The European Council has added six Russian hackers to the EU’s sanctions list for their cyberattacks against member states and Ukraine.

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The European Union on Tuesday accused Microsoft of breaching antitrust rules with the "abusive" bundling of its Teams and Office products. From a report: "The European Commission has informed Microsoft of its preliminary view that Microsoft has breached EU antitrust rules by tying its communication and collaboration product Teams to its popular productivity applications included in its suites for businesses Office 365 and Microsoft 365," the European Commission -- the EU's executive arm -- said in a Statement of Objections, which is sent to inform companies of concerns raised against them. If the commission decides that an infringement has taken place once companies have responded, it can ban the conduct and fine the charged company up to 10% of its global revenue. Microsoft this year took the preemptive step to unbundle Teams from Microsoft 365 in an effort to quash antitrust concerns by the EU. However, the commission said in its Tuesday statement that the changes were "insufficient to address its concerns and that more changes to Microsoft's conduct are necessary to restore competition." Microsoft said it would work to find solutions to address the commission's additional concerns.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Top officials from the European Union and China agreed to negotiate a planned series of import taxes on Chinese electric vehicles. "The call marks the first time the two sides have agreed to negotiate since the EU threatened China with electric vehicle (EV) tariffs of up to 38%," reports the BBC. From the report: The EU said Chinese EVs were unfairly subsidised by its government. In response, China accused the EU of protectionism and trade rule breaches. An EU spokesperson told the BBC the call between Trade Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis and his Chinese counterpart Wang Wentao was "candid and constructive." They said the two sides would "continue to engage at all levels in the coming weeks." However, the spokesperson also doubled down on the EU's opposition to how the Chinese EV industry is funded. They said "any negotiated outcome" to the proposed tariffs must address the "injurious subsidisation" of Chinese EVs. China released a similar statement on Saturday and made clear it still disagreed with the EU. As well as its call with the EU, Mr Wang met German Vice-Chancellor and Federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Climate Action Robert Habeck on Saturday. In a Facebook post about the meeting, China's Ministry of Commerce said it had told Mr Habeck about its "firm opposition" to the tariffs. It repeated its threat to file a lawsuit with the World Trade Organization (WTO) "to firmly defend its legitimate rights and interests." Germany has also expressed criticism of the tariffs. When the EU first proposed them last week following its investigation of Chinese EVs in the trading bloc, Germany's Transport Minister, Volker Wissing, said the move risked a "trade war" with Beijing. "The European Commission's punitive tariffs hit German companies and their top products," he wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, at the time. The European car industry has been critical too. Stellantis - which owns Citroen, Peugeot, Vauxhall, Fiat, and several other brands - said it did not support measures that "contribute to the world fragmentation [of trade]."

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Apple is imposing unfair restrictions on developers of apps for its App Store in violation of a new European Union law meant to encourage competition in the tech industry, regulators in Brussels said on Monday. From a report: The charges further escalated a tussle between Apple, which says its products are designed in the best interest of customers, and E.U. regulators, who say the company is unfairly using its size and considerable resources to stifle competition. Apple is the first company to be charged for violating the Digital Markets Act, a law passed in 2022 that gives European regulators wide authority to force the largest "online gatekeepers" to change their business practices. After initiating an investigation in March, E.U. regulators said Apple was putting unlawful restrictions on companies that make games, music services and other applications. Under the law, also known as the D.M.A., Apple cannot limit how companies communicate with customers about sales and other offers and content available outside the App Store. The company faces a penalty of 10 percent of global revenue, a fine that could go up to 20 percent for repeat infringements, regulators said. Apple reported $383 billion in revenue last year. "Today is a very important day for the effective enforcement of the D.M.A.," said Margrethe Vestager, the European Commission executive vice president in charge of competition policy. She said Apple's App Store policies make developers more dependent on the company and prevent consumers from being aware of better offers.

