LONDON — Australia hopes its teenage social media ban will create a domino effect around the world. Britain isn’t so sure.  As a new law banning under-16s from signing up to platforms such as YouTube, Instagram and TikTok comes into force today, U.K. lawmakers ten thousand miles away are watching closely, but not jumping in. “There are no current plans to implement a smartphone or social media ban for children. It’s important we protect children while letting them benefit safely from the digital world, without cutting off essential services or isolating the most vulnerable,” a No.10 spokesperson said Tuesday. Regulators are tied up implementing the U.K.’s complex Online Safety Act, and there is little domestic pressure on the ruling Labour Party to act from its main political opponents.  While England’s children’s commissioner and some MPs are supportive of a ban, neither the poll-topping Reform UK or opposition Conservative Party are pushing to mirror moves down under.  “We believe that bans are ineffective,” a Reform UK spokesperson said.  Even the usually Big Tech skeptic lobby groups have their doubts about the Australian model — despite strong public support to replicate the move in the U.K. Chris Sherwood, chief executive of the NSPCC, which has led the charge in pushing for tough regulation of social media companies over the last decade, said: “We must not punish young people for the failure of tech companies to create safe experiences online.  “Services must be accountable for knowing what content is being pushed out on their platforms and ensuring that young people can enjoy social media safely.” Andy Burrows, who leads the Molly Rose Foundation campaign group, argues the Australian approach is flawed and will push children to higher-risk platforms not included in the ban.  His charity was set up in 2018 in the name of 14-year-old Molly Russell, who took her own life in 2017 while suffering from “depression and the negative effects of online content,” a coroner’s inquest concluded.  Regulators are tied up implementing the U.K.’s complex Online Safety Act, and there is little domestic pressure on the ruling Labour Party to act from its main political opponents. | Ian Forsyth/Getty Images “The quickest and most effective response to better protect children online is to strengthen regulation that directly addresses product safety and design risks rather than an overarching ban that comes with a slew of unintended consequences,” Burrows said.  “We need evidence-based approaches, not knee-jerk responses.” AUSSIE RULES Australia’s eSafety commissioner Julie Inman Grant, an American tasked with policing the world’s first social media account ban for teenagers, acknowledges Australia’s legislation is the “most novel, complex piece of legislation” she has ever seen. But insists: “We cannot control the ocean, but we can police the sharks.” She told a conference in Sydney this month she expects others to follow Australia’s lead. “I’ve always referred to this as the first domino,” she says.  “Parents shouldn’t have to fight billion-dollar companies to keep their kids safe online — the responsibility belongs with the platforms,” Inman Grant told Australia’s Happy Families podcast.  But the move does come with diplomatic peril. Inman Grant has not escaped the attention of the White House, which is pressuring countries to overturn tech regulations it views as unfairly targeting American companies.  U.S. congressman and Trump ally Jim Jordan has asked Inman Grant to testify before the Judiciary Committee he chairs, accusing her of being a “zealot for global [content] takedowns.” She hit back last week, describing the request as an example of territorial overreach.  The social media account ban for under-16s is the latest in a line of Australian laws that have upset U.S. tech companies. It was the first to bring in a news media bargaining code to force Google and Facebook to negotiate with publishers, and was the first major economy to rule out changing laws to let AI companies train on copyrighted material without permission. The U.K. has also upset the White House with its existing online safety measures, and the Trump administration said earlier this year it is monitoring freedom of speech concerns in the U.K. Australia is used to facing down the Big Tech lobby, explains Daniel Stone, who advised the ruling Labor Government on tech policy. “Julie has the benefit of knowing the [political] cabinet is fully supportive of her position,” he said. “It defines what’s permissible across the whole system.”  The social media account ban for under-16s is the latest in a line of Australian laws that have upset U.S. tech companies. | Justin Sullivan/Getty Images “If there is a lesson for the U.K., it is that you don’t have a strong regulator unless you have a strong political leader with a clear and consistent agenda,” Stone adds.  “Australia has its anxieties, too, about pushing U.S. tech companies, but they carry themselves with confidence,” said Stone. “You have to approach Trump from a position of strength.”  Rebecca Razavi, a former Australian diplomat, regulator and visiting fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute, agrees. “The thinking is, we’re a mid-sized economy and there’s this asymmetry with tech platforms dominating, and there’s actually a need to put things in place using an Australian approach to regulation,” she said.  Other countries, including Brazil, Malaysia and some European countries are moving in a similar direction. Last month the European Parliament called for a continent-wide age restriction on social media.  SLOW DOWN Others are biding their time.  The speed at which Australia’s social media ban was approved by parliament means that many of its pitfalls have not been explored, Razavi cautioned.  The legislation passed through parliament last December in 19 days with cross-party and wide public support. “It was really fast,” she said. “There was a feeling that this is something that parents care about. There’s also a deep frustration that the tech companies are just taking too long to make the reforms that are needed.”  But she added: “Some issues, such as how it works in practice, with age verification and data privacy are only being addressed now.”  Lizzie O’Shea, a human rights lawyer and founder of campaign group Digital Rights Watch, agreed. “There was very little time for consultation and engagement,” she said. “There has then subsequently been a lot of concerns about implementation. I worry about experimenting on particularly vulnerable people.”  For now, Britain and the world is watching to see if Australia’s new way to police social media delivers, or becomes an unworkable knee-jerk reaction. 

