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Just being pragmatic and not trying to voice a side here; would it be possible to come up with our own bill that addresses CSAM in a way that is compatible with

Just being pragmatic and not trying to voice a side here; would it be possible to come up with our own bill that addresses CSAM in a way that is compatible with our general values in technology? This bill isn’t coming out of nowhere. Allegedly, CSAM is up 89% from pre-pandemic levels, which if true is fairly shocking and does deserve a response, perhaps in tech, of some kind. CSAM isn’t going away and every sane person hates it - so is the best strategy we can come up with, be to put our heads in the sand and say “but muh encryption!” whenever asked? I would argue, no. We need to seriously consider if it is possible to come with our own bill, addressing the CSAM issue, so that we get to set the policy and not a fed-up ignorant Congress. Trying to keep things the way they are, forever, I don’t think is going to be a winning strategy. Both parties are in favor - so either we can write it, or they can write it.

JackFr 4y ago
> would it be possible to come up with our own bill that addresses CSAM in a way that is compatible with our general values in technology Who is the in that 'our'? That's exactly what this bill is for specific values of our.
photochemsyn 4y ago
The solution has been explained over and over, time and time again: federal prosecutors need to prioritize investigation of such crimes in a targeted manner. Note the government's record on doing their job on this issue is somewhat problematic: > "FBI opens settlement talks with gymnasts who survived abuse by Larry Nassar Updated July 28, 20224:27 PM ET (NPR)" I don't know why it needs to be said again and again that the existence of criminal behavior isn't an excuse for warrantless domestic mass surveillance, but apparently it does.
- snarf21 4y ago
  I agree and think that HUGE whistle blower awards including up to re-location as part of Witness Protection Program would help a lot. There are people in bad personal situations that feel "trapped" but have the knowledge that these crimes (and others like trafficking are happening).
- win32k 4y ago
  [flagged]
  - kyboren 4y ago
    One issue without E2EE is that even WITHOUT a lawful warrant, USGOV can (and does en masse) access/seize data not (or not yet) pertaining to a criminal or counterintelligence investigation.
  - JPws_Prntr_Fngr 4y ago
    The issue with private dwellings is it allows the citizen to destroy his contraband/evidence, so even WITH a lawful warrant, the US gov cannot access/seize it until it’s too late. #endprivatedwellings #camerasineverybathroom #thefourthamendmentispropedophile
  - stephen_g 4y ago
    That's not an issue - just means you need to seize the end devices... If there's a victim (say, of grooming), they should be able to provide all the content from their side.
  - hellojesus 4y ago
    Presumably the content isn't encrypted at rest on the device, or if it is, it could be decrypted by the phone owner (parent, child) to help aid an investigation. E2EE is not the issue when one party discloses the info, excepting mechanisms like plausible deniability built into apps like Signal, but even at that point LE should be able to get a warrant and then do proper police work: stalk the target under cover until they unlock their device, then rush in and grab it before they can put it back to rest (e.g, how it was portrayed in the Silk Road movie).
- vuln 4y ago
  Sorry White men, I mean “Domestic terrorists” are the greater threat to the US than pedophiles or MAPS as their now called. /s
A4ET8a8uTh0 4y ago
<< Allegedly, CSAM is up 89% from pre-pandemic levels Allegedly. That said, the alarming statistic is used by people who have a specific agenda related to CSAM. It is not dissimilar how pro/anti-gun sides ( and many others, it is just an example ) cherry pick their favorite data/ranges and so on. << addressing the CSAM issue << if it is possible to come with our own bill Not if it breaks some basic internet foundations. There is a simple reason for it. There is a way to stop all fraud at bank. Stop all transactions. I think you will agree that while stopping fraud is a valuable proposition, the solution is close to unworkable. It is the same here. In other words, in order to entertain some level of freedom, one must be willing to accept that some bad people will do some bad things with that freedom. That is the trade-off. Now, that is not letting 'bad guy' off the hook. Police still has a job to do. What we do not want to do is create an easier world for police, but a more livable place for all the republic's denizens.
- GrowFelurs 4y ago
  [flagged]
  - A4ET8a8uTh0 4y ago
    Interesting statement. It is not argument. It is an attempt at labeling me as something instead of presenting an argument. It is not going to work. If you want a decent conversation with me, you want to present a valid counter instead of bunching me with "oh, you are one of those people". << "head in the sand" And after that preface, you are wrong about it too. I am openly stating leave internet alone from your hand-wringing. Long term, it is not even helping anyone; including the children.
- CJefferson 4y ago
  By your argument, should we do nothing to try and stop bank fraud? We do lots, including tracking large transactions. Most people agree this is a reasonable thing to do. Most people are, I suspect, more upset by CSAM than by bank fraud.
