Overview

• Justice Minister Stefanie Hubig said Germany will not support undirected scanning of private messages, calling mass checks of chats a red line for a rule-of-law state.
• CDU/CSU parliamentary leader Jens Spahn also opposed an anlasslose chat control, reinforcing doubts over a Council majority for the Danish-led draft.
• EU ambassadors are set to discuss the file, and a ministerial decision once eyed for October 14 has been reported as postponed while negotiations continue.
• The proposal would require providers to scan images and videos on users’ devices before encryption and report suspicions, a model critics say circumvents end-to-end security and risks unlawful mass surveillance.
• Major tech and civil groups—including Bitkom, eco, journalist and lawyer associations, and the German Child Protection Association—warn of false positives, legal risks and overloaded enforcement, while Signal says it would leave the EU rather than weaken encryption.