Da dieci giorni a San Nicola Manfredi, in provincia di Benevento, vive una bambina fantasma. E’ nata il 24 novembre ma per l’anagrafe non esiste. E di conseguenza non ha un codice fiscale. E senza codice fiscale non può avere un pediatra e ricevere cure mediche, se fosse necessario. È la conseguenza dell’eliminazione della madre dalle liste dell’anagrafe. La donna è finita impigliata in una guerra più ampia, iniziata dal sindaco Angelo Leone Vernillo contro centinaia di presunte residenze fittizie: non poche in un comune di circa 3400 abitanti. Una guerra scatenata da alcuni esposti che lo accusano di aver vinto grazie a questi elettori – residenti finti, appunto – che avrebbero dovuto votare altrove. Lui sostiene il contrario, che se le liste elettorali fossero state ripulite negli anni scorsi, avrebbe vinto non solo nel 2021 ma già nel 2016. Sta di fatto che anche la bimba – o meglio, la madre – è finita nella raffica di cancellazioni, argomentate con varie spiegazioni. Eppure la donna sostiene di vivere nel comune del Beneventano. Ma quando si è presentata all’ufficio comunale per registrare la nascita della figlia, si è sentita rispondere: “Non possiamo, lei non risulta residente qui”. La kafkiana vicenda è stata denunciata pubblicamente da una lettera aperta dello zio della bambina. La lettera ricostruisce minuziosamente la prima accettazione ‘con riserva’ nell’ottobre scorso della residenza della sorella, uno stato di famiglia che la attestava, un successivo stato di famiglia con l’eliminazione della residenza. “Sono due anni che mia sorella vive stabilmente qui, siamo vittime di un incomprensibile ostruzionismo, nonostante una diffida del Prefetto”. Vernillo ha spiegato all’emittente locale LabTv che sta procedendo a una serie di cancellazioni in seguito all’apertura di una inchiesta della Procura di Benevento su residenze fittizie che avrebbero alterato i risultati delle elezioni. “Ho contato 203 persone che non hanno la dimora abituale qui”. Da qui una serie di procedimenti per irreperibilità, molti conclusi con un cambio spontaneo di residenza. Sul caso specifico della bambina ‘fantasma’, secondo il sindaco l’accaduto è la conseguenza di un precedente trasferimento della madre in un altro comune, e di una serie di vicende privatissime sue, della sua famiglia, e dei loro immobili, spiattellate in pubblico tramite il mezzo televisivo. Povera bambina: ancora senza codice fiscale e già senza privacy. L'articolo Benevento, lo strano caso della neonata fantasma: l’anagrafe comunale non può registrarla proviene da Il Fatto Quotidiano.

The Dutch government has quietly removed Google tracking tools from job listings for its intelligence services over concerns that the data would expose aspirant spies to U.S. surveillance. The intervention would put an end to Google’s processing of the data of job seekers interested in applying to spy service jobs, after members of parliament in The Hague raised security concerns. The move comes at a moment when trust between the Netherlands and the United States is fraying. It reflects wider European unease — heightened by Donald Trump’s return to the White House — about American tech giants having access to some of their most sensitive government data. The heads of the AIVD and MIVD, the Netherlands’ civilian and military intelligence services, said in October that they were reviewing how to share information with American counterparts over political interference and human rights concerns. In the Netherlands, government vacancies are listed on a central online portal, which subsequently redirects applicants to specific institutions’ or agencies’ websites, including those of the security services. The government has now quietly pulled the plug on Google Analytics for intelligence-service postings, according to security expert Bert Hubert, who first raised the alarm about the trackers earlier this year. Hubert told POLITICO the job postings for intelligence services jobs no longer contained the same Google tracking technologies at least since November. The move was first reported by Follow the Money. The military intelligence service MIVD declined to comment. The interior ministry, which oversees the general intelligence service AIVD, did not respond to a request for comment at the time of publication. In a statement, Communications Manager for Google Mathilde Méchin said: “Businesses, not Google Analytics, own and control the data they collect and Google Analytics only processes it at their direction. This data can be deleted at any time.” “Any data sent to Google Analytics for measurement does not identify individuals, and we have strict policies against advertising based on sensitive information,” Méchin said. ‘FUTURE EMPLOYEES AT RISK’ Derk Boswijk, a center-right Dutch lawmaker, raised the alarm about the tracking of job applicants in parliamentary questions to the government in January. He said that while China and Russia have traditionally been viewed as the biggest security risks, it is unacceptable for any foreign government — allied or not — to have a view into Dutch intelligence recruitment. “I still see the U.S. as our most important ally,” Boswijk told POLITICO. “But to be honest, we’re seeing that the policies of the Trump administration and the European countries no longer necessarily align, and I think we should adapt accordingly.” The government told Boswijk in February it had enabled privacy settings on data gathered by Google. The government has yet to comment on Boswijk’s latest questions submitted in November. Hubert, the cybersecurity expert, said the concerns over tracking were justified. Even highly technical data like IP addresses, device fingerprints and browsing patterns can help foreign governments, including adversaries such as China, narrow down who might be seeking a job inside an intelligence agency, he said. “By leaking job applications so broadly, the Dutch intelligence agencies put their future employees at risk, while also harming their own interests,” said Hubert, adding it could discourage sought-after cybersecurity talent that agencies are desperate to attract. Hubert previously served on a watchdog committee overseeing intelligence agencies’ requests to use hacking tools, surveillance and wiretapping.  One open question raised by Dutch parliamentarians is how to gain control over the data that Google gathered on aspiring spies in past years. “I don’t know what happens with the data Google Analytics already has, that’s still a black box to me,” said Sarah El Boujdaini, a lawmaker for the centrist-liberal Democrats 66 party who oversees digital affairs. The episode is likely to add fuel to efforts to wean off U.S. technologies — which are taking place across Europe, as part of the bloc’s “technological sovereignty” drive. European Parliament members last month urged the institution to move away from U.S. tech services, in a letter to the president obtained by POLITICO. In the Netherlands, parliament members have urged public institutions to move away from digital infrastructure run by U.S. firms like Microsoft, over security concerns. “If we can’t even safeguard applications to our secret services, how do you think the rest is going?” Hubert asked. The country also hosts the International Criminal Court, where Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan previously lost access to his Microsoft-hosted email account after he was targeted with American sanctions over issuing an arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The ICC in October confirmed to POLITICO it was moving away from using Microsoft Office applications to German-based openDesk.

