Governments want to move away from “platforms over which we have no control,” says Dutch minister.

Sure, that is fair enough. But why is EU not setting up their own servers for whisper or activity pub or whatever OSS protocols and just make that their only official and approved communication channel?

European civil servants, some of whom I have worked with, do most of the stuff that is uncontrollable while slightly pissed on roof bars after work. WhatsApp is the least of their problems.

Edit: love the downvoted from people who have never overheard red trouser lot speaking about current operations in a London pub slightly too loudly ... you have no idea!

The problem with these efforts is always the same: organizations make their own messenger, and the fact that these organizations then have control over their own messenger ... means their employees won't use it. And that's ignoring that you can bet your firstborn they cut corners developing these messengers, so they're not pleasant to use to boot. In 2026 you still hear complaints of government employees that they only have 200 mb of mailbox space ... sigh

People "don't trust" in the very abstract sense, Mark Zuckerberg. But in a very real sense they don't trust their manager at all, and they know their own manager can see their messages on the "sovereign" messenger. Zuckerberg wants to sell them stuff they don't want on occasion. Their manager ... well they're cheating their manager.

Oh and it doesn't even buy extra security: the platform owners can spy directly through hardware backdoors, they can "update" any app on the phone, and they have the root keys to the secure element, and so it isn't secure to them. And if you look under the covers ... the backend is on AWS? No? Must be on Azure then.

So annoying lots of people, reducing functionality, for no actual security.

Sure sounds like EU governments are behind this ...

Good. The US is gone.

Very good. No backstabbing DARPA shit in our house

European civil servants are also usually banned from using AI — perhaps with the exception of Microsoft copilot. They live in a bubble where they just don’t know. This goes for most academics as well.

It’s just common sense.

Quite a euphemism, framing regime henchmen as civil servants.