Notices by Meredith Whittaker (mer__edith@mastodon.world), page 2

PSA: we're aware that Signal is down for some people. This appears to be related to a major AWS outage. Stand by.

LOL all morning picturing some finance quant slouched at his desk prompting Dalle, like, "make me a picture of pikachu having sex with the Apple logo" or whatever tf those guys use these things for, then throwing up his hands like "WHY WON'T THIS FIND ALPHA?!"

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-10-15/ken-griffin-says-genai-fails-to-help-hedge-funds-produce-alpha

So we remain vigilant & deeply grateful to our allies.

For Signal, Chat Control is an existential threat. If we were *forced* to choose between building surveillance into our services or keeping our integrity, we would choose integrity & leave the market. We hope it never comes to this. 7/

We must be wary of "new" proposals that allow scanning of "known content" while claiming to protect privacy by proscribing "indiscriminate" surveillance. We must also look out for those that mandate only scanning for “hashed images or videos.” 4/

The reality is that scanning any content before it is encrypted negates the very purpose of encryption and is a dangerous backdoor. No amount of tinkering or word games can change that inescapable reality. 5/

The technical consensus is clear: you can't create a backdoor that only lets the "good guys" in. However they're dressed up, these proposals create cybersecurity loopholes that hackers and hostile nations are eagerly waiting to exploit. 6/

We're so relieved to see Germany reaffirm its opposition to the dangerous Chat Control proposal--the one that would mandate mass scanning of communications.

Germany's long been a solid champion of privacy, and the news that it was considering backing mass surveillance was alarming. 1/

Defending privacy isn't easy. Those in power always want more access +more info. It's especially hard when emotionally charged args are used to advance surveillance

❤️ to those doing the work!

https://social.bau-ha.us/@CCC
https://d-64.social/@d64eV
https://mastodon.social/@chatcontrol
And many others <3 2/

The war is not over, however. Now we move to the European Council, where the issue is unresolved. We expect closed-door negotiations to engage in rhetorical arbitrage--claiming to support privacy by using word games and bespoke definitions--while in practice undermining it. Tedious and dangerous 3/

📣 Germany's close to reversing its opposition to mass surveillance & private message scanning, & backing the Chat Control bill. This could end private comms-& Signal-in the EU.

Time's short and they're counting on obscurity: please let German politicians know how horrifying their reversal would be.

📣 NEW -- In The Economist, discussing the privacy perils of AI agents and what AI companies and operating systems need to do--NOW--to protect Signal and much else!

https://www.economist.com/by-invitation/2025/09/09/ai-agents-are-coming-for-your-privacy-warns-meredith-whittaker?giftId=859d3a46-a913-4ee0-a3d5-060b774c2501&utm_campaign=gifted_article

New Sunday Times profile in which I succeed, like a fencer in a 2hr marathon match, in fending off Qs abt my personal life & consistently turning focus back to my work & ideas.

(Contra the interviewer's claim, many ppl do know me! They're called friends, & you know who you are ❤️)

https://archive.is/BtZD0

Yes, I did sound the alarm on agentic AI's privacy threat, and rightly so.

https://observer.com/2025/07/signal-meredith-whittaker-agentic-ai-risk/

A big humble thank you to @time and @perrigo for featuring Signal and me in your roundup of 2025’s most influential companies. An honor to serve alongside an incredible group of people backed by a rad movement ❤️

https://time.com/collections/time100-companies-2025/7289620/signal/

'Meredith,' some guys ask, 'why won't you shove AI into Signal?'

Because we love privacy, and we love you, and this shit is predictable and unacceptable. Use Signal ❤️

Source: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/jun/18/whatsapp-ai-helper-mistakenly-shares-users-number

Use Signal. We promise, no AI clutter, and no surveillance ads, whatever the rest of the industry does. <3

Happy pride month! Especially to my trans friends <3

📣 The rushed integration of AI into everything is a major threat to privacy, as we've been saying.

Microsoft Recall is a great (not great!) example of exactly why--it screenshots everything on your desktop, to give AI the data to tell you...what you were doing on desktop.

So, Signal took steps to protect you and everyone using Signal on Windows 11 from Recall's hunger for (Signal) data.

Read more about how we navigated, and why we need to ecosystem to a lot more 👇

https://signal.org/blog/signal-doesnt-recall/

I did. Because it does.

https://techcrunch.com/2025/03/07/signal-president-meredith-whittaker-calls-out-agentic-ai-as-having-profound-security-and-privacy-issues/