BRUSSELS — European governments struck a deal on Wednesday that clears the way for new rules protecting kids from child sexual abuse online. The agreement among countries puts an end to a years-long, heated lobbying fight that pitted privacy groups and even Elon Musk against law enforcement and child rights groups. The proposed law — which is now on track to pass by an April deadline, pending final talks with the European Parliament — would allow online messaging apps to scan content to stop the spread of child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and child grooming, and require platforms to do more to detect and take down content. Child rights groups say the deal struck by countries will go some way toward tackling the problem of child abuse online, even if it doesn’t go as far as they had hoped. To land an agreement, Danish diplomats who led negotiations in the Council of the EU softened their proposal to steer clear of a controversial “mandatory scanning” clause, which would have forced apps like Signal and WhatsApp to scan their services for illegal content. That idea — labeled “Chat Control” by privacy campaigners, who argued it would open the door to state surveillance — was also fought hard by end-to-end encrypted messaging apps. Signal had threatened to cease its services in Europe if the “Chat Control” proposal had moved forward. The compromise approved by EU ambassadors on Wednesday allows companies to decide voluntarily whether to scan their services, which is the current status quo under a temporary legal exemption that expires in April. It also places fresh obligations on platforms, including mandatory risk assessments. The deal clears the way for the Council to start negotiations with the European Parliament on a final text. Parliament reached its position on the law in 2023. Wednesday’s compromise doesn’t fully please either camp in the lobbying fight. Police and investigators fear illegal content will remain out of sight on end-to-end encrypted applications, while privacy activists say large-scale surveillance of communication will still expand. Privacy activists voiced concerns over the proposal, particularly over how targeted the scanning measures would be — a sign that they’ll continue to pressure negotiators in coming months. Andy Yen, CEO of the Swiss privacy-friendly tech maker Proton, said in a statement it is “vital we all remain vigilant” against attempts to introduce mandatory scanning “through the back door” during the negotiations. Ella Jakubowska, head of policy at digital rights group EDRi, said there’s “a lot still to fix in the Council’s text.” Meanwhile, ECLAG, a coalition of child rights groups, said it is “concerned by the absence of mandatory detection orders” in the Council compromise. Negotiators in the Council and Parliament have a hard deadline of April, when a temporary legislation allowing apps to scan for CSAM expires. The lead negotiator for the Parliament, Spanish lawmaker Javier Zarzalejos, said in a video posted on X that the negotiations are “urgent.” Cyprus will lead negotiations on behalf of the Council starting in January. A Cypriot official said it is “in full awareness of the April deadline.”

Dopo tre anni di negoziati falliti in senso al Consiglio europeo, Chat control è vicinissimo alla meta, grazie al “sì” del Coreper giunto la mattina del 26 novembre. Gli ambasciatori a Bruxelles dei 27 Stati europei, senza discutere il provvedimento, hanno approvato il testo firmato dalla Danimarca. Serve a contrastare la pedofilia online, ufficialmente, con il nome tecnico di Csar: Child sexual abuse regulation. Ma l’effetto collaterale sarebbe l’azzeramento della privacy online: i messaggi in chat e via mail di 450 milioni di europei sarebbero scansionati automaticamente da un algoritmo, se le piattaforme digitali vorranno. Oggi la maggioranza qualificata è stata raggiunta, nella riunione del Coreper, con il favore decisivo della Germania e l’astensione dell’Italia. La prossima tappa è il voto decisivo del Consiglio Ue l’8 e 9 dicembre. Non ci saranno discussioni, i 27 dovranno prendere o lasciare: sembra scontato il semaforo verde, per ratificare il consenso già espresso. Dopo inizierà la fase finale, con i negoziati tra le massime istituzioni del Vecchio Continente: il trilogo tra Commissione, Parlamento e Consiglio Ue. COSA PREVEDE LA VERSIONE DANESE DI CHAT CONTROL La proposta danese ha riscosso consensi grazie ad una modifica sostanziale. La scansione dei messaggi non sarà imposta alle piattaforme digitali, ma solo caldamente consigliato. Invece il regolamento proposto dalla Commissione europea – l’11 maggio 2022 – prevede controlli automatici e indiscriminati, grazie ad un varco nella “muraglia” della crittografia end to end. Traduzione: un software spierebbe i messaggi di tutti i cittadini europei, eludendo i codici a tutela della privacy, segnalando alle forze dell’ordine i casi sospetti di molestie sui minori. Da circa un decennio, le agenzie di sicurezza come Europol ed Fbi reclamano l’accesso alle comunicazioni online per contrastare la criminalità, inclusi gli abusi sui minori. Ma nel nome della sicurezza, si rischia di sacrificare la privacy. Nel testo danese, il controllo dei messaggi è affidato alla libera scelta delle piattaforme, proprio come avviene ora: una violazione della privacy in virtù di una deroga, contenuta nel regolamento Ue n. 1232 del 2021, rinnovata ogni anno. Ma ora l’eccezione diventerebbe la norma. Facebook già scansiona i nostri messaggi a caccia di sospetti abusi e da Meta giunge il 95 per cento delle segnalazioni per le forze dell’ordine. Tuttavia, la nuova formulazione non fuga i dubbi dei difensori della privacy. Secondo l’ex europarlamentare Patrick Breyer, l’obbligo della scansione è uscito dalla finestra per rientrare dalla porta. L’articolo 4 del nuovo testo, infatti, impone alla piattaforme di adottare “tutte le misure appropriate di mitigazione del rischio”. Senza stilare “un elenco esaustivo delle misure”, i fornitori di servizi conserverebbero “un certo grado di flessibilità per progettare e attuare” le difese digitali a tutela dei minori. Una concreta possibilità è l’obbligo della verifica dell’età: se passasse Chat control, con buona probabilità bisognerà inviare i documenti alle piattaforme, prima di aprire un profilo in chat, un account di posta elettronica o acquistare spazio di archiviazione sul cloud. Da febbraio, sarà così per visitare i siti porno. In pratica, la morte dell’anonimato online. Di sicuro, la scansione automatica e obbligatoria di tutti i messaggi non è accantonata, ma solo rinviata. La possibilità di imporla sarà riesaminata in futuro dalla Commissione Ue, stando al compromesso danese. Bisognerà attendere stagioni migliori, i tempi non sono maturi. LE PIATTAFORME CONTRO CHAT CONTROL, PROTON: “….” Proton è tra le piattaforme ostili a Chat control. “In questo tipo di legislazione, il diavolo si nasconde solitamente nei dettagli – dice al Fatto.it il Ceo e fondatore Andy Yen – Restiamo estremamente vigili e contribuiremo attivamente ai prossimi negoziati di trilogo per garantire i miglioramenti necessari, affinché siano rispettate la protezione della privacy e la sicurezza delle comunicazioni”. Anche Signal e Meta hanno espresso forti critiche verso chat control, per i rischi sulla privacy ma anche per la sicurezza informatica. Aprire un varco nella crittografia end to end sarebbe utile non solo alle forze dell’ordine, ma anche ai delinquenti digitali. L’ITALIA E LA DIFFICILE MINORANZA DI BLOCCO, M5S: “GOVERNO MELONI? ASTENSIONE PILATESCA. FERMARE