Last month Cindy Cohn, executive director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), was a guest at The Daily Show. The occasion for her appearance was her departure from the organization and recent rulings in two lawsuits against Meta and Google. Digital rights have never been so mainstream.

EFF is the oldest digital rights organization in the world. In 1990, John Perry Barlow was one of its founding members. You might also know him as the writer of the influential 1996 paper 'A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace'. It opens with the following words:

"Governments of the Industrial World, you weary giants of flesh and steel, I come from Cyberspace, the new home of Mind. On behalf of the future, I ask you of the past to leave us alone. You are not welcome among us. You have no sovereignty where we gather."

The idea that the internet must be protected from the government has held its ground. What has held less ground is the notion that there is absolutely no need for government involvement with the internet.

During the interview with Cindy Cohn, a very familiar regulatory question came up: should online "intermediaries", such as Meta and Google, be held accountable for what users upload?

One the one hand, the argument goes that if you make hosting providers liable for what user upload, no 'hoster' will allow users to upload content anymore. After all, they won't be able to rule out whether something harmful or illegal is involved, so they'll play it safe. Censorship then looms on the horizon. On the other hand, the argument is that, just as newspapers can be held responsible for what they publish, platforms should be responsible for what appears on their feeds.

And what do we think? In 2017 we wrote that we think there is a 'middle ground' - namely, holding (some) platforms accountable for the effects of the design choices they make. In that case, a platform is not responsible for a hateful post that a user places somewhere in a corner of the platform. But the platform will be held accountable if it picks up that post, places an advertisement next to it, and brings it to the attention of all its users. To put it bluntly.

The focus on design decisions has become a key element of the Digital Services Act, and was also the focus of our lawsuit against Meta. Design choices were also central to the two lawsuits that concluded in the US this month. In those cases, Meta and Google were held accountable for the harm people suffered due to the design of their platforms.

Great news, right?

Yes, we agree, but not without danger either. One of those 'design decisions' that has come under scrutiny? Encryption. In one of the cases the public prosecutor (of the state of New Mexico) argued that the ability to communicate via encryption on Instagram had endangered children. Perhaps anticipating the ruling, Meta announced earlier this month that encrypted messaging on Instagram will no longer be possible starting May 8th. Ouch.

Also from John Perry Barlow's "Declaration": "I declare the global social space we are building to be naturally independent of the tyrannies you seek to impose on us." If we have learned anything in the past thirty years, it is that nowhere are we "naturally" free from the possibility of tyranny. If we do not remain critical of government intervention, we run the risk of simply swapping one tyrant for another.

Together with  Stichting Data Bescherming Nederland (Non Profit Organization Data Protection the Netherlands) we wrote a position paper to the Dutch Senate and the Chamber of Representatives. With it we point their attention to the risks for human rights if these amendments would be passed.

We are worried about the proposal to weaken the term 'personal data'. If the European Commission gets their way, psuedonymised data (data that can be traced to a person with a key), is no longer always personal data. Right now it is.

Psuedonymised data will only be part of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) if it is probable that the party accountable for the processing of the data has the means to trace it back to a person. This is not only very vague, but also hard to check; what makes the data 'personal data' for one processing party, and not for another? Psuedonymised data is not only traceable to a person with a key. Sometimes it is possible to put together who's data it is by the combination of data. For example, if you track someones travel behavior, you can figure out where this person lives. That is why the safeguards that the GDPR put on data are also important for psuedonymised data. Messing around with that brings a lot of (juridical) uncertainty to everyone involved and it makes supervision more complicated.

The European Commission would also like to make it easier to process special categories of personal data when training AI-models. If it is up to the Commission, the parties that process data can safe themselves the trouble of removing this data from a data set if it is too complicated to do so. But the processing of special categories of personal data is in general not allowed. Data about someones ethnicity, sexuality, health, religion or political preference is so sensitive, that the risks for this data falling into the wrong hands, are unacceptably big.

What did we see the past couple years? With the use of AI these risks often come true, for example, people with certain ethnicities or religions get discrimination through profiling algorithms. Therefore it is unfathomable that such an important article from the GDPR, that has links to many constitutional and human rights, would be weakened.

But the obsession of the European Commission to quickly and largely train AI doesn't stop  there. Because of the GDPR, parties that process personal data need to have a legal ground to use this data, like permission, an agreement, or a duty by law. You need to have a good reason to process personal data. Often this is lacking when training or using AI. The solution according to the Commision: fabricate a legal ground for the development and use of AI, by adding a special amendment for this into the GDPR. With this, the use of AI is no longer a means, but a goal.

The European Commission acts like they propose these amendments to lessen the administrative work load. They say that we don't have to worry about the human rights violations. But that is not true. The amendments have very little to do with lessening the administrative work load while our human right are weakened if these amendments come into effect. Therefore we strongly advice the Dutch government to reject these harmful proposals. They have to remind the European Commission that the interest of the European citizens should be protected over the interest of tech companies.

