8 ms·

In case people no longer remember, when China started to require websites to register for a license before be allowed to operate, it was for "protecting the chi

by nirui 4mo ago

In case people no longer remember, when China started to require websites to register for a license before be allowed to operate, it was for "protecting the children" too. This simple policy then goes on to silence most individual publisher(/self-media) and consolidated the industry into the hands of the few, with no opportunity left for smaller entrepreneurs. This is arguably much worse than allowing children to watch porn online, because this will for sure effect people's whole life in a negative way. Also, if EU really wants "VPN services to be restricted to adults only", they should just fine the children who uses it, or their parent for allowing it to happen. The same way you fine drivers for traffic violation, but not the road. And if EU still think that's not enough, maybe they should just cut the cable, like what North Korea did.

zero-hp 4mo ago
Not only in China. Russian internet cenzorship also started as a "children protection" measure.
- pronik 4mo ago
  Ursula von den Leyen has been pushing internet blocks in Germany for the sake of the children since 2009. Which is when "Zensursula" nickname has been coined. You don't need to look far to find the same thinking by the people in power.
  - jesterson 4mo ago
    they know mass populace is stupid and won't look behind the title. Are you against the law "protecting children"? Shame on you
  - joe_mamba 4mo ago
    >Ursula von den Leyen has been pushing internet blocks in Germany for the sake of the children since 2009. Which is when "Zensursula" nickname has been coined. And then in a completely democratic mannner, Europeans said "that's who we want leading us".
    - wafflemaker 4mo ago
      >And then in a completely democratic mannner, Europeans said "that's who we want leading us". No, it wasn't. She was chosen by a group of country leaders during a closed doors voting. If it's democratic at all, it's very tangential.
      - pronik 4mo ago
        I've taken that comment to be very sarcastic, but maybe it wasn't.
      - rayiner 4mo ago
        There's an election in the chain. Voters elected the national MPs who then selected the national PMs, who then selected von den Leyen. Democratic-ish.
        joe_mamba 4mo ago
        After how many levels detached from the general population, does the vote stop being democratic?
        rayiner 4mo ago
        It doesn’t stop being democratic. It’s just a scale from more to less democratic. America’s founding fathers were skeptical of democracy, so they provided for the president to be elected by the Electoral College, which was originally appointed by state legislatures. It’s still “democratic”—just less so than a direct election.
        joe_mamba 4mo ago
        American people went to the polls to vote(or not) for Trump, Europeans didn't go to the polls to vote for Cenzura. Kind of a big difference on the democracy scale.
- otabdeveloper4 4mo ago
  No, actually it started to protect intellectual property. A guy posted a recap in a post above.
delusional 4mo ago
> This is arguably much worse than allowing children to watch porn online, because this will for sure effect people's whole life in a negative way. I would like you to make that argument.
- pembrook 4mo ago
  What argument? You're the one that needs to argue the presence of harm, given you're the one arguing we need to create a surveillance dragnet to shield certain age groups of humans from witnessing how their species procreates. The default state is that humans procreate via sexual reproduction. You need to argue why we need to take action to hide this, especially given we let children witness other far more brutal activities from the human species like violence.
  - delusional 4mo ago
    The argument I am asking him to make is the one about how age verification is "much worse" than "allowing children to watch porn". If your argument in favor of that is that watching porn isn't harmful to children, then I don't understand what all that superfluous waffling about china is doing in there.
  - ckjellqv 4mo ago
    > This is arguably much worse Surely someone claiming it's arguable should be willing to make that argument. For me it's not that it's reproduction. Film that shows sex is not an issue as I see it and I don't know anyone that has developed serious addictions to sex in Hollywood film. However I know several people, family members included, that have absolutely obliterated their childhoods and early adult years by becoming addicted to porn. They were groomed by adults online from a young age and, although their parents tried to stop it, kids are sneakier and they got around it, exposing themselves to some truly dark things. It is not easy for families to recover from having dealt with a child with serious addiction issues. I think it's pretty silly to argue that systemic protections are ineffective and overreach whereas the efforts of one or two parents should be enough and are the correct level of enforcement for the protection of children. The parents of the people I know went to extremes to protect their children and they were mostly unsuccessful.