LA SORVEGLIANZA DI MASSA” Al Coreper l’Italia si è astenuta su chat control: in passato ha sempre espresso posizioni dubbiose, mai apertamente sfavorevoli. Non è chiaro quali Paesi abbiano espresso voto contrario, nell’assise degli ambasciatori del 26 novembre. Cechia, Polonia, Paesi Bassi e Slovacchia avrebbero espresso riserve su Chat control. Ma non basta per formare una minoranza di blocco: l’unico modo per fermare il provvedimento è il no di almeno 4 Paesi con il 35 per cento della popolazione europea. Il poker di Paesi con riserva, sommando gli abitanti dell’Italia, si ferma poco sotto l’asticella del 30 per cento. Dunque l’ago della bilancia è nelle mani della Germania e il voto contrario dell’Italia non cambierebbe il risultato. Il governo Meloni lascia trapelare alle agenzie le sue perplessità: condivide la lotta agli abusi sessuali online, ma non accetta forme di controllo massivo di chat e dati personali. Ma allora, perché astenersi al voto su chat control? Una mossa “pilatesca” secondo l’europarlamentare del Movimento 5 stelle Gaetano Pedullà. “Con la scusa della tutela dei minori, i governi vogliono assicurarsi uno strumento potente di sorveglianza e controllo dei cittadini”, rincara il pentastellato. Il 19 novembre a Montecitorio, il deputato del Movimento Marco Pellegrini ha chiesto alla premier di esporre in Parlamento la posizione del governo su Chat control. Per ora, palazzo Chigi tace. L'articolo Chat control, c’è la maggioranza qualificata per la sorveglianza di massa. Italia astenuta, M5s: “Meloni come Pilato” proviene da Il Fatto Quotidiano.

BRUSSELS — You can even put an exact date on the day when Brussels finally gave up on its decade-long dream of seeking to be the predominant global tech regulator that would rein in American tech titans like Google and Apple.  It came last Wednesday — Nov. 19 — when the European Commission made an outright retreat on its data and privacy rules and hit pause on its AI regulation, all part of an attempt to make European industries more competitive in the global showdown with the United States and China.   It sounded the death knell for what has long been described as the “Brussels Effect” — the idea that the EU would be a trailblazer on tech legislation and set the world’s standards for privacy and AI.  Critics say Washington is now setting the deregulatory trajectory, while U.S. President Donald Trump is battering down Europe’s ambitions by threatening to roll out tariffs against countries that he accuses of attacking “our incredible American Tech Companies.” “I don’t hear anybody in Brussels saying ‘We’re a super regulator’ anymore,” said Marietje Schaake, who shaped Europe’s tech rulebooks as a former European Parliament member and special adviser to the European Commission. The big pivot away from rule-setting came in a “digital omnibus” proposal on Wednesday — a core part of Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s “simplification” program to cut red tape to make Europe more competitive. The digital omnibus was one of the “main discussion points” at a meeting between the EU’s tech chief Henna Virkkunen and U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Trade Representative Jamieson Greer. | Nicolas Tucat/AFP via Getty Images “Whether you call it ‘simplification’ or ‘deregulation,’ you are certainly moving away from the high watermark era of regulation,” said Anu Bradford, a professor at Columbia University who coined the term “Brussels Effect” in 2012. The deregulation drive followed a year in which the Trump administration pressured the EU to roll back enforcement of its tech rulebooks, which Big Tech giants and Trump himself deem “taxes” targeted at U.S. companies. The digital omnibus was one of the “main discussion points” at a meeting between the EU’s tech chief Henna Virkkunen, U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Trade Representative Jamieson Greer on Monday. “We adopted a major package that would have an impact not only on EU companies, but also on U.S. companies, so this is the appropriate moment … to explain what we’re doing on our side,” European Commission spokesperson Thomas Regnier told reporters on Monday when asked why Virkkunen had discussed the topic with her U.S. counterparts. Lutnick, however, told Bloomberg that Washington was seeking more than just an explanation of EU laws — it wanted changes to its tech rulebooks as well. U.S. giants like Google and Meta have led a full-frontal lobbying push to replace heavy-handed EU enforcement with lighter-touch rules. Behind the push to break the shackles for tech firms is a fear of missing out on the promised economic boom linked to AI technologies. The bloc has traded its role as global tech cop for a ticket to the AI race.  GLOBAL FIRST Brussels showed its ambition to lead the world in regulating the online space throughout the 2010s. In 2016 it adopted the General Data Protection Regulation. Since then, the law has been copied in new legislation across more than 100 countries, said Joe Jones, director of research and insights at the International Association of Privacy Professionals.  When the GDPR came into force, international companies like Microsoft, Google and Facebook acknowledged it spurred them to apply EU privacy standards globally.  It served as a quintessential case of the Brussels Effect: When setting the bar in Brussels, multinational firms would roll out standards across their businesses far beyond the EU’s borders. Other governments, too, copied some of Brussels’ early attempts at setting the rules. After the GDPR, the EU adopted other laws that had the ambition of reining in Big Tech, either by pressing platforms to police for illegal content through its Digital Services Act or by blocking them from using their dominance to favor own services through the Digital Markets Act. Right after the EU adopted its risk-focused AI rulebook, Trump took office and scrapped AI safety rules embraced by his predecessor Joe Biden.  | Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images The EU’s latest blockbuster tech rulebook, the Artificial Intelligence Act, was Brussels’ latest attempt at pioneering legislation, as it sought to address the risks posed by the fledgling technology. “There was more confidence in the EU’s regulation, partially because the EU seemed confident. Right now, when the EU seems to be retreating, any government around is also asking the same question,” Bradford said. Right after the EU adopted its risk-focused AI rulebook, Trump took office and scrapped AI safety rules embraced by his predecessor Joe Biden.   The changing of the guard in Washington came right as Brussels was waking up to the need to be competitive in a global technology race. Former Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi presented the EU’s competitiveness report in 2024, just weeks before Trump won a second term. “I think the Brussels effect is still alive and well. It just has a bit of the Draghi effect, in that it has a bit of this geopolitical innovation, pro-growth effect in it,” said IAPP’s Jones.  According to German politician Jan Philipp Albrecht, a former European Parliament member who was a chief architect of the GDPR, Europe has become blind to the benefits of its regulatory regime that set the gold standard. “Europeans have no self-secureness anymore … They don’t see the strength in their own market and in their own regulatory and innovative power,” Albrecht said.  WASHINGTON EFFECT Other critics of deregulation are taking a step further, claiming that Washington has hijacked the Brussels Effect — but just on its own terms.   “In an odd way, maybe the Trump administration has taken inspiration from the Brussels Effect, in the sense [that] they see what it means for this one regulating entity to be the one that sets global standards,” said Brian J. Chen, policy director at nonprofit research group Data & Society. It’s just, “they want to be the ones setting those standards,” Chen said. The Trump administration pressured Brussels to tone down its tech regulation during heated trade talks this summer, POLITICO previously reported. That the EU followed through with scaling back its tech laws just as the U.S. is pressing the EU is bad optics, said Schaake, the former lawmaker. “The timing of the whole simplification [package] is very bad,” she said.  She argued that it’s essential to deal with the unnecessary burden on companies, but issuing the digital omnibus after the U.S. pressure “looks like a response to that criticism.” Commission spokesperson Thomas Regnier dismissed the idea that the EU was acting on U.S. pressure. “On the digital omnibus, absolutely no third country had an influence on our sovereign simplification agenda. Because this omnibus is about Europe: less administrative burden, less overlaps, less costs,” Regnier said in a comment on Friday. “We have always been clear: Europe has its sovereign right to legislate,” Regnier added. “Nothing in the omnibus is watering down our digital legislation and we will keep enforcing it, firmly but always fairly.” This article has been updated to include new developments.

LONDON — Criminal networks are “weaponizing children” to commit torture and murder by recruiting them through multiplayer video games and smartphones — and parents often have no idea what’s happening, the boss of Europe’s law enforcement agency warns.  These groups now pose the greatest single criminal threat to the European Union because they destabilize society by targeting children and destroying families, said Catherine De Bolle, executive director of Europol.  “The weaponization of children for organized crime groups is what is going on at the moment on European soil,” she said in a joint interview with POLITICO and Welt. “They weaponize the children to torture or to kill. It’s not about petty theft anymore. It’s about big crimes.”  The “worst case” Europol has seen was of a young boy who was ordered “to kill his younger sister, which happened,” she said. “It’s cruel, we have never seen this before.”  She even suggested that children and young people are being used by hostile states and hybrid threat perpetrators as unwitting spies to eavesdrop on government buildings.  The Europol chief is in a unique position to describe the criminal landscape threatening European security, as head of the EU agency responsible for intelligence coordination and supporting national police. In a wide-ranging discussion, De Bolle also cautioned that the growth of artificial intelligence is having a dramatic impact, multiplying online crime, described how drug smugglers are now using submarines to ship cocaine from South America to Europe, and described an increasing threat to European society from Russia’s hybrid war.  De Bolle’s comments come amid an ongoing debate about how to police the internet and social media to prevent young and vulnerable people from coming to harm. The greatest threat facing the EU from organized crime right now comes from groups that have “industrialized” the recruitment of children, she said: “Because [they are] the future of the European Union. If you lose them, you lose everything.” FROM GAMING TO GROOMING Criminals often begin the process of grooming children by joining their multiplayer video games, which have a chat function, and gaining their trust by discussing seemingly harmless topics like pets and family life.  Then, they will switch to a closed chat where they will move on to discussing more sinister matters, and persuade the child to share personal details like their address. At that point, the criminals can bribe or blackmail the child into committing violence, including torture, self-harm, murder and even suicide.  Europol is aware of 105 instances in which minors were involved in violent crimes “performed as a service” — including 10 contract killings. Many attempted murders fail because children are inexperienced, the agency said. “We also have children who do not execute the order and then, for instance, [the criminals] kill the pet of the child, so that the child knows very well, ‘We know where you live, we know who you are, you will obey, and if you don’t, we will go even further to kill your mother or your father,’” De Bolle warned.  Criminals will also offer children money to commit a crime — as much as $20,000 for a killing, sometimes they pay and sometimes they don’t. While these networks often target children who are vulnerable because they have psychological problems or are bullied at school, healthy and happy children are also at risk, De Bolle said. “It’s also about others, youngsters who are not vulnerable but just want new shoes — shoes that are very expensive.”  Sometimes young people are even recruited for hybrid war by state actors, she said. “You also have it with hybrid threat actors that are looking for the crime as a service model — the young perpetrators to listen to the foreign state, to listen to the communication around buildings.” Once police catch a child, the criminals abandon them and move to groom a new child to turn into a remote-operated weapon.  “Parents blame themselves in a lot of cases. They do not understand how it is possible,” she said. “The problem is you don’t have access to everything your child does and you respect also the privacy of your children. But as a parent, you need to talk about the dangers of the internet.” DRUGS AND AI ARE ALSO A PROBLEM Among the new criminal methods crossing Europol’s desks, two stand out: The use of so-called narco-submarines to smuggle drugs like cocaine from South America into the EU and the growth in AI technology fueling an explosion in online fraud that enforcement agencies are virtually powerless to stop.  Instead of shipping cocaine into the ports of Hamburg, Rotterdam and Antwerp through containers, criminals have diversified their methods, De Bolle said. One key route is to sail semi-submersible vessels from South America to Europe’s North Atlantic coast, where speedboats meet them and offload the illegal cargo via Portugal, according to Europol’s information.  While Europe now is “overflooded with drugs,” criminal organizations may make more money, more easily through online fraud, she said. “Artificial intelligence is a multiplier for crime,” she said. “Everything is done a thousand times more and faster. The abuse of artificial intelligence lies in phishing emails — you do not recognize it very easily with phishing emails anymore because the language is correct.”  She said “romance fraud” is also “booming,” as “people look for love, also online.” “With deepfakes and with voice automation systems, it’s very difficult for a law enforcement authority to recognise that from a genuine picture. The technology is not there yet to [tell] the difference,” De Bolle added.  De Bolle said Europol needed to be able to access encrypted phone messages with a judge’s authorization to disrupt these criminal networks. “When a judge decides that we need to have access to data, the online providers should be forced to give us access to this encrypted communication,” she said. Otherwise, “we will be blind and then we cannot do our job.”