In the Netherlands, everyone knows about BOB. "BOB" refers to the person who agrees to stay alcohol-free to drive friends or family home safely. It's the most successful government campaign ever, partly started by the police. For more than three decades, she has reminded us to show restraint.

But restraint is exactly what the police struggles to show. With the Crime Anticipating System, CAS, she turns innocent civilians into suspects.
Her databases are filled with faces that don't belong there. She deploys facial recognition technology when she shouldn't. And while collecting all this data, none of her 36 most sensitive apps comply with Dutch privacy and information-security standards.

And that's not all. Under the guise of innovation, she knowingly pushes beyond the limits of the permissible. Under the guise of security, she deliberately ignores data-retention limits and stores data indefinitely. And in the name of public order, she pays intimidating house visits to innocent citizens who are interested in attending a protest. On the 20th of februari 2026, we awarded the police the Big Brother Awards 2025 public Award for exactly this behaviour.

Which brings us to the following news on the 3th of march 2026: an investigation found that approximately 1,700 police officers accessed police databases to look up information about the violent death of Lisa from Abcoude - even though in many cases there was no clear operational reason to do so. That’s how the Dutch Minister of Justice and Security begins her letter to Parliament, informing lawmakers of yet another large-scale privacy violation by the police.

In response, all 1,700 employees will be questioned. The police also says she is reviewing her information security and -management. Whether this is truly an information-security problem remains to be seen.

It makes sense that officers can access case files. But did all 1,700 of them need that access to this one?

While I’m curious to hear the answer, I’m also worried the question distracts from the real issue: the police consistently fails to show restraint. In her use of technology. In the collection of data. In storing it. And in accessing it.

New legislation is on the way that will allow the police to monitor more of our online life and deploy even more technology against us. That legislation should, of course, be as limited as possible. But that will only have effect if something changes in the day-to-day reality of police work. The police must cultivate a culture of limits.

A culture of restraint.

Maybe we can help them with that - with a campaign slogan.

Got inspiration? Share your slogan with us!

• Fake friend notifications: Snapchat sends notifications on behalf of accounts, which imply to have been sent by the account itself. However, Snapchat is sending these messages.  The messages refer to content posted by the account, encouraging users to open the notification. 
• Notifications with false information. During our investigation we received a notification from Snapchat with the text “Check out this spotlight post from a creator you follow”. We didn’t follow anyone. 
• Time sensitive notifications. Snapchat marks notifications regarding permanent content as time sensitive, 1) increasing urgency with users to view content and 2) causing these notifications to override focus modes on smartphones (such as ‘do not disturb’). All the while the notification doesn’t link to time sensitive content, but to permanent content. In doing so, Snapchat creates unnecessary pressure. 

Based on the above alleged breaches of the law, we’ve submitted a request for enforcement with the ACM. The ACM is the Dutch regulator for to the DSA. Because Snapchat resides in the Netherlands, the ACM has to regulate the platform. A request for enforcement is an administrative measure through which we can ask the ACM to act on the alleged breaches. The ACM must decide on the request, which can be contested or objected against. Because of that, a request for enforcement is a stronger measure than a complaint, wherein the ACM isn’t bound to make a decision. 

In the request for enforcement we’ve asked the ACM to act on these notifications sent by Snapchat. We’ll keep you posted on the outcomes! 

Sometimes we forget that what we measure is not reality itself. It is a representation of reality. This representation does not come about arbitrarily. We make choices about what we measure, but also how, when, where, how often, and by whom. These are variables that can make a difference to the resulting model of reality.

Therefore it is also an illusion that data are an objective representation of the world. This representation often says something about the world, but just as much about how we see the world. We try to divide the world into categories: male or female, young or old, trustworthy or not trustworthy.

Lets look at a simple example. The length of an object is hard to dispute. But if the measuring instrument is imprecise, you still end up with a distorted picture of reality. An object can also change in size over time. Whether this matters, depends on the context in which you take the measurement. Misrepresenting a person's height by a few millimeters is not a serious problem. However, in aircraft maintenance, precise measurements of materials do matter, because a difference of a few millimeters can have unforeseen consequences.

Length is still something tangible. But lets look at something more abstract, like income. This cannot be directly observed in the world. The word "income" is itself a category, an umbrella term for something. What we mean by income is not a number in itself - that number alone tells us very little. 3000 euros of income means something very different in the Netherlands compared to another country. Income is really an approximation of what a person can afford in the world. In rental situations, we want to know whether someone can pay the rent. In benefits assessments, we want to know whether someone can make ends meet without support. Without context, without interpretation, data are meaningless and without value. It is only within a particular context that they acquire meaning.

