“In response to this outpouring of resistance, the U.K. government’s response has been to wave its hands and deny reality.”
The Online Safety Bill is at its last stage in the House of Lords and no amendment protecting encryption has been accepted. WhatsApp, Signal, Element and Apple have all said it breaks end-to-end encryption. The government points to its Safety Tech Challenge Fund, whose grant winners built client-side scanning. Paying startups to scan your messages before encryption is not privacy. It is a wiretap with a press release.