Macron, Durov, Zuckerberg, and the Crypto Wars
Updates from the Crypto Wars front: as usually, conspiracy theorists were right.
Pavel Durov, the founder of Telegram, has been captured on the French front. Commentators, media outlets, and conspiracy theorists from around the world have taken sides.
Thus, President Macron deemed it necessary to issue a statement on X, the platform most despised by the European Union, yet inevitably used by everyone, revealing his “Truth” to us.
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The brief post starts in the best way possible: "I have seen false information regarding France following the arrest of Pavel Durov." Macron, or rather the intern tasked with posting the statement, then proceeds to tell us the that:
France is deeply committed to freedom of expression and communication, to innovation, and to the spirit of entrepreneurship. It will remain so.
In a state governed by the rule of law, freedoms are upheld within a legal framework, both on social media and in real life, to protect citizens and respect their fundamental rights. It is up to the judiciary, in full independence, to enforce the law. T
he arrest of the president of Telegram on French soil took place as part of an ongoing judicial investigation. It is in no way a political decision. It is up to the judges to rule on the matter.
The statement is perfect; it contains all the necessary triggers to stimulate the standard atavistic reaction of the perfect social network NPC: defense of freedom; the rule of law; freedom guaranteed by a legal framework to protect citizens. The magic formula is complete. This would have been enough, but the intern also informs us that the decision is in no way political and that it is now up to the judges to decide, just to silence any potential insinuations.
Encryption as a Weapon of War
Except, well… the charges are indeed very political!
Among other things, Pavel Durov is accused of several crimes related to the development and dissemination of encryption technologies for communication privacy without authorization, as can be read in the official statement:
Providing cryptology services aiming to ensure confidentiality without certified declaration
Providing a cryptology tool not solely ensuring authentication or integrity monitoring without prior declaration
Importing a cryptology tool ensuring authentication or integrity monitoring without prior declaration
The laws that restrict the importation and dissemination of encryption technologies for communication privacy are the result of political decisions and directions that the United States and the United Kingdom already tried to pursue in the 1990s — during the first Crypto Wars.
Encryption tools were considered akin to weapons of war, and their importation and dissemination were strictly regulated. We all remember (or perhaps not) the notorious case of Phil Zimmermann, who, after publicly releasing his PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) algorithm in 1993, was investigated for "unauthorized export of munitions without a license".
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France is therefore stuck in the 1990s, just like the laws invoked in the charges against Durov. I am not familiar with the intricacies of the French legal system, but I might be willing to bet that Pavel Durov is the only one being charged under such extremely outdated laws.
So yes, it very much seems like a political choice to worsen his judicial situation. And even if it is not, it should become one. Incarcerating someone for disseminating encryption tools while simultaneously claiming to protect citizens is simply absurd!
As for the remaining charges, well, what can I say? Holding the owner of a digital platform responsible — and complicit! — for the crimes committed through its infrastructure is absurd, and a few decades ago it would have been politically unsustainable, even before it was legally so (laws change with political sentiment).
Zuckerberg's Confession
As if the landscape weren't already complicated and bleak enough, good old Mark Zuckerberg has come along to make things even more complex.
In a letter resembling a confession, the CEO of Meta admitted that between 2020 and 2021, he caved to pressure from the intelligence community and the Biden administration to censor content on Facebook and Instagram related to Covid-19 and the elections.
Now he says he regrets it and wouldn't make the same mistake again, as the censorship severely limited the freedom of expression of millions of people and even the dissemination of true and legitimate information.
The letter, which is a powerful blow to all the fact-checkers who have spent years labeling anyone who talked about censorship and illicit political interference as a conspiracy theorist, shouldn't actually surprise those who have followed me for a while, as it's exactly what happened on Twitter before the Musk administration during the same period.
In that case as well, both intelligence and government tried (and succeeded) in every way to censor numerous accounts, eventually even obtaining Trump's removal.
The confession once again demonstrates that major online platforms are battlegrounds for information control (which politicians call protection from disinformation) and for limiting people's capacity for self-determination. Despite what Macron says, what is happening with Telegram fully falls into this context, and no sane person could ever trust the same governments that continuously threaten the freedom of their own citizens.
Why did Zuckerberg choose this delicate period to publish this letter? Is it to morally support his colleagues Durov and Musk (already in trouble with the European Commission over the Digital Services Act), or is it instead a strategic political move to position himself ahead of a possible Trump victory and secure more favorable treatment in a world that seems increasingly intent on tightening the noose around the necks of big platform CEOs?
Perhaps we'll find out in time. What is certain is that the Crypto Wars are experiencing a full revival today, and the involuntary and unfortunate protagonists of these new battles are Alexey Pertsev, Roman Storm, Roman Semenov, William Lonergan Hill, Keonne Rodriguez, and the latest addition, Pavel Durov. We will discover in time the role that Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg shall choose to play.
If you don't know who the people I mentioned are, I recommend you delve into my column and analyses on the Crypto Wars — you won't find many others like it.
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