ozgung 4mo ago
But you are asking logical questions. You are thinking and talking too much for a World citizen in 2026. "Reasoning" is a reserved word for chatbots now, so we humans are not allowed to do that anymore. We can only obey like a bot and pretend all the lies they tell are the truth. BTW I live in Turkiye where the government banned ALL the adult websites around 2008. Even as an adult you can't access them. This year they are banning VPNs, introduce age controls and ID verification COORDINATED with the rest of the world. Also banning some games, control social media, and basically make it legal to control and track everyone on the internet. What a coincidence that similar attempts are simultaneous in many independent countries. And no, children have not been really protected in Turkiye since 2008.
- rvnx 4mo ago
  Not only that, sprinkle a bit of hate speech laws on top and then you got rid a lot of political competition that could disagree with you
- retired 4mo ago
  Grab a SIM-card from Bulgaria with roaming enabled. Internet is routed through the Bulgarian ISP even when you are in Turkiye. Full internet access, no VPN required.
  - gessha 4mo ago
    Until the three representatives from Bulgaria and the ones from the other EU countries win out lobbying for ChatControl and expand it to VPNControl too.
  - slaw 4mo ago
    You have to tolerate 100ms ping.
    - loloquwowndueo 4mo ago
      It’s like living in Australia baby. And yet believe it or not, people do!
u8080 4mo ago
Just a recap how it happened in Russia: 1. First, year ~2015 legal framework was created under disguise of banning pirated media(specifically torrents.ru)(legislative push). State-wide DNS ban introduced. Very easy to circumvent via quering 8.8.8.8 2. Then, having legal basis, govt included extra stuff in banned list(casinos, terrorist orgs, etc)(executive push). IP bans introduced, applied very carefully. 3. Legal expanded allowing govt to ban specific media on very vague criterias(legislative push). IP blocks tried on some large websites. DPI hardware mandated to be installed by ISPs to filter by HTTPS SNI(executive push). 4. At ~2019 Roskomnadzor(RKN) created, special govt entity which enforces bans without court orders(legislative push). 5. ~2021 sites become banned if they are not filtering content by Russian laws by request of RKN(executive push). VPN services were obligated to also DPI-filter traffic(legislative push). 6. ~2023 Crackdown on VPN started(executive push). Popular commercial services were IP-banned, OpenVPN and IPSec connections selectively degraded by DPI. 7. ~2025 Heavy VPN filtering(vless, wireguard, etc) introduced(executive push). Performance of certain sites were degraded(youtube, twitter, etc).
- spixy 4mo ago
  DPI = Deep packet inspection?
  - delamon 4mo ago
    yes
- dvtkrlbs 4mo ago
  Similar stuff is happening in Turkey as well. Afaik with ipv6 adoption goverment mandates DPI hardware at ISPs. It was voluntary for ipv4 traffic.
- darqis 4mo ago
  and yet my friend in Moscow is able to use VPN to get around all this
  - jllyhill 4mo ago
yorwba 4mo ago
> In case people no longer remember, when China started to require websites to register for a license before be allowed to operate, it was for "protecting the children" too. Indeed I do not remember this, nor can I find corroborating evidence that there was much of an effort to justify the requirement to the public at all. As far as I can tell, the government simply decided that they needed more control over the internet, so they made a law to give themselves more control over the internet. https://www.gov.cn/gongbao/content/2000/content_60531.htm https://www.gov.cn/gongbao/content/2000/content_60531.htm It has no special provisions limited to children that only later got extended to adults. (Meanwhile, restrictions on how long children may play games continue to only apply to children, AFAIK.)
nameconflicts 4mo ago
You're right
leonidasrup 4mo ago
You always hear the argument "protecting the children", because anyone oposing the regulation/laws can be labeled at best "exposing the children to danger" or at worst "pedofile". So as a consequence at best the oponents of such regulation/laws should not be listened to, or at worst they should be put into prison. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Think_of_the_children https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Think_of_the_children
- buran77 4mo ago
