Europe’s spies are learning to trust each other — thanks to Trump

Chat Control & Going Dark: The war on encryption is on the rise. Through a shady collaboration between the US and the EU.

After Snowden’s whistleblowing in 2013, large parts of the internet became encrypted, enabling private and secure communication. Not everyone has welcomed this change. Most notably, the FBI and other U.S. government agencies have fought what is often called the “crypto wars”, the war on encryption. In recent years, they have been joined by the European Commission. Under the slogan “what about the children,” they try to introduce total mass surveillance of all EU citizens — first through the proposed Chat Control legislation, and later via the Going Dark and ProtectEU initiatives. The goal is to legally mandate spy tools on every European smartphone and computer. The forces behind these efforts have turned out to be American tech companies and intelligence agencies.

EU Wants To Break Up With US Tech

Wary of being vulnerable to the whims of foreign governments, the European Union is preparing far-reaching new moves to ditch American digital companies and Chinese chips in favour of European alternatives.

The Internet Has Become Too American to Trust | The Walrus

Trump and Big Tech have fused into a new kind of threat

Create a CIA-style European spy service, von der Leyen is told

The bloc should green-light a “fully fledged intelligence cooperation service at the EU level,” said former Finnish President Sauli Niinistö in a sweeping new report.

W Social, public institutions and the theater of European digital sovereignty | Hacker News

And weirdly, there was never a peep about this in the press - while the W Social launch was on national news and a bunch of high-profile EU politicians immediately joined. What's going on here?

Artificial Intelligence

Europe is transforming into the AI continent by fostering the development and uptake of new AI applications while ensuring that AI remains safe and respect EU values.

Privacy as EU Tech advantage - The LeafPlaza Blog

Online crime loves legal massive data collection, grey systems, and jurisdictional gaps. Privacy-first design can actually reduce crime exposure and build trust in digital services. It is also central to the EU's tech autonomy: build systems aligning with European rights and risk models. Do not rely on foreign platforms or copy outside practices that might go against the EU values and needs.

All the Ways Europe Is Ditching American Technology

A WIRED timeline shows how dozens of governments, companies, and other organizations across Europe are moving, or planning to shift, away from US Big Tech.

Europe's W Social Bet Tests its Vision of Digital Sovereignty

The European Commission has joined W Social, a closed-source platform. Megan Kirkwood asks what that reveals about Europe's digital sovereignty agenda.

Elena Rossini 🌈 (@_elena@mastodon.social)

Attached: 1 image This was definitely NOT on my bingo card for this year: European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen taking a moment between G7 meetings to promote the launch of the closed-source, for-profit network #WSocial. 🔗 : https://web.archive.org/web/20260617083436/https://www.linkedin.com/posts/rentzhog_kind-of-cool-to-see-ursula-von-der-leyen-ugcPost-7472769475885461504-hwct/ I fear this may be a harbinger of things to come: MANDATORY AGE VERIFICATION for social media across Europe. I hope I'm wrong on this. #privacy #SurveillanceCapitalism #EUBigTech

As more Americans adopt AI tools, fewer say they can trust the results | TechCrunch

AI adoption is rising in the U.S., but trust remains low, with most Americans concerned about transparency, regulation, and the technology’s broader societal impact, according to a new Quinnipiac poll.

AI alliance Cohere and Aleph Alpha

Cohere and Aleph Alpha, two trusted sovereign AI providers for governments and regulated industries, today announce their plan to join forces. This transatlantic alliance would combine Cohere’s global AI scale with Aleph Alpha’s strong research excellence and deep institutional relationships, forging a globally competitive AI champion backed by their Canadian and German ecosystems. The initiative reflects a shared vision: To provide the world with an independent, enterprise-grade sovereign alternative in an era of growing AI concentration and to ensure that organizations do not need to relinquish control over their own AI stack.

The EU Is Going Through a Trump-Fueled Breakup With Big Tech

France is already moving on from Zoom and Microsoft Teams in favor of homegrown alternatives. Other countries are quickly following suit.

Commission proposes tech sovereignty package to strengthen Europe\'s digital autonomy and resilience

The European Commission today presented the European Technological Sovereignty Package, a set of measures to strengthen Europe\'s capacity in semiconductors, artificial intelligence (AI), cloud and open source.

Putin announces international AI alliance to enhance cooperation in AI development and infrastructure

Putin unveils the BRICS+ AI Alliance to build shared computing infrastructure and challenge Western AI dominance. Here's what it means for crypto investors.

Privacy and/or Trade

International privacy and trade law developed together, but are now engaged in significant conflict. Current efforts to reconcile the two are likely to fail, an