UK ministers seek to allay WhatsApp and Signal concerns in encryption row

The kicker here really is in the last two paragraphs, quotes from opposite sides of the civil society debate:

  Richard Collard, the head of child safety online policy at the NSPCC, said: “This statement reinforces how the online safety bill sets out a balanced settlement that should encourage companies to mitigate the risks of child sexual abuse when designing and rolling out features like end-to-end encryption. It does not change the requirements in the legislation.”

Distinct from:

  A spokesperson for the campaign organisation Index on Censorship said: “The online safety bill as currently drafted is still a threat to encryption and as such puts at risk everyone from journalists working with whistleblowers to ordinary citizens talking in private. We need to see amendments urgently to protect our right to free speech online.”