  The excuse has to be something nobody can appear to be supporting (pedophilia, terrorism, nazis, etc.). It's not only an appeal to emotion, it's also a false dichotomy, a loaded question, guilt by association. Others look at this recipe and can't help but notice its effectiveness. Eventually nobody is beneath pulling this kind of logic, even if they were the ones crucifying it just a few short years ago. The weaker the leader, the more likely that that they forget where they wrote down those principles of theirs and resort to this crap.
  - autoexec 4mo ago
    > The excuse has to be something nobody can appear to be supporting (pedophilia, terrorism, nazis, etc.). If only being associated with pedophilia and nazis was still something that had to be avoided because it would be career ending otherwise.
    - galangalalgol 4mo ago
      Right? I was just thinking that Maine looks to be electing someone who had nazi tattoos, and it would seem pedophilia is one of the few things both parties approve of at least in deed.
      - smcin 4mo ago
        (Graham Platner had the tattoo covered up 10/2025)
  - 4mo ago
izacus 4mo ago
> In case people no longer remember, when China started to require websites to register for a license before be allowed to operate, it was for "protecting the children" too. People don't remember because it didn't happen and the license wasn't about protecting the children. But it's so convenient to just blantantly lie on the internet nowadays, isn't it? Just like the title of this article blatantly lies about "EU" doing something.
- card_zero 4mo ago
  One of you ought to find out what really did happen, and tell us. I can only do the lame thing and quote Wikipedia: > China had no such legislation until 1997. That year, China's sole legislative body – the National People's Congress (NPC) – passed CL97, a law that deals with cyber crimes, which it divided into two broad categories: crimes that target computer networks, and crimes carried out over computer networks. Behavior illegal under the latter category includes, among many things, the dissemination of pornographic material, and the usurping of "state secrets."
  - antonvs 4mo ago
    Notably, there’s nothing about children in that quote.
redeeman 4mo ago
or maybe just maybe its time for people to realize that the EU is an enemy of the people, and hold the people pushing for this personally responsible.
lemoncookiechip 4mo ago
You know, if Politicians, Law Enforcement and Military Personnel are included and affected by all these anti-privacy laws, I'm all for it (not really). Let their daily corruption come to light by the opposition exposing all their dirty laundry (because of course they'd used the data against each other) and vice-versa over and over... and that's not gonna happen because we don't live in that world where laws apply fairly to everyone. "Rules for thee but not for me."
- miohtama 4mo ago
  Europol is lobbying for this. Of course, by using tax payers money.
  - Saline9515 4mo ago
    It's amazing that they are spending billions on "think of the kids" problems, yet in many countries of the EU it's very hard to find a decent children playground in the city center. I'm quite sure that if you asked parents, they would rather have the playground than the surveillance.
TacticalCoder 4mo ago
> And if EU still think that's not enough, maybe they should just cut the cable, like what North Korea did. I'll make a similar comment I made on another thread: we saw a thread with many upvotes hating on the cyber-libertarians... We all know the EU institutions are ran by cyber-libertarians and that it's cyber-libertarians making such research and decisions right? Pick your fight brothers. I don't think spending your time hating on the three John Galts of this world is a worthy fight. You may even turn out to be more morally aligned with the John Galt of this world than with the people running the EU institutions (and North Korea).
- rini17 4mo ago
  The former cyber-libertarians are running the tech unicorns now. Ofc they would prefer you see them as John Galts lol. But they aren't that and they will defend freedom of cyberspace only as far as it aligns with their power and profit.
rdiddly 4mo ago
"...into the hands of the few..." And there you have it, the actual reason for this.
ZetsuBouKyo 4mo ago
I have an extreme slippery slope idea. If they want to protect children, shouldn't they sterilize everyone? Every child born, regardless of wealth will inevitably suffer injury, illness, and psychological setbacks. Therefore, the best way to protect them would be not allowing people to have children. By the way, not having children is also more eco-friendly, because an infinite series simply converges. I wonder if I’ll see this ridiculous scene in my lifetime.
- noisy_boy 4mo ago
  Forced sterilisations for population control has been a thing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uttawar_forced_sterilisations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uttawar_forced_sterilisations
  - samcarter1 4mo ago
    Ashen vibes
- AnthonyMouse 4mo ago