  - 4y ago
0zemp2c 4y ago
[flagged]
swapfile 4y ago
Increasingly, the amount of CSAM being created is by children themselves. > Of the 153,369 webpages actioned during 2020, almost half (68,000 or 44%) were assessed as containing self-generated imagery.[1] I suggest starting there rather than my encrypted communications with friends and family. [1]: https://annualreport2020.iwf.org.uk/trends/international/selfgenerated https://annualreport2020.iwf.org.uk/trends/international/sel...
- xp84 4y ago
  Awesome. So they are “abusing themselves” and as a result to “protect them” from that we all have to accept weakened protections.
  - seanw444 4y ago
    But did you think of the children though?
- askiiart 4y ago
  As a teenager, I'm surprised that more of it isn't self-generated. Teens are real horny bastards.
- danaris 4y ago
  This is just evidence that our absolutist classification of this is unhelpful—treating the nude selfies a 16-year-old texts to her boyfriend as no different from photos of a 6-year-old forced into it, especially when you find those texts on the phone of either the person who took it or the one who it was sent to, without any nonconsensual distribution, is preposterous. Calling fully intentional, consensual nude selfies or even sex videos created by teenagers of themselves "child sexual abuse material" is so very clearly a misapplication of the term. That said, if those selfies do, by whatever means, get distributed beyond where the subject originally intended them to go, they need to be treated as...well, at the very least as revenge porn, which is now (fortunately) banned in a number of jurisdictions. So I'm definitely not saying this is a black and white issue; quite the contrary, in fact.
  - 4y ago
formerly_proven 4y ago
CSAM is some pretty bad stuff but case numbers are often wildly misleading. A big share (in my country some 40+ %) are minors and teens sharing images of themselves or receiving images from their bf/gf.[1] Another chunk is parents or teachers trying to report it and invariably finding themselves in possession of CSAM (e.g. teacher sees pupil has image of a naked 13yo on their phone, takes phone from them => teacher intentionally gained possession of CSAM => will be a felon shortly). Traditionally such cases would be dropped, but around here it was recently updooted to felony status, which means cases cannot be dropped. [1] Jurisdictions vary wildly in how they prosecute this but many seem to have funny age combinations where e.g. a 13yo sending an explicit image to a 14yo means the 13yo can't be charged for producing CSAM but the 14yo committed a felony by possessing it. Some jurisdictions have charged people for sex trafficking themselves in these situations. It's all pretty insane if you ask me. Edit: Worth pointing out that the organizations that push hardest for legislation like this (mostly christian fundamentalists) also care the least about these side-effects, because sex before marriage is a sin and ought to be illegal anyway. A conspiracy theorist would hypothesize that these side-effects are actually the intended main effect for those groups.
- tankerkiller 4y ago
  A teenage couple in high school (just barely underage) were both charged with possession and production of CSAM because they sent images between each other. As I understand it from the local papers they ended up getting off fairly easy with something like 100 hours of community service. But only because our local prosecutor understood that they were kids, a couple, and sharing between each other, and almost of age to begin with. If we had a prosecutor less understanding they would have been facing at least 5 years in prison each.
- stephen_g 4y ago
  Another factor is that the numbers are almost always "reports" - because there are so many reports generated. People doing this content moderation are very much operating on a "better safe than sorry" approach (for obvious reasons). The result of that is that statistics I've seen put it at somewhere between 70-90% of these reports don't actually correctly identify CSAM and are discarded at the first stage. But it's always the much larger, initial number that is used to illustrate the apparent size of the problem.
zb1plus 4y ago
Technology will not solve CSAM. It is a social problem, you don't see policy makers going after the Catholic Church and other organizations that have systematic pedophilia as heavily as they are pursuing banning people's freedoms. This is an attempt by the state security establishment to restrict civil liberties using scare tactics around CSAM. This issue just highlights to the need to remove the power to restrict civil liberties from the State and the need for issues like CSAM to be addressed in a manner led by Psychologists as opposed to government officials without specialized knowledge and conflicts of interest intent.
- gjsman-1000 4y ago
  > systematic pedophilia Worth noting that the rates of pedophilia among public schoolteachers is actually higher. Actually, many, many times more likely. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/has-media-ignored-sex-abuse-in-school/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/has-media-ignored-sex-abuse-in-...
  - zb1plus 4y ago
    Agreed, we need to figure out ways to address the systematic pedophilia in schools, youth athletics and other institutions. Banning cryptography won't solve the problem, only push us closer to fascism.

