Mission: Impossible - Chatcontrol
2024-11-01, 10:00–11:00 (Europe/Amsterdam), Main stage

The EU wants to address digital CSAM (Child Sexual Abuse Material). Their ideas of getting rid of it direct us into a minefield of problems, as the current plans would lead to an unparalleled surveillance of 450 million EU citizens, while it is not clear what it can bring.
It is a topic that seems to contrast the protection of privacy versus the protection of children. But is that really the case? And are there other solutions?


The regulation aims to create a system for detecting and reporting online CSAM and so the last two years the EU plans to counter CSAM revolve around breaking encryption (via backdoors) and clientside scanning. If you've heard of it, you probably know the ideas by the name 'Chat Control'. So far, members states are divided because of details, but they seem to be getting closer to passing new rules. Hungary, which took up the rotating Council presidency for six months starting July 1st, is keen to work further on the topic. But what exactly does it mean (spoiler, it's not just about your chat messages), what impact could it have? In this talk I will address the scope of the plans and their possible impact, the legal side, the technical side and the human factor and what could be a reasonable approach with an emphasis on solid security and privacy.

Helma is a privacy and security professional, currently working as information security officer with SURF, the ICT cooperation for education and research. Early in her career, she worked as a legal assistant. She taught herself programming in the 1990s and built many websites and databases for SMEs. She worked with Arjen Kamphuis on the book Personal information security for the Dutch Broodfonds and she maintains the website beschermjegegevens.nl. She is certified DPO, Information Privacy Technologist (CIPT) and CISM.