Estonia opposed to EU plan to monitor private chats online
The Riigikogu EU Affairs Committee on Friday found that Estonia cannot support the EU's so-called chat control initiative due to its unprecedented infringement on privacy.
Peeter Tali, chair of the European Union Affairs Committee (ELAK), said that while fighting and preventing child sexual abuse is obviously necessary online as well, Estonia cannot accept the European Commission's proposal to scan message files indiscriminately before they are sent.
"It is inconceivable that we would begin to systematically restrict our citizens' freedoms and weaken their privacy across the European Union, preemptively and under any pretense, no matter how noble," Tali said.
The ELAK chair added that many countries have expressed criticism of the initiative. Tali welcomed the decision by the Council presidency to pull the draft regulation from the agenda of the October 14 meeting of the EU Justice and Home Affairs Council and to effectively pause it. However, he stressed that if the draft were to return to the agenda in its current form, Estonia would vote against it.
The European Commission first proposed the regulation in 2022 to establish rules aimed at preventing and combating child sexual abuse. A compromise acceptable to all member states has yet to be reached — some countries are willing to allow broader infringements on privacy rights, while others, such as Estonia, prioritize protecting those rights.
Estonia supports the regulation's overall goals — protecting children from sexual abuse, preventing the spread of related online content and bringing perpetrators to justice — but it does not support the blanket scanning of user-shared content, such as images, videos or web links. Estonia also argues that if users are denied access to a service for refusing to consent to such scanning, it would constitute a violation of the principle of voluntary consent.
The position presented at the committee meeting was introduced by Minister of the Interior Igor Taro (Eesti 200). The European Union Affairs Committee unanimously endorsed the government's position.
On Thursday, German Justice Minister Stefanie Hubig (SPD) confirmed that Germany's federal government does not support the EU's plan to monitor private online communications. The positions of populous member states like Germany carry significant weight and could prove decisive.
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Editor: Mirjam Mäekivi, Marcus Turovski
