Currently pending in the House of Lords, an online security bill touches on end-to-end encryption and the chances of a compromise with WhatsApp are dwindling.
End of the festivities after the coronation of King Charles III, political life continues in the United Kingdom, starting with the regulation of digital life. A measure on end-to-end encryption in the online security bill could lead to the withdrawal of WhatsApp from the territory, reports The Guardian.
The UK government risks getting into a battle with WhatsApp, ministers have warned, as the bill is pending in the House of Lords. Four years of work, eight Secretaries of State and five Prime Ministers took part in drafting the text of more than 250 pages.
This bill, which concerns all aspects of online life, aims to make end-to-end encryption less opaque. The objective would be to make it possible to detect illegal content within encrypted exchanges.
The text thus gives Ofcom (the telecommunications regulatory authority in the United Kingdom) the power to impose on social networks the use of new tools to fight against terrorism or child pornography content, with fines of up to 10% of worldwide turnover for services that do not comply.
Except that, in the case of WhatsApp, which secures their users’ data with end-to-end encryption, it is technologically impossible to read users’ messages without breaking its initial promise: to protect the confidentiality of exchanges.
“The bill does not provide any explicit protection for encryption”, denounced WhatsApp in an open letter April 17.
An “intentional ambiguity”
Last March, the head of WhatsApp, Will Cathcart declared that he did not intend to degrade his current system and said he was shocked by this bill.
A spokesman for the Interior Ministry told the Guardian to be “in favor of strong encryption, but this cannot come at the expense of public safety”. And tries to temper: “The online security bill does not in any way represent a ban on end-to-end encryption, nor will it require services to weaken encryption”.
The spokesperson calls on platforms to use special technology, or develop new technology, to accurately identify child pornography or terrorist content.
Richard Allan, a member of the Chamber who worked as head of policy at Meta (Facebook’s parent company) until 2019, denounces an “intentional ambiguity”.
“They are careful to say that they do not intend to ban end-to-end encryption (…), but at the same time refuse to confirm that they could not do so under the new powers provided for in the bill,” said Richard Allan to the Guardian.
According to him, the other possible scenario would be for the government to come clean and state that its intention is to limit end-to-end encryption to allow “an orderly transition”.
However, according Politicothe Ministry of Science, Innovation and Technology wants to find a favorable outcome between the different parties and is currently in talks “with all those who wish to discuss it”.
