On Thursday, the European Parliament “adopted” the extension of Chat Control 1.0. This is the temporary suspension of the EU’s ePrivacy rules that allows tech platforms to mass-scan citizens’ private communications, ostensibly to detect child sexual abuse material. “Adopted” is placed in quotation marks here because the word implies something that conspicuously failed to happen: a majority of MEPs voting in favour. In fact, 314 MEPs voted to reject the text, against 276 in favour. And yet it passed anyway.

This was made possible through a procedural sleight of hand worthy of Brussels at its most cynical. The file was rammed through under an “urgency procedure”: European Parliament President Roberta Metsola unilaterally reopened a dossier that MEPs had already rejected in March, and the Council conveniently bounced it back at the start of the summer recess, when securing attendance is hardest. Rejecting it a second time would have required not a simple majority but an absolute one: 360 votes. The law was therefore approved despite a majority of MEPs voting against it. The regulation will now remain in force until April 2028, buying time for negotiations on its even more ambitious successor, Chat Control 2.0.

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continua qui: https://unherd.com/newsroom/eu-chat-control-extension-is-an-insult-to-democracy/