  > By the way, not having children is also more eco-friendly, because an infinite series simply converges. This one isn't actually accurate. Younger people have longer time horizons (i.e. aren't expecting to be dead as soon) and are therefore more likely to support policies like electrifying transportation and generating power from lower CO2 sources, and policies get enacted when they have majority support, so causing the population to skew older by reducing the number of children is ecologically very bad.
  - lukan 4mo ago
    In theory. In reality the number of young people concerned about climate change is high, but the number of those willing to then not take a airplane for a few days of vacation is pretty low in my experience. So supporting policies, "that somebody should do something" sure, also my generation thinks like this and the older one. But supporting policies that also actually affect themself, different story. Because there is also the effect of doomerism. If the world is doomed anyway, then I can at least enjoy my vacation while I am still alive.
jesterson 4mo ago
[flagged]
- leonidasrup 4mo ago
  In this case EU is moving towards less freedom, but to compare it with one of the least free countries in the world is an exaggeration.
  - jesterson 4mo ago
    [flagged]
    - mcv 4mo ago
      Not remotely at full speed. This is not a law, and is not in any way being enforced. Bad ideas get proposed too often, but usually they get rejected. I expect the same will happen here, although we should absolutely remain vigilant. I do share your concern for policy moving in the direction of NK, but the EU isn't moving there nearly as fast as for example the US.
      - nxm 4mo ago
        Are you serious? In the US, you don’t get fined or arrested for posting mean memes like in Germany
        jesterson 4mo ago
        No point to argue. EU propaganda machine portrays EU as beautiful garden while the US is portrayed as the one descending into fascism. You can’t push anto-freedom laws without mass brainwashing.
        mcv 4mo ago
        Portrayed? Have you seen the news at all in the past year? The US is descending into fascism really hard. Closing your eyes to it is not going to stop it.
cameldrv 4mo ago
You shouldn't have to be an "entrepreneur" to have a website. The idea that the only useful/interesting things to say are those that are profitable is a big part of the problem we find ourselves in.
eduction 4mo ago
Do you have a single link or other piece of evidence to substantiate this? I’ve never seen, nor can I find in a search, any evidence the ICP license scheme in place for that past 26 years in China has ever related to children in any meaningful sense. It has the ring of BS. Why would an authoritarian government in a country with no free press or free elections feel any need to justify a speech regulation with a fig leaf? They openly restrict speech. I think you’re full of it.
- luotuoshangdui 4mo ago
  An authoritarian government needs excuses too. China even claims to be a democratic country. North Korea even has the word Democratic in its name. "Protecting children" is a common excuse China uses. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Very_erotic_very_violent https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Very_erotic_very_violent is a famous example of them trying to justify internet censorship under the name of "protecting children".
qingcharles 4mo ago
The simplest solution is perhaps to simply imprison any children found using a VPN until they reach 18, then the state can exert total control over their access to information and they can be safely released into unmoderated society on their 18th birthday.
baranul 4mo ago
It is definitely not really "for the children", when legislation is aimed at all adults, and not specifically for parents. It is parents who should be responsible for the actions of their children and given the software tools to manage their online access. This arguably can be done with government sponsored and specific help for parents; software, websites, and shops with IT personnel. These measures taken by the EU and other government entities has always been about surveillance, censorship, control, and eliminating freedom of speech and association. People need to keep calling out this continual deception and attempt to erode freedoms.
ActorNightly 4mo ago
Prove to me that people deserve to be free and not micromanaged on a day to day basis.
alibarber 4mo ago
> The same way you fine drivers for traffic violation, but not the road. Eh - my new car has an EU mandated speed limiter in it that takes over the cruise control. It uses a combination of GPS and vision to determine what speed limit to apply. Only slammed the breaks on on the motorway to drop from 120 to 80 KM/h erroneously 4 times in one journey last week. Much like the oft maligned Google PM that releases/deprecates another chat product to get their promotion, some commissioner somewhere in Brussels managed to make the world a better place with this too.

