The Infinite Brief

The nonprofit behind the app published a blog post which says, “At a time when more people than ever are benefiting from these (encryption) protections, the EARN IT bill proposed by the Senate Judiciary Committee threatens to put them at risk.”

Although the goal of the legislation is to stamp out online child exploitation, it does so by letting the US government regulate how internet companies should combat the problem, potentially undermining the end-to-end encryption protecting your messages.

If the companies fail to do so, they risk losing legal immunity under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which can shield them from lawsuits concerning objectionable or illegal content posted on their websites or apps.