Tag: eu

“Chat Control” – EU Proposal To Scan All Private Messages Gains Momentum

A controversial European Union proposal dubbed “Chat Control” is regaining momentum, with 19 out of 27 EU member states reportedly backing the measure.

The plan would mandate that messaging platforms, including WhatsApp, Signal and Telegram, must scan every message, photo and video sent by users starting in October, even if end-to-end encryption is in place, popular French tech blogger Korben wrote on Monday.

Denmark reintroduced the proposal on July 1, the first day of its EU Council presidency. France, once opposed, is now in favor, Korben said, citing Patrick Breyer, a former member of the European Parliament for Germany and the European Pirate Party.

Belgium, Hungary, Sweden, Italy and Spain are also in favor, while Germany remains undecided. However, if Berlin joins the majority, a qualified council vote could push the plan through by mid-October, Korben said.

A qualified majority in the EU Council is achieved when two conditions are met. First, at least 55 percent of member states, meaning 15 out of 27, must vote in favor. Second, those countries must represent at least 65% of the EU’s total population.

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EU Revives Plan to Ban Private Messaging

The European Union is still wrestling with a controversial plan that would turn private messaging services into surveillance tools. For over three years, talks have stalled over whether providers should be forced to scan every user’s messages for possible illegal material and forward anything suspicious to law enforcement.

The European Commission is still pushing for a universal scanning requirement.

In contrast, the European Parliament insists any checks should apply only to unencrypted messages from people already under suspicion. Attempts to strike a deal have repeatedly fallen apart, with Poland the latest presidency to walk away without an agreement.

July brought a change in leadership of the Council of the EU, with Denmark stepping in and putting chat scanning back at the top of the legislative pile. Copenhagen wants this handled as a priority and wasted no time tabling a new draft on its very first day in charge.

Leaked records from a closed door July meeting show the Danish text closely tracks earlier proposals from Belgium and Hungary, with no concessions for encrypted conversations. A softer version from Poland, which would have made scanning voluntary and left encrypted chats alone, has been dropped entirely.

Out of 27 EU countries, 20 spoke during the July debate, each lodging what officials call a “comprehensive audit reservation.” Germany summed up the atmosphere by noting, “the familiar mood was clear.”

Italy, Spain, and Hungary have been in favor of mandatory chat scanning from the start. France could tip the balance since blocking the plan requires four countries representing at least 35 percent of the EU’s population. Paris has moved from tentative support to saying it could “basically support the proposal.”

Others remain cautious or opposed. Belgium, despite earlier enthusiasm, admits encrypted scanning is “a difficult topic nationally.” Estonia reports a “national conflict between security authorities and data protection officers regarding encryption and client-side scanning.” Austria is bound by a parliamentary vote against mandatory scanning or undermining encryption, a stance shared by the Netherlands. Luxembourg and Slovenia say they are still “not yet convinced.”

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EU plans $30 billion investment in gigawatt AI data centers — multiple sites to host 100,000 AI GPUs each as bloc plays catch-up to US and China

The European Union is the world’s second-largest economy in terms of GDP, but when it comes to its place on the AI market, its position is by far not as strong. To catch up with the U.S. and China, the bloc is launching a $30 billion initiative to build a network of high-capacity data centers that can host millions of AI GPUs, reports CNBC. If successful, the EU will have gigawatt-class datacenters with performance akin to that owned by leading U.S. companies.

To date, the European Union has allocated €10 billion (approximately $11.8 billion) to establish 13 AI data centers, alongside an additional €20 billion earmarked as initial funding for a network of gigawatt-class AI facilities. So far, the project has attracted 76 expressions of interest from 16 member states, covering a total of 60 potential locations, according to CNBC. Initial launches are underway, with the first AI factory expected to go live in the coming weeks and a large-scale project in Munich planned for early September.

Each gigawatt datacenter is expected to require €3 to €5 billion and deliver a level of computational power far greater than existing AI data centers, potentially supporting over 100,000 advanced AI GPUs per site, according to estimates by UBS cited by CNBC. xAI’s Colossus cuper cluster consumes about 150 MW of power when equipped with 100,000 H100 GPUs, so a gigawatt facility will probably be able to host many more GPUs. Perhaps, 300,000 Blackwell Ultra processors.

The EU’s effort, if realized, is probably one of the world’s largest publicly funded initiatives in artificial intelligence, probably well below what Chinese authorities (both federal and local) have invested in AI data centers, but well ahead of what other big economies invest in their AI efforts.