by nirui 4mo ago

zero-hp 4mo ago

Not only in China. Russian internet cenzorship also started as a "children protection" measure.

pronik 4mo ago
Ursula von den Leyen has been pushing internet blocks in Germany for the sake of the children since 2009. Which is when "Zensursula" nickname has been coined. You don't need to look far to find the same thinking by the people in power.
- jesterson 4mo ago
  they know mass populace is stupid and won't look behind the title. Are you against the law "protecting children"? Shame on you
- joe_mamba 4mo ago
  >Ursula von den Leyen has been pushing internet blocks in Germany for the sake of the children since 2009. Which is when "Zensursula" nickname has been coined. And then in a completely democratic mannner, Europeans said "that's who we want leading us".
  - wafflemaker 4mo ago
    >And then in a completely democratic mannner, Europeans said "that's who we want leading us". No, it wasn't. She was chosen by a group of country leaders during a closed doors voting. If it's democratic at all, it's very tangential.
    - pronik 4mo ago
      I've taken that comment to be very sarcastic, but maybe it wasn't.
    - rayiner 4mo ago
      There's an election in the chain. Voters elected the national MPs who then selected the national PMs, who then selected von den Leyen. Democratic-ish.
      - joe_mamba 4mo ago
        After how many levels detached from the general population, does the vote stop being democratic?
        rayiner 4mo ago
        It doesn’t stop being democratic. It’s just a scale from more to less democratic. America’s founding fathers were skeptical of democracy, so they provided for the president to be elected by the Electoral College, which was originally appointed by state legislatures. It’s still “democratic”—just less so than a direct election.
        joe_mamba 4mo ago
        American people went to the polls to vote(or not) for Trump, Europeans didn't go to the polls to vote for Cenzura. Kind of a big difference on the democracy scale.
otabdeveloper4 4mo ago
No, actually it started to protect intellectual property. A guy posted a recap in a post above.

delusional 4mo ago

> This is arguably much worse than allowing children to watch porn online, because this will for sure effect people's whole life in a negative way. I would like you to make that argument.

pembrook 4mo ago
What argument? You're the one that needs to argue the presence of harm, given you're the one arguing we need to create a surveillance dragnet to shield certain age groups of humans from witnessing how their species procreates. The default state is that humans procreate via sexual reproduction. You need to argue why we need to take action to hide this, especially given we let children witness other far more brutal activities from the human species like violence.
- delusional 4mo ago
  The argument I am asking him to make is the one about how age verification is "much worse" than "allowing children to watch porn". If your argument in favor of that is that watching porn isn't harmful to children, then I don't understand what all that superfluous waffling about china is doing in there.
- ckjellqv 4mo ago
  > This is arguably much worse Surely someone claiming it's arguable should be willing to make that argument. For me it's not that it's reproduction. Film that shows sex is not an issue as I see it and I don't know anyone that has developed serious addictions to sex in Hollywood film. However I know several people, family members included, that have absolutely obliterated their childhoods and early adult years by becoming addicted to porn. They were groomed by adults online from a young age and, although their parents tried to stop it, kids are sneakier and they got around it, exposing themselves to some truly dark things. It is not easy for families to recover from having dealt with a child with serious addiction issues. I think it's pretty silly to argue that systemic protections are ineffective and overreach whereas the efforts of one or two parents should be enough and are the correct level of enforcement for the protection of children. The parents of the people I know went to extremes to protect their children and they were mostly unsuccessful.