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Apple is withholding a raft of new technologies from hundreds of millions of consumers in the European Union, citing concerns posed by the bloc's regulatory attempts to rein in Big Tech. From a report: The company announced Friday it would block the release of Apple Intelligence, iPhone Mirroring and SharePlay Screen Sharing from users in the EU this year, because the Digital Markets Act allegedly forces it to downgrade the security of its products and services. "We are concerned that the interoperability requirements of the DMA could force us to compromise the integrity of our products in ways that risk user privacy and data security," Apple said in a statement. Under the DMA, Apple is expected to receive a formal warning from EU regulators over how it allegedly blocks apps from steering users to cheaper subscription deals on the web -- a practice for which it received a $1.9 billion fine from Brussels regulators earlier this year.

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The EU has passed a nature restoration law which, despite its reduced scope appeared to be headed for the policy graveyard. The law was saved by Austria's climate minister, Leonore Gewessler, whose vote of conscience hit the bar of support of 55% of EU member states representing 65% of EU population. Her government attempted to have her vote disregarded, and she now looks likely to face criminal prosecution. (Via fixthenews)

Ongoing European Union quest to break end-to-end encryption (E2EE) mysteriously disappears.

The post EU Aims to Ban Math — ‘Chat Control 2.0’ Law is Paused but not Stopped appeared first on Security Boulevard.

European Union officials have delayed talks over proposed legislation that could lead to messaging services having to scan photos and links to detect possible child sexual abuse material (CSAM). From a report: Were the proposal to become law, it may require the likes of WhatsApp, Messenger and Signal to scan all images that users upload -- which would essentially force them to break encryption. For the measure to pass, it would need to have the backing of at least 15 of the member states representing at least 65 percent of the bloc's entire population. However, countries including Germany, Austria, Poland, the Netherlands and the Czech Republic were expected to abstain from the vote or oppose the plan due to cybersecurity and privacy concerns, Politico reports. If EU members come to an agreement on a joint position, they'll have to hash out a final version of the law with the European Commission and European Parliament.

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The European Union is getting closer to passing new rules that would mandate the bulk scanning of digital messages -- including encrypted ones. On Thursday, EU governments will adopt a position on the proposed legislation, which is aimed at detecting child sexual abuse material (CSAM). The vote will determine whether the proposal has enough support to move forward in the EU's law-making process. From a report: The law, first introduced in 2022, would implement an "upload moderation" system that scans all your digital messages, including shared images, videos, and links. Each service required to install this "vetted" monitoring technology must also ask permission to scan your messages. If you don't agree, you won't be able to share images or URLs. As if this doesn't seem wild enough, the proposed legislation appears to endorse and reject end-to-end encryption at the same time. At first, it highlights how end-to-end encryption "is a necessary means of protecting fundamental rights" but then goes on to say that encrypted messaging services could "inadvertently become secure zones where child sexual abuse material can be shared or disseminated."

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Experts slammed the latest European Union proposals for chat control to prevent child sexual abuse, calling the proposals a front for mass surveillance that will undermine encryption standards. Meredith Whittaker, president of the Signal foundation that operates the end-to-end encrypted (E2EE) messaging application, criticized the latest European Union proposals for chat control to prevent child sexual abuse, calling it “an old wine repackaged in new bottle.” “For decades, experts have been clear: there is no way to both preserve the integrity of end-to-end encryption and expose encrypted contents to surveillance. But proposals to do just this emerge repeatedly,” Whittaker said.

“Either end-to-end encryption protects everyone, and enshrines security and privacy, or it’s broken for everyone.” – Meredith Whittaker

The Chat Control Proposal

Her statement comes in response to the European Council’s proposal for chat control, which lays down rules to monitor E2EE under the veil of preventing and combating child sexual abuse. “While end-to-end encryption is a necessary means of protecting fundamental rights and the digital security of governments, industry and society, the European Union needs to ensure the effective prevention of and fight against serious crime such as child sexual abuse,” the proposal says. “It is crucial that services employing end-to-end encryption do not inadvertently become secure zones where child sexual abuse material can be shared or disseminated. Therefore, child sexual abuse material should remain detectable in all interpersonal communications services through the application of vetted technologies.” The proposal suggests that chat control could work in way that when any visual content is uploaded, the users be required to give explicit consent for a detection mechanism to be applied to that particular service. “Users not giving their consent should still be able to use that part of the service that does not involve the sending of visual content and URLs,” it said. “This ensures that the detection mechanism can access the data in its unencrypted form for effective analysis and action, without compromising the protection provided by end-to-end encryption once the data is transmitted.”

