Vitalik Buterin Warns EU Surveillance Plan Threatens Digital Privacy

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has criticized the EU’s proposed Chat Control regulation, warning that mandatory scanning of private messages would create significant security vulnerabilities.

Known as the Chat Control regulation, the proposal would compel messaging platforms — even encrypted ones — to scan all user content for potential signs of child exploitation.

EU Chat Control Regulation Sparks Backlash

Buterin warned that such measures, while framed as child protection, would erode the foundation of digital privacy. He argued that any policy claiming to make society safer by weakening individual security achieves the opposite outcome.

“You cannot make society secure by making people insecure. We all deserve privacy and security, without inevitably hackable backdoors, for our private communications,” Buterin wrote.

Instead, Buterin insisted that meaningful security reforms should focus on “common-sense policing” rather than blanket interception of digital communication.

He added that mandatory data collection often creates new vulnerabilities, as stored surveillance records can become prime targets for hackers.

“There are many opportunities to improve safety today, mostly around common-sense policing improvements, not carelessly releasing repeat offenders, etc. Meanwhile, intercepted digital messages are a security vulnerability, and there are many easy-to-find stories where mandatory wiretap data collected by one government gets hacked by other governments,” Buterin said.

The Ethereum co-founder also stressed that citizens should be afforded the same privacy online as they once enjoyed in face-to-face interactions or cash transactions.

“We need our physical environments to be secure and we need our digital environments to be secure,” he added.

The Regulation to Prevent and Combat Child Sexual Abuse (CSAR) builds on earlier monitoring systems used by large technology firms for unencrypted data.

Meanwhile, concerns about the regulation have deepened following a leaked 2024 report. The document revealed that several interior ministers sought exemptions for intelligence agencies, police, and military staff.

Considering this, Buterin and privacy advocates say these carveouts highlight the hypocrisy of lawmakers imposing surveillance they would not accept for themselves.

Pratam Rao, co-founder of blockchain security firm QuillAudits, echoed this view. He noted that “any surveillance system lawmakers won’t subject themselves to is automatically tyrannical.”

“They’re admitting these systems are dangerous to privacy and democracy. They just don’t think citizens deserve the same protections they do,” Rao wrote on X.

As a result, Buterin has urged people across the European Union to oppose the controversial proposal. Notably, opposition to the proposal has gained momentum on the social media platform X.

Data from the advocacy group FightChatControl.eu shows that only seven EU member states — including Austria, Finland, and the Netherlands — have formally rejected the plan.

Meanwhile, 12 others, including France, Spain, and Denmark, have voiced support for the controversial regulation, while several key nations, such as Germany and Italy, remain undecided.