JackFr 4y ago

> would it be possible to come up with our own bill that addresses CSAM in a way that is compatible with our general values in technology Who is the in that 'our'? That's exactly what this bill is for specific values of our.

photochemsyn 4y ago

The solution has been explained over and over, time and time again: federal prosecutors need to prioritize investigation of such crimes in a targeted manner. Note the government's record on doing their job on this issue is somewhat problematic: > "FBI opens settlement talks with gymnasts who survived abuse by Larry Nassar Updated July 28, 20224:27 PM ET (NPR)" I don't know why it needs to be said again and again that the existence of criminal behavior isn't an excuse for warrantless domestic mass surveillance, but apparently it does.

snarf21 4y ago
I agree and think that HUGE whistle blower awards including up to re-location as part of Witness Protection Program would help a lot. There are people in bad personal situations that feel "trapped" but have the knowledge that these crimes (and others like trafficking are happening).
win32k 4y ago
[flagged]
- kyboren 4y ago
  One issue without E2EE is that even WITHOUT a lawful warrant, USGOV can (and does en masse) access/seize data not (or not yet) pertaining to a criminal or counterintelligence investigation.
- JPws_Prntr_Fngr 4y ago
  The issue with private dwellings is it allows the citizen to destroy his contraband/evidence, so even WITH a lawful warrant, the US gov cannot access/seize it until it’s too late. #endprivatedwellings #camerasineverybathroom #thefourthamendmentispropedophile
- stephen_g 4y ago
  That's not an issue - just means you need to seize the end devices... If there's a victim (say, of grooming), they should be able to provide all the content from their side.
- hellojesus 4y ago
  Presumably the content isn't encrypted at rest on the device, or if it is, it could be decrypted by the phone owner (parent, child) to help aid an investigation. E2EE is not the issue when one party discloses the info, excepting mechanisms like plausible deniability built into apps like Signal, but even at that point LE should be able to get a warrant and then do proper police work: stalk the target under cover until they unlock their device, then rush in and grab it before they can put it back to rest (e.g, how it was portrayed in the Silk Road movie).
vuln 4y ago
Sorry White men, I mean “Domestic terrorists” are the greater threat to the US than pedophiles or MAPS as their now called. /s

A4ET8a8uTh0 4y ago

<< Allegedly, CSAM is up 89% from pre-pandemic levels Allegedly. That said, the alarming statistic is used by people who have a specific agenda related to CSAM. It is not dissimilar how pro/anti-gun sides ( and many others, it is just an example ) cherry pick their favorite data/ranges and so on. << addressing the CSAM issue << if it is possible to come with our own bill Not if it breaks some basic internet foundations. There is a simple reason for it. There is a way to stop all fraud at bank. Stop all transactions. I think you will agree that while stopping fraud is a valuable proposition, the solution is close to unworkable. It is the same here. In other words, in order to entertain some level of freedom, one must be willing to accept that some bad people will do some bad things with that freedom. That is the trade-off. Now, that is not letting 'bad guy' off the hook. Police still has a job to do. What we do not want to do is create an easier world for police, but a more livable place for all the republic's denizens.

GrowFelurs 4y ago
[flagged]
- A4ET8a8uTh0 4y ago
  Interesting statement. It is not argument. It is an attempt at labeling me as something instead of presenting an argument. It is not going to work. If you want a decent conversation with me, you want to present a valid counter instead of bunching me with "oh, you are one of those people". << "head in the sand" And after that preface, you are wrong about it too. I am openly stating leave internet alone from your hand-wringing. Long term, it is not even helping anyone; including the children.
CJefferson 4y ago
By your argument, should we do nothing to try and stop bank fraud? We do lots, including tracking large transactions. Most people agree this is a reasonable thing to do. Most people are, I suspect, more upset by CSAM than by bank fraud.
- 4y ago