Henna Virkkunen, European Commission executive vice president for technology policy, told CNBC that while Europe has a strong talent base — reportedly 30% more AI researchers per capita than the U.S. — their limited access to computing has held back development. Building massive AI data centers is designed to solve this problem and kick-start the AI sector across the EU.

Despite strong public interest, the scale and sustainability of the project remain in question. Bertin Martens of Bruegel noted that while the EU has committed taxpayer funding, it is unclear how much the public sector will invest in the project. Also, the specifications of the upcoming data centers are unclear. While the EU has access to Nvidia GPUs and other advanced AI accelerators developed in America through a trade agreement with the U.S., Martens pointed out that acquiring hardware is only the beginning.

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Europe’s Forgotten Enslavement: The Brutal Islamic Slave Raids That Captured Millions

While America grapples with its own dark past of slavery, a massive chapter of history gets buried by academics who fixate on Western guilt.

Justin Marozzi’s eye-opening book, Captives and Companions, shines a light on the Islamic world’s slave trade, spanning over a millennium with unmatched scale and savagery. This isn’t ancient news, but it is a wake-up call for historians.

Marozzi estimates that from the 7th century to the 20th, up to 17 million Africans and Europeans were enslaved in Muslim lands, dwarfing the transatlantic trade’s 11-15 million.

Brutal raids targeted black Africans for labor and white Europeans for markets in North Africa and the Middle East. The sheer numbers reveal a system that caused more deaths and misery than often admitted.

In the opulent courts of Abbasid Baghdad, slave concubines like the poet ʿInān rose to fame, dazzling with wit and beauty while navigating deadly risks.

These women, often captured from distant lands, became cultural icons but remained property, their lives hanging on a ruler’s whim. Yet, their stories mix triumph with tragedy, showing resilience amid cruelty.

Raiders from Barbary coasts struck fear across Europe, hitting places like Devon, Cornwall, and even Iceland in 1627, where pirates abducted over 400 people into lifelong bondage.

Witnesses recounted horrors: families torn apart, villages burned, and captives sold far from home. This white slavery terrorized coasts for centuries, a truth sidelined in today’s narratives.

Castration created eunuchs for harems, with Victorian-era Sudan alone seeing 35,000 boys die yearly from botched operations to supply 3,500 survivors.

Female slaves faced routine violation, arriving in Egypt or Arabia rarely as virgins after brutal journeys. Such practices highlight a level of barbarism that demands honest reckoning.

Today, descent-based slavery traps over 200,000 in Mali, where people inherit bondage through ancestry, facing violence for resisting.

UN experts urge criminalization, but cultural norms and weak laws let it persist. Victims like one defiant man in Bamako declare inner freedom despite poverty.

In Morocco, King Hassan II kept dozens of young concubines until his 1999 death, echoing royal traditions.

Saudi Arabia holds 740,000 in modern slavery, fueled by migrant exploitation under kafala systems. These nations cling to a “tradition” of foreign enslavement dating back ages.

Marozzi’s fearless history exposes this ongoing nightmare we pretend ended long ago. He also illuminates a forgotten chapter of world history that many historians have conveniently overlooked, enabling them to attribute all conceivable evils to the Western world.

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WEF’s Klaus Schwab Allegedly Altered Report to Make Brexit Look Bad: Reports

The founder of the World Economic Forum (WEF) has been accused of ordering the falsification of research to make it appear that Brexit was detrimental to Britain’s economy.

An internal probe conducted by the Homburger law firm into the alleged misconduct of former WEF Chairman and founder of the globalist Davos institution, Klaus Schwab, has reportedly found that the German-born economist orchestrated the manipulation of economic research to advance his political agendas.

According to the Swiss Sonntags Zeitung newspaper, the architect of the Great Reset is accused of personally intervening during the World Economic Forum’s 2017/18 Global Competitiveness Report to ensure that no positive indications were relayed about the British economy following the 2016 EU Referendum.

After the WEF finding that Britain had become more competitive after the Brexit vote, then-chairman Schwab is claimed to have written a memo to WEF staffers, saying that Britain “must not see any improvement” in the report and its rankings, lest it be “exploited by the Brexit camp”.

Although the WEF report claimed that Brexit had not had any meaningful impact as of yet, it claimed that it “will by definition weaken the UK’s markets”. The paper ranked the UK economy as the eighth most competitive country, down from seventh the previous year.

At the time, Brexit was far from being settled, with even discussions often surrounding the possibility of holding a second referendum to overturn the democratic mandate for the United Kingdom to leave the European Union, with claims of economic calamity often being put up as justification.

