Tom Tugendhat, UK minister of security, stated that Meta enabled child offenders to “operate with impunity.” E2EE prevents anyone other than the sender and recipient from receiving the message.
Facebook’s parent company, Meta, stated it would collaborate with law enforcement and child safety experts as it deployed the technology.
These plans and other platforms’ resistance to weakening the privacy of end-to-end encrypted communications have long been criticised by the government.
The government and police assert that the technology, which is also utilised by Signal, WhatsApp, and Apple‘s iMessage. Prevents law enforcement and companies from identifying the sharing of child sexual abuse material.
According to the UK security minister: “Faced with an epidemic of child sexual exploitation abuse, Meta is choosing to ignore it. And in doing so, they are allowing predators to operate with impunity.
“That is an exceptional moral decision. It is a remarkable decision. And I believe we should consider who is producing it.”
He was speaking at the PIER23 conference at Anglia Ruskin University Chelmsford on combating online harm.
“I am speaking about Meta specifically, and Mark Zuckerberg’s choices particularly. These are his choices,” he said.
A government advertising campaign will soon be launched “to tell parents the truth about Meta’s choices and what they mean for the safety of their children”, Mr Tugendhat stated.
The campaign, which would run in print, online and broadcast, would “encourage tech firms to take responsibility and to do the right thing”, Mr Tugendhat said.
According to Meta, the majority of UK citizens currently rely on encryption-enabled apps to keep them safe from hackers, fraudsters, and criminals.
“Because we don’t believe people want us to read their private messages. We’ve developed safety measures that prevent, detect. And allow us to take action against this heinous abuse while maintaining online privacy and security,” the company adds.
Every month, the firm removes and reports millions of pictures.
Despite using end-to-end encryption, WhatsApp, which Meta owns, received over one million reports in a year.
The Home Office has previously backed similar initiatives, such as last year’s No Place to Hide. Which also urged Facebook to abandon plans for end-to-end encryption.