BRUSSELS — A fresh proposal by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen to reform digital laws on Wednesday was welcomed by lawmakers on the right but shunned on the left. It signals a possible repeat of a pivotal parliamentary clash last week in which von der Leyen’s center-right European People’s Party sided with the far right to pass her first omnibus proposal on green rules — sidelining the centrist coalition that voted the Commission president into office last year. The EU executive on Wednesday presented plans to overhaul everything from its flagship General Data Protection Regulation to data rules and its fledgling Artificial Intelligence Act. The reforms aim to help businesses using data and AI, in an effort to catch up with the United States, China and other regions in the global tech race. Drafts of the plans obtained by POLITICO caused an uproar in Brussels in the past two weeks, as everyone from liberal to left-leaning political groups and privacy-minded national governments rang the alarm. Von der Leyen sought to extend an olive branch with last-minute tweaks to her proposal, but she’s still a long way away from center-left groups. The Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats, Greens and The Left all slamming the plans in recent days. Tom Vandendriessche, a Belgian member of the far-right Patriots for Europe group, said the GDPR is not “untouchable,” and that there needs to be simplification “to ensure our European companies can compete again.” He added: “If EPP supports that course, we’re happy to collaborate on that.” Charlie Weimers a Swedish member of the right-wing European Conservatives and Reformists, welcomed the plan for “cleaning up overlapping data rules, cutting double reporting and finally tackling the cookie banner circus.” Weimers argued von der Leyen could go further, saying it falls short of being “the regulatory U-turn the EU actually needs” to catch up in the AI race. Those early rapprochements on the right are what Europe’s centrists and left fear most. The digital omnibus “should not be a repetition of omnibus one,” German Greens lawmaker Sergey Lagodinsky told reporters on Wednesday. Lagodinsky warned EPP leader Manfred Weber that “there should be no games with anti-democratic and anti-European parties.” BIG REFORMS, SMALL CONCESSIONS The Commission’s double-decker digital omnibus package includes one plan to simplify the EU’s data-related laws (including the GDPR as well as rules for nonpersonal data), and another specifically targeting the AI Act. A Commission official, briefing reporters without being authorized to speak on the record, said the omnibus’ impact on the GDPR was subject to “intense discussion” internally in the run up to Wednesday’s presentation, after its rough reception from some parliament groups and privacy organizations. Much in the EU executive’s final text remained unchanged. Among the proposals, the Commission wants to insert an affirmation into the GDPR that AI developers can rely on their “legitimate interest” to legally process Europeans’ data. That would give AI companies more confidence that they don’t always have to ask for consent. It also wants to change the definition of personal data in the GDPR to allow pseudonymized data — where a person’s details have been obscured so they can’t be identified — to be more easily processed. The omnibus proposals also aim to reduce the number of cookie banners that crop up across Europe’s internet. To assuage privacy concerns, Commission officials scrapped a hotly contested clause that would have redefined what is considered “special category” data, like a person’s religious or political beliefs, ethnicity or health data, which are afforded extra protections under the GDPR. The new cookie provision will also contain an explicit statement that website and app operators still need to get consent to access information on people’s devices. SEEKING POLITICAL SUPPORT The final texts will now be scrutinized by the Parliament and Council of the European Union. Von der Leyen’s center-right EPP welcomed the digital simplification plans as a “a critical boost for Europe’s industrial competitiveness.” Parliament’s group of center-left Socialists and Democrats came out critical of the reforms. Birgit Sippel, a prominent German member of the group, said in a statement the Commission “wants to undermine its own standards of protection in the area of data protection and privacy in order to facilitate data use, surveillance, and AI tools ‘made in the U.S.’” On the EPP’s immediate left, the liberal Renew group cited “important concerns” about the final texts but said it was “delighted” that the Commission backtracked on changing the definition of sensitive data, one idea in the leaked drafts that triggered a backlash. Renew said it would “support changes in the digital omnibus that will make life easier for our European companies.” If von der Leyen goes looking for votes for her digital omnibus among far-right groups, she will find support but it might not be a united front. German lawmaker Christine Anderson of the Alternative for Germany party, part of the far-right Europe of Sovereign Nations group, warned the digital omnibus could end up boosting “the ability to track and profile people.” Weaker privacy rules would “enable enhanced surveillance architecture,” she said, adding her party had “always opposed” such changes. “On these issues, we find ourselves much closer to the groups on the left in the Parliament,” she said. Pieter Haeck contributed reporting.