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Meta refuses to sign EU’s AI code of practice

Meta has refused to sign the European Union’s code of practice for its AI Act, weeks before the bloc’s rules for providers of general-purpose AI models take effect.

“Europe is heading down the wrong path on AI,” wrote Meta’s chief global affairs officer Joel Kaplan in a post on LinkedIn. “We have carefully reviewed the European Commission’s Code of Practice for general-purpose AI (GPAI) models and Meta won’t be signing it. This Code introduces a number of legal uncertainties for model developers, as well as measures which go far beyond the scope of the AI Act.”

The EU’s code of practice — a voluntary framework published earlier this month — aims to help companies implement processes and systems to comply with the bloc’s legislation for regulating AI. Among other things, the code requires companies to provide and regularly update documentation about their AI tools and services and bans developers from training AI on pirated content; companies must also comply with content owners’ requests to not use their works in their datasets.

Calling the EU’s implementation of the legislation “overreach,” Kaplan claimed that the law will “throttle the development and deployment of frontier AI models in Europe and will stunt European companies looking to build businesses on top of them.”

A risk-based regulation for applications of artificial intelligence, the AI Act bans some “unacceptable risk” use cases outright, such as cognitive behavioral manipulation or social scoring. The rules also define a set of “high-risk” uses, such as biometrics and facial recognition, and in domains like education and employment. The act also requires developers to register AI systems and meet risk- and quality-management obligations.

Tech companies from across the world, including those at the forefront of the AI race like Alphabet, Meta, Microsoft, and Mistral AI, have been fighting the rules, even urging the European Commission to delay its rollout. But the Commission has held firm, saying it will not change its timeline.

Also on Friday, the EU published guidelines for providers of AI models ahead of rules that will go into effect on August 2. These rules would affect providers of “general-purpose AI models with systemic risk,” like OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and Meta. Companies that have such models on the market before August 2 will have to comply with the legislation by August 2, 2027.

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Backroom Politics and Big Tech Fuel Europe’s New Spy Push

A hastily arranged gathering within the European Union is reigniting fears over a renewed push for sweeping surveillance measures disguised as child protection.

Behind closed doors, a controversial “Chat Control” meeting, scheduled for Wednesday, has raised alarms among digital rights advocates who see it as a thinly veiled attempt to subvert the European Parliament’s current stance, which expressly prohibits the monitoring of encrypted communications.

Despite no formal negotiations underway between the Parliament, Commission, and Council, Javier Zarzalejos, the rapporteur for the regulation and chair of the Parliament’s Civil Liberties Committee (LIBE), has chosen to hold what is being described as a “shadow meeting.”

Notably, this comes over a year after the Parliament reached a compromise aimed at defending fundamental rights by shielding private, encrypted exchanges from warrantless surveillance.

The meeting’s guest list, obtained by netzpolitik.org, painted a lopsided picture.

Government and law enforcement figures from Denmark, including its Justice Ministry, which has put forward an even stricter proposal, are slated to attend, alongside Europol, representatives from Meta and Microsoft, and several pro-surveillance NGOs like ECPAT.

Also expected is Hany Farid, a US academic affiliated with the Counter Extremism Project, an organization known for its close relationships with intelligence agencies.

What was missing from the invitation list until late Monday was any representation from civil liberties groups or organizations that have consistently pushed back against warrantless monitoring.

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Czech President Urges EU to Change Course and Take a Diplomatic Approach with Russia

In a candid interview with BBC Ukraine, Czech President Petr Pavel, a former general with decades of military experience, offered a pragmatic assessment of the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war. Pavel emphasized the need for diplomatic pressure and negotiation to achieve a sustainable resolution.

Pavel, who assumed office in early 2023 after a career dedicated to the Czech armed force, has been a vocal supporter of Ukraine since Russia’s invasion. His recent remarks signal a shift towards a conservative approach focused on minimizing human and economic costs.

Pavel’s perspective comes amid stalled Ukrainian counteroffensives and mounting international fatigue. Reflecting on the conflict’s trajectory, he acknowledged Russia’s limited tactical victories, such as the occupation of certain territories, but highlighted the exorbitant price Moscow has paid in lives and resources.

“Russia has several tactical successes. They managed to seize some parts of Ukrainian territory, but their advance is worth great sacrifices and losses,” Pavel said. “I think this is a very, very high price for land grabbing.”

He praised Ukraine’s defensive efforts, noting their effectiveness in inflicting heavy damage on Russian forces and holding strategic positions.

