. Chat Control 2.0 will require every messaging app to introduce client-side scanning. Your messages are scanned by your computer before they are