ozgung 4mo ago

But you are asking logical questions. You are thinking and talking too much for a World citizen in 2026. "Reasoning" is a reserved word for chatbots now, so we humans are not allowed to do that anymore. We can only obey like a bot and pretend all the lies they tell are the truth. BTW I live in Turkiye where the government banned ALL the adult websites around 2008. Even as an adult you can't access them. This year they are banning VPNs, introduce age controls and ID verification COORDINATED with the rest of the world. Also banning some games, control social media, and basically make it legal to control and track everyone on the internet. What a coincidence that similar attempts are simultaneous in many independent countries. And no, children have not been really protected in Turkiye since 2008.

rvnx 4mo ago
Not only that, sprinkle a bit of hate speech laws on top and then you got rid a lot of political competition that could disagree with you
retired 4mo ago
Grab a SIM-card from Bulgaria with roaming enabled. Internet is routed through the Bulgarian ISP even when you are in Turkiye. Full internet access, no VPN required.
- gessha 4mo ago
  Until the three representatives from Bulgaria and the ones from the other EU countries win out lobbying for ChatControl and expand it to VPNControl too.
- slaw 4mo ago
  You have to tolerate 100ms ping.
  - loloquwowndueo 4mo ago
    It’s like living in Australia baby. And yet believe it or not, people do!

u8080 4mo ago

Just a recap how it happened in Russia: 1. First, year ~2015 legal framework was created under disguise of banning pirated media(specifically torrents.ru)(legislative push). State-wide DNS ban introduced. Very easy to circumvent via quering 8.8.8.8 2. Then, having legal basis, govt included extra stuff in banned list(casinos, terrorist orgs, etc)(executive push). IP bans introduced, applied very carefully. 3. Legal expanded allowing govt to ban specific media on very vague criterias(legislative push). IP blocks tried on some large websites. DPI hardware mandated to be installed by ISPs to filter by HTTPS SNI(executive push). 4. At ~2019 Roskomnadzor(RKN) created, special govt entity which enforces bans without court orders(legislative push). 5. ~2021 sites become banned if they are not filtering content by Russian laws by request of RKN(executive push). VPN services were obligated to also DPI-filter traffic(legislative push). 6. ~2023 Crackdown on VPN started(executive push). Popular commercial services were IP-banned, OpenVPN and IPSec connections selectively degraded by DPI. 7. ~2025 Heavy VPN filtering(vless, wireguard, etc) introduced(executive push). Performance of certain sites were degraded(youtube, twitter, etc).

spixy 4mo ago
DPI = Deep packet inspection?
- delamon 4mo ago
  yes
dvtkrlbs 4mo ago
Similar stuff is happening in Turkey as well. Afaik with ipv6 adoption goverment mandates DPI hardware at ISPs. It was voluntary for ipv4 traffic.
darqis 4mo ago
and yet my friend in Moscow is able to use VPN to get around all this
- jllyhill 4mo ago

yorwba 4mo ago

> In case people no longer remember, when China started to require websites to register for a license before be allowed to operate, it was for "protecting the children" too. Indeed I do not remember this, nor can I find corroborating evidence that there was much of an effort to justify the requirement to the public at all. As far as I can tell, the government simply decided that they needed more control over the internet, so they made a law to give themselves more control over the internet. https://www.gov.cn/gongbao/content/2000/content_60531.htm https://www.gov.cn/gongbao/content/2000/content_60531.htm It has no special provisions limited to children that only later got extended to adults. (Meanwhile, restrictions on how long children may play games continue to only apply to children, AFAIK.)