0zemp2c 4y ago

[flagged]

swapfile 4y ago

Increasingly, the amount of CSAM being created is by children themselves. > Of the 153,369 webpages actioned during 2020, almost half (68,000 or 44%) were assessed as containing self-generated imagery.[1] I suggest starting there rather than my encrypted communications with friends and family. [1]: https://annualreport2020.iwf.org.uk/trends/international/selfgenerated https://annualreport2020.iwf.org.uk/trends/international/sel...

xp84 4y ago
Awesome. So they are “abusing themselves” and as a result to “protect them” from that we all have to accept weakened protections.
- seanw444 4y ago
  But did you think of the children though?
askiiart 4y ago
As a teenager, I'm surprised that more of it isn't self-generated. Teens are real horny bastards.
danaris 4y ago
This is just evidence that our absolutist classification of this is unhelpful—treating the nude selfies a 16-year-old texts to her boyfriend as no different from photos of a 6-year-old forced into it, especially when you find those texts on the phone of either the person who took it or the one who it was sent to, without any nonconsensual distribution, is preposterous. Calling fully intentional, consensual nude selfies or even sex videos created by teenagers of themselves "child sexual abuse material" is so very clearly a misapplication of the term. That said, if those selfies do, by whatever means, get distributed beyond where the subject originally intended them to go, they need to be treated as...well, at the very least as revenge porn, which is now (fortunately) banned in a number of jurisdictions. So I'm definitely not saying this is a black and white issue; quite the contrary, in fact.
- 4y ago

formerly_proven 4y ago

CSAM is some pretty bad stuff but case numbers are often wildly misleading. A big share (in my country some 40+ %) are minors and teens sharing images of themselves or receiving images from their bf/gf.[1] Another chunk is parents or teachers trying to report it and invariably finding themselves in possession of CSAM (e.g. teacher sees pupil has image of a naked 13yo on their phone, takes phone from them => teacher intentionally gained possession of CSAM => will be a felon shortly). Traditionally such cases would be dropped, but around here it was recently updooted to felony status, which means cases cannot be dropped. [1] Jurisdictions vary wildly in how they prosecute this but many seem to have funny age combinations where e.g. a 13yo sending an explicit image to a 14yo means the 13yo can't be charged for producing CSAM but the 14yo committed a felony by possessing it. Some jurisdictions have charged people for sex trafficking themselves in these situations. It's all pretty insane if you ask me. Edit: Worth pointing out that the organizations that push hardest for legislation like this (mostly christian fundamentalists) also care the least about these side-effects, because sex before marriage is a sin and ought to be illegal anyway. A conspiracy theorist would hypothesize that these side-effects are actually the intended main effect for those groups.

tankerkiller 4y ago
A teenage couple in high school (just barely underage) were both charged with possession and production of CSAM because they sent images between each other. As I understand it from the local papers they ended up getting off fairly easy with something like 100 hours of community service. But only because our local prosecutor understood that they were kids, a couple, and sharing between each other, and almost of age to begin with. If we had a prosecutor less understanding they would have been facing at least 5 years in prison each.
stephen_g 4y ago
Another factor is that the numbers are almost always "reports" - because there are so many reports generated. People doing this content moderation are very much operating on a "better safe than sorry" approach (for obvious reasons). The result of that is that statistics I've seen put it at somewhere between 70-90% of these reports don't actually correctly identify CSAM and are discarded at the first stage. But it's always the much larger, initial number that is used to illustrate the apparent size of the problem.

zb1plus 4y ago

Technology will not solve CSAM. It is a social problem, you don't see policy makers going after the Catholic Church and other organizations that have systematic pedophilia as heavily as they are pursuing banning people's freedoms. This is an attempt by the state security establishment to restrict civil liberties using scare tactics around CSAM. This issue just highlights to the need to remove the power to restrict civil liberties from the State and the need for issues like CSAM to be addressed in a manner led by Psychologists as opposed to government officials without specialized knowledge and conflicts of interest intent.

gjsman-1000 4y ago
> systematic pedophilia Worth noting that the rates of pedophilia among public schoolteachers is actually higher. Actually, many, many times more likely. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/has-media-ignored-sex-abuse-in-school/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/has-media-ignored-sex-abuse-in-...
- zb1plus 4y ago
  Agreed, we need to figure out ways to address the systematic pedophilia in schools, youth athletics and other institutions. Banning cryptography won't solve the problem, only push us closer to fascism.