I difensori della privacy già si preparavano a celebrare il funerale di Chat control, il regolamento proposto dalla Commissione europea per sorvegliare tutti i messaggi in chat di 450 milioni di cittadini europei. Invece il “Grande fratello” è risorto più minaccioso di prima nel nuovo testo firmato dalla Danimarca, presidente di turno del Consiglio europeo. La scansione automatica dell’algoritmo investirà non solo i link, le foto e i video, ma anche le parole e i testi. LA MORTE DELLA PRIVACY IN NOME DEI MINORI Lo scopo è combattere la piaga della pedofilia online in vertiginoso aumento. Tecnicamente la proposta di chiama Csar, Child sexual abuse regulation. Ma l’effetto collaterale è la “sorveglianza di massa” – per citare letteralmente il Parlamento Ue – e la morte della privacy digitale. Di più: il controllo dei testi apre la possibilità di equivoci drammatici e infondate accuse di pedofilia. “Nessuna intelligenza artificiale può distinguere in modo affidabile tra un flirt, il sarcasmo e un ‘adescamento’ criminale”, ha commentato Patrick Breyer, giurista ed ex europarlamentare tedesco. “Immaginate che il vostro telefono controlli ogni conversazione con il vostro partner, vostra figlia, il vostro terapeuta e la trasmetta solo perché da qualche parte compare la parola ‘amore’ o ‘incontro’ – prosegue Breyer – Questa non è protezione dei minori, è una caccia alle streghe digitale. Il risultato sarà un’ondata di falsi positivi, che metterà cittadini innocenti sotto il sospetto generale ed esporrà masse di chat e foto private, persino intime, a sconosciuti”. Dello stesso tenore le preoccupazioni dell’europarlamentare 5 stelle Gaetano Pedullà. Secondo il giornalista, il controllo dei testi “potrebbe portare a un’enorme quantità di false accuse”. Basta citare la storia di papà Mark, negli Usa, raccontata dal New York Times il 21 agosto 2022. Per una foto ai genitali del figlio, inviata al pediatra in chat durante la pandemia, è scattata l’indagine per pedofilia: invece era solo un problema di salute. L’algoritmo non sempre indovina, anzi. Breyer cita un dato fornito dalla polizia tedesca: circa il 50% di tutte le segnalazioni sono irrilevanti dal punto di vista penale. Ecco perché, secondo Pedullà, il compromesso danese “è addirittura peggiore della versione stralciata qualche settimana fa”. “Con la scusa della tutela dei minori, i governi vogliono assicurarsi uno strumento potente di sorveglianza e controllo dei cittadini”, conclude il pentastellato. IL TRUCCO DANESE E LA “MITIGAZIONE DEL RISCHIO” Giova ricordare: i servizi di messaggistica possono già spiare ogni chat a caccia di pedofili, se lo vogliono. Facebook è in prima fila. La sorveglianza avviene grazie ad una deroga europea alla tutela della privacy varata nel 2021, rinnovata ogni anno. Prossima scadenza: aprile 2026. Anche per questo Mette Frederiksen, premier danese socialdemocratica, aveva imposto la priorità per chat control. La proposta di Copenaghen sembrava seppellire i timori del Grande fratello perché aboliva l’obbligo della scansione automatica, in capo alle piattaforme, fotografando la situazione attuale: sorveglianza sì, ma su base volontaria e senza imposizioni per Whatsapp e gli altri: come Google, Meta, Signal, Telegram, Proton. Invece l’obbligo, uscito dalla finestra rientra dalla porta: “un inganno politico di primissimo ordine”, secondo Breyer. Il trucco è all’articolo 4 del nuovo testo, dice il giurista: i fornitori di servizi sono obbligati ad adottare “tutte le misure appropriate di mitigazione del rischio”. Inclusa la scansione dei messaggi privati, avvisa l’ex europarlamentare tedesco. Dunque la minaccia per la privacy resta intatta. Non solo. Per tutelare i minori, la verifica dell’età diventerebbe obbligatoria prima di accedere a chat e servizi di posta elettronica. Ogni cittadino dovrebbe fornire un documento d’identità o accettare una scansione. In pratica, “la morte dell’anonimato online”, dice Pedullà. “Un disastro per dissidenti, giornalisti, attivisti politici e persone in cerca di aiuto che fanno affidamento sulla protezione dell’anonimato”, avverte Breyer. LA MAGGIORANZA QUALIFICATA ORA È POSSIBILE La nuova proposta è stata discussa il 12 novembre nella riunione tecnica del Law Enforcement Working Party. Il 19 dovrebbe approdare sul tavolo degli ambasciatori del Coreper, per preparare il voto decisivo nel Consiglio Ue. E potrebbe essere la volta buona per la proposta di regolamento Chat control, dopo tre anni di negoziati falliti. L’ostinazione degli Stati europei e della Commissione Ue si spiega solo con la portata della posta in palio. La versione danese è già stata discussa in una riunione informale degli ambasciatori nazionali il 5 novembre. Come rivelato dalla testa Brussellese Politico, anche la Germania sarebbe favorevole. La giravolta tedesca consentirebbe di raggiungere la maggioranza qualificata e superare la minoranza di blocco. Ma non è detta l’ultima parola. L'articolo Chat control, trucco danese per resuscitare la sorveglianza di massa. M5s: “In nome dei minori, controllano i cittadini” proviene da Il Fatto Quotidiano.

LONDON — Donald Trump’s war against the media has gone international.  Britain’s public service broadcaster has until 10 p.m. U.K. time on Friday to retract a 2024 documentary that he claims did him “overwhelming financial and reputational harm” — or potentially face a $1 billion lawsuit (nearly £760 million). It’s the U.S. president’s first notable battle with a non-American media organization. The escalation from Trump comes as the BBC is already grappling with the double resignations this past weekend of two top executives, Director General Tim Davie and news CEO Deborah Turness, amid the growing furor sparked by the release last week of an internal ombudsman’s report criticizing the Trump program as well as the BBC’s coverage of the Gaza war. Trump told Fox News he believes he has “an obligation” to sue the corporation because “they defrauded the public” and “butchered” a speech he gave. POLITICO walks you through the possible road ahead — and the potential pitfalls on both sides of the Atlantic.  WHY IS TRUMP THREATENING TO SUE?  The U.S. president is objecting to the broadcaster’s reporting in a documentary that aired on Panorama, one of the BBC’s flagship current affairs shows, just days before the U.S. presidential election.  The program included footage from Trump’s speech ahead of the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol riot, which was selectively edited to suggest, incorrectly, that he told supporters: “We’re going to walk down to the Capitol and I’ll be there with you, and we fight. We fight like hell.”   But those lines were spoken almost an hour apart, and the documentary did not include a section where Trump called for supporters “to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard.”  “I really struggle to understand how we got to this place,” former BBC legal affairs correspondent Clive Coleman told POLITICO. “The first lesson almost you’re taught as a broadcast journalist is that you do not join two bits of footage together from different times in a way that will make the audience think that it is one piece of footage.” The U.S. president’s legal team claimed the edit on the footage was “false, defamatory, disparaging, and inflammatory” and caused him “to suffer overwhelming financial and reputational harm.”  BBC Chair Samir Shah apologized on Monday for the “error of judgment” in the edit. Trump’s lawyers said in their letter that they want a retraction, an apology and appropriate financial compensation — though their client’s subsequent comments suggest that may not satisfy him at this point. DO TRUMP’S CLAIMS STAND A CHANCE?  