France wants international ‘fight’ against encrypted messages

French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said on Thursday that he wants to fight against the encryption of messages together with Germany. To this end, he wants to set up a European initiative with the option of an ‘international action plan’.

According to Cazeneuve, the majority of messages related to the export of terrorist attacks are sent encrypted. As a result, the French intelligence services can no longer intercept the messages of extremists, Reuters writes.

The attacker who cut the throat of a French priest in July is said to have communicated mainly via Telegram, according to the report. Services such as WhatsApp also use end-to-end encryption.

Cazeneuve meets his German colleague Thomas de Maizière on August 23 in Paris. The two ministers will then discuss France’s proposals. Whether that also means that France wants decryption techniques from the service providers themselves to be made available, the minister did not want to say to Reuters.

Germany is also busy with counter-terrorism measures, including expediting the deportation of criminal foreigners and rejected asylum seekers. A new package of measures announced yesterday also requires doctors to give up their professional secrecy if they suspect someone is planning to commit a crime.