However, Pavel warned that prolonging the war in its current state could extend for an indefinite period, a outcome he deemed unacceptable. “If the war continues in the same spirit, it will last for years, he stated, adding that such a scenario benefits no one.

Central to Pavel’s strategy is a balanced Western response. He supports the continued bolstering of Ukraine’s defenses to demonstrate that Russia cannot prevail militarily, while ramping up non-lethal pressures to push Moscow toward talks, so that “[Russia] understands that solutions can be found only at the negotiating table”.

Pavel expressed confidence in the combined economic might of the United States and Europe as the most potent weapon against Russian aggression. He predicted that Russia’s economy, already strained, would buckle under intensified sanctions, compelling it to negotiate sooner rather than later.

The Czech leader was forthright about the harsh realities facing Ukraine, arguing against demands for a hasty full liberation of occupied lands which could inflict significant human casualties. “We do not want to exterminate the Ukrainian people,” Pavel explained.

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Environmental Regulations Are Literally Baking Europeans to Death

Much of the U.S. has been suffering a sweltering heat wave for the past two weeks. Though uncomfortable, particularly in areas with nearly 100 percent humidity like Washington, D.C., most Americans experience heat waves as a sweaty annoyance. Our European counterparts are not so fortunate, thanks to excessive regulations driving up the price of energy and outright banning certain air conditioning units.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration put 130 million Americans “under extreme heat warnings or heat advisories [last] Thursday…with 282 locations breaking daily heat records,” according to The Guardian. CNN reported that at least one death in the St. Louis area was ascribed to the heat wave, but mass casualties have not been suffered stateside. Meanwhile, in Europe, eight people have died across the continent as of Wednesday: four in Spain (two were killed in a wildfire that is believed to be driven by hot, dry conditions), two in France, and two more in Italy, per Al Jazeera. 

The situation was even worse during the summer of 2023. The U.K. Health Security Agency estimated that 2,295 deaths were associated with excessive heat. The U.S., meanwhile, recorded nearly the same number of heat-related deaths (2,325), despite having a population (335 million) nearly five times greater than the U.K. population (​​68 million) at the time.

The United Nations estimates that the European continent accounted for approximately 175,000 heat-related deaths annually between 2000 and 2019. The Environmental Protection Agency, meanwhile, calculates that about 1,300 deaths per year in the U.S. are due to extreme heat. (This translates to four heat-related deaths per million annually in the U.S. and 235 heat-related deaths per million annually across Europe.)

There are myriad reasons why there are so many more heat-related deaths in Europe than there are in the United States. But the most significant explanation might just be the simplest: air conditioning.

David S. Jones, a physician and historian at Harvard University, told CNN in 2023 that the disparity is explained by some combination of the U.S. underreporting its numbers and heat being more lethal in Europe due to the lack of air conditioning. The American-European disparity along this latter dimension could hardly be greater: nearly 90 percent of U.S. households have air conditioning, whereas less than 10 percent of European homes do. The productivity gap between the U.S. and Europe helps explain this disparity.

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This Newly Implemented Online Speech Code Just Gave European Censors Another Weapon

Under the shadow of the European Union’s Digital Services Act censorship regime, Europeans already face fines, raids, and arrests for their social media posts, but starting July 1, the Code of Conduct on Disinformation has the force of law. The once-voluntary “code,” a 56-page document that spells out censorship strategies, is now an enforceable “benchmark” that the EU can use to measure tech companies’ censorship regimes.

The Code requires large online platforms to meet “tougher transparency and auditing obligations aimed at stamping out disinformation,” according to Tech Policy Press. Previously, the Code operated as a “self-regulatory framework” for tech companies before the EU “endorsed” its “integration” into the DSA.

The DSA “regulates online intermediaries and platforms” to police so-called “disinformation.” Under the law, which went into full effect last year, tech companies like Google, Meta, Microsoft, and X are required to undergo independent audits that “assess” their management of “disinformation risks,” Tech Policy Press reported. The Code commitments will act as “benchmarks” for these assessments, where applicable.

In April of 2023, the EU designated 19 large tech companies required to comply with the DSA. All of these companies serve more than 45 million monthly users in the EU, and 14 of them are U.S.-based, Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Counsel Jeremy Tedesco told The Federalist. As of June, the Commission is still “supervising” these tech companies under the DSA.

“The EU is trying to impose its draconian, very restrictive free speech regime on the world,” Tedesco said in an interview.

Full adherence to the Code is now a “marker of DSA compliance” for companies, according to Tech Policy Press. “While signing on [to the Code] remains optional,” “failing to adhere to its commitments may now trigger investigations or fines.”

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