European police have expressed concerns that the increased use of end-to-end encryption is jeopardizing cooperation between law enforcement agencies and the tech industry, which is fueling crime.
They called on industry and governments to take immediate action to ensure public safety on social media platforms.
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“Current privacy, such as end-to-end encryption, are an obstacle for technology companies, as they cannot identify breaches taking place on their platforms,” Europol said. “It also limits the ability of law enforcement authorities to access and use this data in their investigations to prevent and prosecute serious crimes such as child sexual abuse, human trafficking, drug trafficking, homicide, financial crime, and terrorism.”
The concept that the protection mechanisms of E2EE can become an obstacle to law enforcement is often referred to as the “dark” issue, implying concerns about creating new challenges in gathering evidence against criminal activity.
The UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA) is facing serious criticism for design decisions by a company that have proven to be an obstacle to strengthening the protection of children from online. These choices not only made investigations more difficult, but also undermined the agency’s ability to protect the public from serious threats. “Encryption provides significant benefits, protecting users from a range of crimes,” said NCA Director General Graeme Biggar. “However, the reckless and ever-increasing provision of end-to-end encryption by big tech companies, without due regard to public safety, poses risks to users.”
Read more: Apple chip vulnerability leaks encryption keys
Eurool executive director Catherine de Bolle emphasized the social responsibility of technology companies to create a safe digital environment. At the same time, she underscored the need for this not to hinder the ability of armed forces to collect evidence.
The joint statement also urges the technology to build products with cybersecurity in mind, but at the same time provide a mechanism to identify and flag harmful and illegal content.
“We do not accept that there needs to be a binary choice between cybersecurity or privacy on the one hand and public safety on the other,” the agencies said. We believe that there are technically feasible solutions, which require flexibility from both industry and governments. It is clear that these solutions will need to be adapted to the different needs and specificities of each case, and that they will vary from platform to platform.
Meta isalready leveraging a wealth of data it receives from unencrypted information sources and user reports, with the aim of addressing child sexual exploitation through WhatsApp.
Earlier this month, the social media giant also announced the pilot implementation of a new set of features on Instagram, aimed at protecting young users from threats such as extortion and abuse through images, thanks to user-side scanning technology.
See also: Who benefits from the EU's fight against child sexual abuse?
“Protection against inappropriate content focuses on using machine learning directly on the device to determine whether an image sent via DM on Instagram contains nudity,” Meta said.
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“Since images are analyzed directly on the device, protection against inappropriate content will apply even in end-to-end encrypted conversations, in which Meta does not have access to the images. This is true unless a user decides to share them with us.”
Source: thehackernews