Trump’s lawyers indicated in their letter that he plans to sue in Florida, his home state, which has a two-year statute of limitations for defamation rather than the U.K.’s one-year limit — which has already passed.  The U.S. president is objecting to the broadcaster’s reporting in a documentary that aired on Panorama, one of the BBC’s flagship current affairs shows, just days before the U.S. presidential election. | Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images To even gain a hearing, the U.S. president would first need to prove the documentary was available there. The broadcaster confirmed the Panorama episode was not shown on the global feed of the BBC News Channel, while programs on iPlayer, the BBC’s catchup service, were only available in the U.K.  The Trump team’s letter to the BBC, however, claimed the clip was “widely disseminated throughout various digital mediums” reaching tens of millions of people worldwide — a key contention that would need to be considered by any judge deciding whether the case could be brought.  U.S. libel laws are tougher for claimants given that the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment guarantees the right to free speech. In U.S. courts, public figures claiming to have been defamed also have to show the accuser acted with “actual malice.”  The legal meaning doesn’t require animosity or dislike, but instead an intent to spread false information or some action in reckless disregard of the truth — a high burden of proof for Trump’s lawyers.  American libel standards tend to favor publishers more than those in Britain, so much so that in recent decades public figures angry about U.S. news reports have often opted to file suit in the U.K. That trend even prompted a 2010 U.S. law aimed at reining in so-called libel tourism. Yet Trump’s legal team is signaling it will argue that since the full video of Trump’s 2021 speech was widely available to the BBC, the editing itself amounted to reckless disregard and, therefore, actual malice.  BBC Chair Samir Shah apologized on Monday for the “error of judgment” in the edit. | Henry Nicholls/AFP via Getty Images “The BBC’s reckless disregard for the truth underscores the actual malice behind the decision to publish the wrongful content, given the plain falsity of the statements,” his lawyers wrote.  However, a court battle wouldn’t be without risks for Trump. Prateek Swaika, a U.K.-based partner with Boies Schiller Flexner, said pursuing litigation “could force detailed examination and disclosure in connection” with Trump’s Jan. 6 statements —  potentially creating “more reputational damage than the original edit.”  COULD THE BBC SETTLE?  Trump has a long history of threatening legal action, especially against the press, but has lately had success in reaching out-of-court agreements with media outlets — including, most notably, the U.S. broadcasters ABC and CBS.  Trump’s latest claim is the flipside of his $20 billion suit against CBS’s “60 Minutes” over an interview with then-Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris, which Trump claimed was deceptively edited to make Harris look good and therefore amounted to election interference.  CBS settled for $16 million in July, paying into a fund for Trump’s presidential library or charitable causes, though the network admitted no wrongdoing. The settlement came as CBS’ parent company, Paramount, was pursuing a corporate merger that the Trump administration had the power to block — and after Trump publicly said he thought CBS should lose its broadcast license, which is also granted by the federal government. The president doesn’t hold that same sway over the BBC, though the organization does have some U.S.-based commercial operations. Some news organizations have also opted to fight rather than settle past Trump claims, including CNN, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. Some news organizations have opted to fight rather than settle past Trump claims, including CNN, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. | Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images “Litigation is always a commercial decision and it’s a reputational decision,” said Coleman, suggesting settlement talks may look appealing compared to fighting a case that could “hang over the heads of the BBC for many, many years, like a dark cloud.”  COULD THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT STEP IN?  Despite the BBC’s standing as a state broadcaster, the Labour government has so far taken a hands-off approach, perhaps unsurprisingly given Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s ongoing efforts to woo Trump on trade. No. 10 said on Tuesday that the lawsuit threat was a matter for the BBC, though Starmer subsequently reiterated his support for it generally. “I believe in a strong and independent BBC,” Starmer said at prime minister’s questions Wednesday. “Some would rather the BBC didn’t exist … I’m not one of them.” Perhaps eager to stay in Trump’s good books, the PM’s ministers have also avoided attacking the president and instead walked a diplomatic tightrope by praising the BBC in more general terms. Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy on Tuesday reiterated the government’s vision of the BBC as a tool of soft power. The BBC documentary did not include a section where Trump called for supporters “to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard.” | Brendan Smialowski/Getty Images “At a time when the line between fact and opinion, and between news and polemic, is being dangerously blurred, the BBC stands apart,” Nandy told MPs Tuesday. “It is a light on the hill for people here and across the world.”  WHO WOULD FUND ANY PAYOUT?  The BBC is funded by the country’s license fee, which requires any household that has a TV or uses BBC iPlayer to pay £174.50 a year (some people are exempt from paying). In the year ending March 2025, this accounted for £3.8 billion of the corporation’s overall £5.9 billion in income. The remaining £2 billion came from activities including commercial ventures. Any licence fee revenue that funded a settlement with Trump would likely go down very poorly as a political matter, given looming tax increases in the U.K. as well as the U.S. president’s significant unpopularity with British voters. The corporation lost a €100,000 (£88,000) libel case earlier this year against former Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams after a Dublin jury found the broadcaster falsely connected him to a 2006 Irish Republican Army killing, showing there is a precedent for politicians winning cases.  Responding to a question as to whether license fee payers would fund any legal sum, Starmer said Wednesday: “Where mistakes are made, they do need to get their house in order and the BBC must uphold the highest standards, be accountable and correct errors quickly.” Singer Cliff Richard also received £210,000 in damages and around £2 million in legal costs from the BBC in 2019 over a privacy case, though those payments were within the scope of its legal insurance. MIGHT AN ALTERNATIVE PAYMENT WORK?  The BBC has paid damages to a foreign head of state before, including compensating then-Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko in 2019 for an incorrect report. But Trump technically faces rules on accepting foreign payments. There’s every chance that a settlement to Trump could pass through another vehicle, as the with the CBS agreement. ABC’s settlement involved $15 million to a Trump-related foundation alongside $1 million for his legal fees.  Trump’s former attorney Alan Dershowitz suggested just that on Tuesday, saying if the corporation made a “substantial” contribution to a charity “that’s relevant to the president might put this thing behind them.”