What Experts Say

However, Whittaker said that what the EU is proposing isn't possible without fundamentally undermining encryption and creating “a dangerous vulnerability in core infrastructure” that can have global implications beyond Europe. She called the proposal a “rhetorical game” of some European countries that have come up with the same idea under a new banner. Whittaker was referring to previous proposals under the name of “client-side scanning,” which is now being called “upload moderation.”

“Some are claiming that ‘upload moderation’ does not undermine encryption because it happens before your message or video is encrypted. This is untrue. We can call it a backdoor, a front door, or “upload moderation.” But whatever we call it, each one of these approaches creates a vulnerability that can be exploited by hackers and hostile nation states, removing the protection of unbreakable math and putting in its place a high-value vulnerability."

Whittaker reiterated that mandating mass scanning of private communications fundamentally undermines encryption, “Full stop.”

Chaos Computer Club, German MP Also Opposed

The Chaos Computer Club (CCC) and Patrick Dreyer, Member of European Parliament for the German and the European Pirate Party, argued along similar lines. The proposal stipulates that users must actively agree to chat control, but the refusal to do so comes with a punishment: Those who do not agree are no longer allowed to send any pictures or videos at all, a severe restriction of the service. “There can be no talk of voluntary participation here,” commented Linus Neumann, spokesman for the Chaos Computer Club. [caption id="attachment_77633" align="aligncenter" width="1024"] Source: Patrick Dreyer[/caption] Dreyer urged Europeans to take immediate action against the Chat Control proposal and said the EU countries pushing the proposal are exploiting the short period after the European Elections during which there is less public attention and the new European Parliament is not yet formed. “If Chat Control is endorsed by Council now, experience shows there is a great risk it will be adopted at the end of the political process,” he said. Dreyer said the silver lining in the current situation is the fact that many EU governments have not yet decided whether to go along with this final Belgian push for Chat Control mass surveillance. The countries still considering the proposal are Italy, Finland, Czech Republic, Sweden, Slovenia, Estonia, Greece and Portugal. Only Germany, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Austria and Poland are relatively clear that they will not support the proposal, but this is not sufficient for a “blocking minority,” Dreyer said. The proposal for chat control searches of private communications could be greenlighted by EU governments as early as Wednesday, June 19. Dreyer urged Europeans to press their governments to vote against this. “Demand a firm ‘No.’ Time is pressing. This may be our last chance to stop Chat Control!” Dreyer said.

Last week's EU parliamentary elections have resulted in big wins for right (and far-right) parties across the continent, with inflation- and migration-driven campaigns seeing late surges in support from Giorgia Meloni's Brothers of Italy to Geert Wilder's Party of Freedom to the extremist (and Nazi-curious) Alternative for Germany. Most notable was the unprecedented success of Marine Le Pen's hard-right National Rally in France, whose demolition of the ruling centrist coalition was so complete that President Emmanuel Macron has unexpectedly dissolved the legislature and called for snap elections later this month in a high-stakes bid to disrupt the national-populist wave. Not all is grim for the left -- socialist parties held their own in multiple nations, proudly illiberal Viktor Orban's Fidesz fell short of projections against a rising Péter Magyar, and France's two-round system has reliably kept the far-right out of power. Still, this week's results have massive and troubling implications for climate change, Ukraine, and a swath of other critical issues.

Disruptive digital attacks – many traced to Russia-backed groups – have doubled in the European Union in 2024 and are also targeting election-related services, according to the EU’s top cybersecurity official.

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