nameconflicts 4mo ago

You're right

leonidasrup 4mo ago

You always hear the argument "protecting the children", because anyone oposing the regulation/laws can be labeled at best "exposing the children to danger" or at worst "pedofile". So as a consequence at best the oponents of such regulation/laws should not be listened to, or at worst they should be put into prison. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Think_of_the_children https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Think_of_the_children

buran77 4mo ago
The excuse has to be something nobody can appear to be supporting (pedophilia, terrorism, nazis, etc.). It's not only an appeal to emotion, it's also a false dichotomy, a loaded question, guilt by association. Others look at this recipe and can't help but notice its effectiveness. Eventually nobody is beneath pulling this kind of logic, even if they were the ones crucifying it just a few short years ago. The weaker the leader, the more likely that that they forget where they wrote down those principles of theirs and resort to this crap.
- autoexec 4mo ago
  > The excuse has to be something nobody can appear to be supporting (pedophilia, terrorism, nazis, etc.). If only being associated with pedophilia and nazis was still something that had to be avoided because it would be career ending otherwise.
  - galangalalgol 4mo ago
    Right? I was just thinking that Maine looks to be electing someone who had nazi tattoos, and it would seem pedophilia is one of the few things both parties approve of at least in deed.
    - smcin 4mo ago
      (Graham Platner had the tattoo covered up 10/2025)
- 4mo ago

izacus 4mo ago

> In case people no longer remember, when China started to require websites to register for a license before be allowed to operate, it was for "protecting the children" too. People don't remember because it didn't happen and the license wasn't about protecting the children. But it's so convenient to just blantantly lie on the internet nowadays, isn't it? Just like the title of this article blatantly lies about "EU" doing something.

card_zero 4mo ago
One of you ought to find out what really did happen, and tell us. I can only do the lame thing and quote Wikipedia: > China had no such legislation until 1997. That year, China's sole legislative body – the National People's Congress (NPC) – passed CL97, a law that deals with cyber crimes, which it divided into two broad categories: crimes that target computer networks, and crimes carried out over computer networks. Behavior illegal under the latter category includes, among many things, the dissemination of pornographic material, and the usurping of "state secrets."
- antonvs 4mo ago
  Notably, there’s nothing about children in that quote.

redeeman 4mo ago

or maybe just maybe its time for people to realize that the EU is an enemy of the people, and hold the people pushing for this personally responsible.

lemoncookiechip 4mo ago

You know, if Politicians, Law Enforcement and Military Personnel are included and affected by all these anti-privacy laws, I'm all for it (not really). Let their daily corruption come to light by the opposition exposing all their dirty laundry (because of course they'd used the data against each other) and vice-versa over and over... and that's not gonna happen because we don't live in that world where laws apply fairly to everyone. "Rules for thee but not for me."

miohtama 4mo ago
Europol is lobbying for this. Of course, by using tax payers money.
- Saline9515 4mo ago
  It's amazing that they are spending billions on "think of the kids" problems, yet in many countries of the EU it's very hard to find a decent children playground in the city center. I'm quite sure that if you asked parents, they would rather have the playground than the surveillance.

TacticalCoder 4mo ago

> And if EU still think that's not enough, maybe they should just cut the cable, like what North Korea did. I'll make a similar comment I made on another thread: we saw a thread with many upvotes hating on the cyber-libertarians... We all know the EU institutions are ran by cyber-libertarians and that it's cyber-libertarians making such research and decisions right? Pick your fight brothers. I don't think spending your time hating on the three John Galts of this world is a worthy fight. You may even turn out to be more morally aligned with the John Galt of this world than with the people running the EU institutions (and North Korea).

rini17 4mo ago
The former cyber-libertarians are running the tech unicorns now. Ofc they would prefer you see them as John Galts lol. But they aren't that and they will defend freedom of cyberspace only as far as it aligns with their power and profit.

rdiddly 4mo ago

"...into the hands of the few..." And there you have it, the actual reason for this.

ZetsuBouKyo 4mo ago

I have an extreme slippery slope idea. If they want to protect children, shouldn't they sterilize everyone? Every child born, regardless of wealth will inevitably suffer injury, illness, and psychological setbacks. Therefore, the best way to protect them would be not allowing people to have children. By the way, not having children is also more eco-friendly, because an infinite series simply converges. I wonder if I’ll see this ridiculous scene in my lifetime.

