Denmark reportedly withdraws Chat Control proposal following controversy

I’m continually astounded that so many people, faced with a societal problem, reflexively turn to “Hmmm, perhaps if we monitored and read and listened to every single thing that every person does, all of the time…”

As though it would 1) be a practical possibility and 2) be effective.

Compounding the issue is that the more technology can solve #1, the more these people fixate on it as the solution without regards to the lack of #2.

I wish there were a way, once and for all, to prevent this ridiculous idea from taking hold over and over again. If I could get a hold of such people when these ideas were in their infancy… perhaps I should monitor everything everyone does and watch for people considering the same as a solution to their problem… ah well, no, still don’t see how that follows logically as a reasonable solution.

The issue is that there is a place where this model ~is working. It's in China and Russia. The GFW, its Russian equivalent, and the national security laws binding all of their tech companies and public discussion do exactly these things in a way that has allowed their leadership to go unchallenged for decades now.

The rest of the world isn't stupid or silly for suggesting these policies. They're following a proven effective model for the outcomes they are looking for.

We do ourselves a disservice by acting like there is some inherent flaw in it.

I don't know about China, but in Russia private conversations do not trigger immediate response and they do not control every possible means of communication. They simply do not have capacity to investigate every violation - too many people talk negatively about the government and ongoing events, so use reactive approach. People may get in trouble while being searched on the border crossing or after being reported by someone, but it is hardly different from border searches in USA. Things may change with their new messenger and disruption of WhatsApp and Telegram there (Russia just started blocking SMS verification codes making registration there difficult).