Disrupting violence while preserving encryption

Technology and Regulation, vol. 2024, pp. 115–131

Abstract

Business models adopted by online platforms have enabled the proliferation of online hate speech. Platforms providing end-to-end encrypted (E2EE) services have been under increased scrutiny for hosting hate mongers. Legislators struggle to conceptualise the responsibilities of E2EE services to not host hate speech without infringing the users’ rights to freedom of expression, association, privacy, or data protection. This interdisciplinary article proposes a new legal minimum standard expanding corporate human rights responsibilities of E2EE services to mitigate a category of criminal hate speech - incitement to violence. We explore the regulation and application of metadata, hashing, and homomorphic encryption to disrupt incitement to violence in large groups on E2EE services in compliance with human rights.

Authors 3

1. Eva Nave Aachen

   Leiden University

   Affiliation as printed

   Leiden University

2. Stephan Raaijmakers Aachen

   Leiden University

   Affiliation as printed

   Leiden University Centre for Linguistics

3. Thijs Veugen

   University of Twente

   Affiliation as printed

   University of Twente