General apathy about this law is just another symptom of a failing democracy. It's not only this online safety law, there's been apathy over all laws and regula

General apathy about this law is just another symptom of a failing democracy. It's not only this online safety law, there's been apathy over all laws and regulation about security and safety—they've all sailed through into law over the last 30 or so years without so much as a murmur from the GP. The only opposition comes from background noise—such as likes of us who post to columns on HN and we're easily discarded. Lawmakers and politicians know if they want a law passed for certain all they they have to do is to mention those 's' words in context. As some have said, people are apathetic about protesting over this issue—and I'd add many other issues as well—as it does no good. I'd essentially agree, protesting is damn hard and thankless work especially so given that it's effectively banned in most anglophone countries. Seems to me little or nothing can be done until the political climate changes, when or if that will be is anyone's guess. One issue that may tip the balance after backdoors are added to encryption is when politicians are caught out by their own law—as, no doubt, sooner or later they will be. Imagine the impact of a political scandal like the Profumo Affair after having been exposed by a backdoor hack. Only then will politicians realize what they've actually done—so too will the GP. For those not old enough to realize how huge the Profumo scandal was here's the Wiki (I remember it being headline news for days and I wasn't even in the UK at the time): https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Profumo_affair https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Profumo_affair