French Prime Minister Manuel Valls has stated that France will not ban public Wi-Fi nor the Tor anonymity network following the terrorist attacks in Paris, stating “Internet is a freedom.”
Valls’ announcement comes after police urged the country’s government to impose restrictions upon the Internet in order to potentially limit terrorist organization ISIS’ communications. However, Valls has now confirmed that this will not be the case, releasing a statement on Wednesday saying: “A ban of Wi-Fi is not a course of action envisaged. Internet is a freedom, is an extraordinary means of communication between people, it is a benefit to the economy.”
It had been reported earlier in the week that France was looking to outlaw encrypting software such as Tor, which allows users to access the Internet anonymously, in an attempt to make it more difficult for ISIS members to communicate with one another online. ISIS have notably been using the Telegram messaging app, which boasts higher levels of encryption than competitors such as WhatsApp.
But the push against encryption isn’t limited to France. As the Daily Dot notes, US Senator for California Dianne Feinstein proposed a bill intended to “pierce” encryption, which followed her re-introduction of another bill in which she called for social media companies to report any terrorist activity. This bill had previously been blocked due to being “terribly vague.”
Imposing restrictions upon the Internet has become a major point of contention among the world’s governments, with US presidential candidate Donald Trump recently saying that he was going to talk to Bill Gates about “closing parts of it down.”
