EU Advances Chat Control Legislation, Raising Mass Surveillance Fears and Impacting Privacy Coins

On November 26, 2025, EU member states agreed on a revised version of the Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM) regulation, commonly known as Chat Control, which removes mandatory message scanning but makes voluntary scanning permanent under EU law. This decision affects all 450 million Europeans using digital communication services and follows years of division, including opposition from Germany that helped block earlier mandatory proposals.

Privacy experts warn the legislation creates dangerous precedents for mass surveillance, with over 500 cryptographers and security researchers from 34 countries calling it technically infeasible. Real-world data highlights concerns: Swiss federal police report 80% false positives in machine-generated reports, and German authorities received over 99,000 false alarms in 2024 alone. The proposal includes vague language that could pressure platforms into implementing scanning systems, and review clauses allow for reconsideration of mandatory scanning every three years.

The legislation is part of the broader ProtectEU strategy, aiming to enable law enforcement decryption by 2030, and could require age verification, ending anonymous communication. It has already impacted cryptocurrencies, with exchanges like Kraken and Binance delisting privacy-focused tokens such as Monero (XMR) due to regulatory compliance. The agreement now moves to trilogue negotiations between the Council, European Parliament, and European Commission, with the Parliament previously opposing encryption scanning in 2023.