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#Signal threatens to exit the UK if the Online Safety Bill weakened encryption.

But we will not make it so easy: We will not 'walk' from the UK.

If Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and his government want to stop people in the UK to use strong encryption, he must block access to Tutanota - just like Russia and Iran.

The UK would be on the same level as authoritarian regimes like Russia & Iran.

Read our full statement & fight for strong encryption with us! 🔒💪👇

https://tutanota.com/blog/posts/uk-undermine-encryption

Dear Mr. Sunak, will you block access to encryption, just like Russia & Iran?

Tutanota: We will not 'walk out' of UK like Signal. Nor will we comply with any request to bypass our encryption.
Tutanota
#signal
in reply to Tuta

sebastian_hos
sebastian_hos
• •
@Mer__edith
I believe Signal should adopt this policy as well. Let them enforce their totalitarian policy.
@Meredith Whittaker
in reply to Tuta

Aral Balkan
Aral Balkan
• •
Are you talking with the Signal folks? If not, please do. A unified response would be best.

CC @Mer__edith

(PS. We left the UK eight years ago as we could see this coming and I wanted to do so on our own terms before we were forced to: https://ar.al/notes/so-long-and-thanks-for-all-the-fish/ – happy to lend our voice if there’s a united response in the works.)

Aral Balkan — So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish

ar.al
@Meredith Whittaker
in reply to Aral Balkan

Meredith Whittaker
Meredith Whittaker
• •
@aral Let's be clear -- Signal would choose to walk if the choice were between staying and weakening our privacy commitments, or leaving. Until then, we will do everything we can to ensure people have access to Signal and meaningful private communications.
@Aral Balkan
in reply to Meredith Whittaker

Rich Felker
Rich Felker
• •
@Mer__edith @aral OK, but can you clarify why the options are "stay" and "walk" rather than "comply" and "ignore the ridiculous demands of a hostile totalitarian regime and help people find proxies" like you did for Iran and Russia?
@Aral Balkan @Meredith Whittaker
This entry was edited (1 year ago)
in reply to Rich Felker

Meredith Whittaker
Meredith Whittaker
• •
@dalias @aral Because the journalist interviewing me asked a hypothetical: if you had the choice between staying and weakening encryption or walking, which would you choose? And obviously the choice -- in the context of that hypothetical -- is to proverbially walk. This is clear in the body AND abstract of the article, even though they chose a headline w less nuance. OF COURSE we'd set up proxies and etc before "walking". And what "walking" would actually entail is not straightforward.
@Aral Balkan @Rich Felker
This entry was edited (1 year ago)
in reply to Meredith Whittaker

Meredith Whittaker
Meredith Whittaker
• •
@dalias @aral Honestly, it's a bit annoying to see an org that allied with ours in terms of values and is also facing down the misguided regulatory landscape overindex so hard on a headline in what appears to be an attempt to set themsleves apart as a more moral/strategic actor. We are clearly all fighting the same fight, and Signal will of course do whatever we can to get people everywhere access to private comms. As we always have.
@Aral Balkan @Rich Felker
in reply to Meredith Whittaker

Aral Balkan
Aral Balkan
• •
@Mer__edith @dalias Agree. This isn’t a marketing opportunity. It’s an existential crisis for what we’re all working towards. Tutanota folks, I’d highly recommend getting whomever is in charge over there to give Meredith a call (if you have time, that is, Meredith and are open to it, don’t want to add more to your plate) and come up with a common strategy. Ideally, with an eye towards involving other organisations that are similarly effected. Again, I’m happy to help any way I can.
@Rich Felker @Meredith Whittaker
This entry was edited (1 year ago)
in reply to Aral Balkan

Tuta
Tuta
• •
@aral @dalias We fully agree with what @Mer__edith says. W do not judge the 'walking' statement - it is a perfect way to put pressure on the UK government to not pass the Online Safety Bill. So is forcing them to block encrypted services - just like authoritarian governments.

We apologize if the post looks like an attack on Signal's strategy in this. It is absolutely not what we were trying to achieve, we just wanted to add to the pressure with our statement. We are in this fight together.
@Aral Balkan @Rich Felker @Meredith Whittaker
in reply to Tuta

TheCodeKnight
TheCodeKnight
• •
Some governments really get upset when they don't get to put their nose in other people's buissiness. They want to know everything everyone is doing all the time!
That's why not just services like Tutanota is important, but also self hosting file storage and chat could prevent hits against privacy, freedom of data and freedom of speach like these hits.
in reply to Tuta

TheCodeKnight
TheCodeKnight
• •
Say if protesters in china whould use some strongly encrypted self hosted chat and social network, the chinese regime would have much harder time tracking them
in reply to Tuta

Chris
Chris
• •
I agree with your stance but the problem here is that it assumes that the UK Govt doesn't want to go the route of China & Russia

The truth is that they look at China & Russia with envy and want that level of control for themselves

The Great UK Firewall is the aim & nationwide site blocking is already prevalent
in reply to Tuta

Krita :vlpn_pat_melt:
Krita :vlpn_pat_melt:
• •
Lmfao, the UK are a bunch of pussies if they do that. Just build a damn quantum computer already lmao
in reply to Tuta

Cykonot
Cykonot
• •
It's crazy how they just accept having the house of lords and an actual formalized ruling class + monarch

absolutely bananas
Unknown parent

Tuta
Tuta
• •

@mihira @signalapp This is not what we were trying to achieve. Read this: https://mastodon.social/@Tutanota/109944284824994161

Tuta

2023-02-28 20:37:30


@aral @dalias We fully agree with what @Mer__edith says. W do not judge the 'walking' statement - it is a perfect way to put pressure on the UK government to not pass the Online Safety Bill. So is forcing them to block encrypted services - just like authoritarian governments.

We apologize if the post looks like an attack on Signal's strategy in this. It is absolutely not what we were trying to achieve, we just wanted to add to the pressure with our statement. We are in this fight together.


@Signal @mihira🍉
in reply to Tuta

Alex
Alex
• •
if companies offering encrypted communications are forced to leave, groups of hackers and developers will as individuals create their own networks to fill in the gaps. a good example is shadowsocks which was originally created to scale the great chinese firewall.

fuck these politicians who are too stupid to give a damn about encryption.
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