noisy_boy 4mo ago
Forced sterilisations for population control has been a thing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uttawar_forced_sterilisations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uttawar_forced_sterilisations
- samcarter1 4mo ago
  Ashen vibes
AnthonyMouse 4mo ago
> By the way, not having children is also more eco-friendly, because an infinite series simply converges. This one isn't actually accurate. Younger people have longer time horizons (i.e. aren't expecting to be dead as soon) and are therefore more likely to support policies like electrifying transportation and generating power from lower CO2 sources, and policies get enacted when they have majority support, so causing the population to skew older by reducing the number of children is ecologically very bad.
- lukan 4mo ago
  In theory. In reality the number of young people concerned about climate change is high, but the number of those willing to then not take a airplane for a few days of vacation is pretty low in my experience. So supporting policies, "that somebody should do something" sure, also my generation thinks like this and the older one. But supporting policies that also actually affect themself, different story. Because there is also the effect of doomerism. If the world is doomed anyway, then I can at least enjoy my vacation while I am still alive.

jesterson 4mo ago

[flagged]

leonidasrup 4mo ago
In this case EU is moving towards less freedom, but to compare it with one of the least free countries in the world is an exaggeration.
- jesterson 4mo ago
  [flagged]
  - mcv 4mo ago
    Not remotely at full speed. This is not a law, and is not in any way being enforced. Bad ideas get proposed too often, but usually they get rejected. I expect the same will happen here, although we should absolutely remain vigilant. I do share your concern for policy moving in the direction of NK, but the EU isn't moving there nearly as fast as for example the US.
    - nxm 4mo ago
      Are you serious? In the US, you don’t get fined or arrested for posting mean memes like in Germany
      - jesterson 4mo ago
        No point to argue. EU propaganda machine portrays EU as beautiful garden while the US is portrayed as the one descending into fascism. You can’t push anto-freedom laws without mass brainwashing.
        mcv 4mo ago
        Portrayed? Have you seen the news at all in the past year? The US is descending into fascism really hard. Closing your eyes to it is not going to stop it.

cameldrv 4mo ago

You shouldn't have to be an "entrepreneur" to have a website. The idea that the only useful/interesting things to say are those that are profitable is a big part of the problem we find ourselves in.

eduction 4mo ago

Do you have a single link or other piece of evidence to substantiate this? I’ve never seen, nor can I find in a search, any evidence the ICP license scheme in place for that past 26 years in China has ever related to children in any meaningful sense. It has the ring of BS. Why would an authoritarian government in a country with no free press or free elections feel any need to justify a speech regulation with a fig leaf? They openly restrict speech. I think you’re full of it.

luotuoshangdui 4mo ago
An authoritarian government needs excuses too. China even claims to be a democratic country. North Korea even has the word Democratic in its name. "Protecting children" is a common excuse China uses. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Very_erotic_very_violent https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Very_erotic_very_violent is a famous example of them trying to justify internet censorship under the name of "protecting children".

qingcharles 4mo ago

The simplest solution is perhaps to simply imprison any children found using a VPN until they reach 18, then the state can exert total control over their access to information and they can be safely released into unmoderated society on their 18th birthday.

baranul 4mo ago

It is definitely not really "for the children", when legislation is aimed at all adults, and not specifically for parents. It is parents who should be responsible for the actions of their children and given the software tools to manage their online access. This arguably can be done with government sponsored and specific help for parents; software, websites, and shops with IT personnel. These measures taken by the EU and other government entities has always been about surveillance, censorship, control, and eliminating freedom of speech and association. People need to keep calling out this continual deception and attempt to erode freedoms.

ActorNightly 4mo ago

Prove to me that people deserve to be free and not micromanaged on a day to day basis.

alibarber 4mo ago

> The same way you fine drivers for traffic violation, but not the road. Eh - my new car has an EU mandated speed limiter in it that takes over the cruise control. It uses a combination of GPS and vision to determine what speed limit to apply. Only slammed the breaks on on the motorway to drop from 120 to 80 KM/h erroneously 4 times in one journey last week. Much like the oft maligned Google PM that releases/deprecates another chat product to get their promotion, some commissioner somewhere in Brussels managed to make the world a better place with this too.