Another example: a zip code. In one context, simply an indication of a geographical location. But in another context, it can be interpreted as a predictor of reoffending. The same value, but an entirely different meaning.

"We are not our data, but we are treated as if we are - out of convenience and efficiency."

In an era of data-driven working, it may seem logical to make one organization responsible for data management. That organization collects the data, monitors quality, and keeps everything up to date. The advantage seems clear: fewer inconsistencies, fewer trivial errors, one standardized way of organizing things. For citizens, centralization means they only have to submit their details once. For the government, it means decisions can be made more quickly, because all the necessary information is immediately available.

But that advantage is also the disadvantage. Because data come from a single source, the context in which they were generated is lost. Those who use the data also have no clear picture of how the data came to be. Different organizations use data for different purposes. For one organization, income means only a person's monthly salary; for another, it also includes any benefits or allowances they receive. In one context, the fact that someone has received a benefit has no consequences; in another context, that benefit causes the person to be wrongly rejected when applying for support.

When data are detached from the organizations that actually use them, something is lost. Those organizations find it harder to deliver tailored solutions. They also find it harder to explain how they reached decisions, because those decisions are based on data supplied to them according to standards determined elsewhere.

In addition, the original purposes for which the data were collected become blurred. Under the dutch interpretation of the General Data Protection Regulation, data collected for one purpose may not simply be used for another. But when data management is centralized, the same data are used for multiple purposes: making the principle of purpose limitation difficult to uphold.

People whose data do not fit neatly into existing categories, face particular difficulties. Supplying this data becomes harder, because it does not fit tidily into the predefined boxes. A self-employed person with a fluctuating income, someone with a complex family situation, a person whose life simply doesn't fit the available boxes: they fall through the cracks.

"We can now easily find out all sorts of things about people without involving them at all. Just because we can, does not mean we should."

Data should not be the leading principle. When you store information about people, you see that data separately from the person themselves. In the past, finding out about someone meant knocking on their door or picking up the phone. There was direct contact. Now, with existing data, all kinds of conclusions can be drawn about someone without that person knowing they are being investigated. They cannot defend themselves or raise an objection until they experience the consequences.

What does it mean that our data are viewed separately from ourselves? We are not our data, but we are treated as if we are - out of convenience and efficiency. This separation between person and data representation has far-reaching consequences for how we approach and treat people. We can now easily find out all sorts of things about people without involving them at all. Just because we can, does not mean we should.

The government considers data centralization worthwhile and accepts its drawbacks. It prioritizes efficiency for the majority, even if it becomes harder for those who do not fit the system. But the government exists to serve everyone. And so the government owes it to these people not to leave them behind.

In concrete terms, this means we must design systems that accommodate exceptions - and do not treat them as an afterthought. A human reviewer should always be available for complex cases. There must be transparency about how citizens' data are processed. Organizations must be able to account for how they interpret data. And above all: we must not mistake the map for the territory. Data are a representation of reality. Not reality itself.

At such a young age children can't express what they're comfortable with and they fully depend on their parents. When parents share most of their life on social media, it is a real violation of privacy for those children. At the same time it exposes children to reactions online, which can have bad impact on their mental health. The episode of BOOS generated quite a stir about family vloggers and the rights of children in these families including the right for privacy.

Bert Hubert, a software developer and tech commentator, receives the Felipe Rodriquez Award 2025 from Bits of Freedom for his idea of ‘Cloud Kootwijk’.  He brought to light a subject that very important for the digital rights movement. For a long time we have been saying that the Dutch government is too dependent of American Big Tech companies. Trump’s appointment and the striking actions from Big Tech gave a new urgency to digital sovereignty. Hubert converted this into a concrete proposal: Cloud Kootwijk.

Last February, Bert Hubert wrote an article about ‘Cloud Kootwijk’ in which he draws an analogy to Radio Kootwijk. In 1918 the Netherlands started building the Dutch radio connection, because dependence on foreign countries caused problems for communication.

Hubert argues that in 2025 we will again be depended on foreign countries for our communication. Especially when the Dutch government intends to run all communication on American servers. They have been using American companies - such as Microsoft - for a long time. Hubert therefore proposes a ‘Cloud Kootwijk’, on which our government, healthcare and authorities can communicate without the knowledge of the United States.

Together these three organizations ensured a campaign to raise awareness about the bill that criminalize ‘glorification of terrorism’ and makes public statements to support so-called terrorist organizations illegal. In doing so, the organizations shared their concerns about freedom of expression and the right to demonstrate. The Rights Forum, Plant een Olijfboom and PAX called for a response to the bill during the internet consultation. They explained very well why and how people could respond. As a result people resisted en masse.

The Rights Forum is focused on Dutch and European policy having to do with Palestine, focusing on international law and human rights.

Plant en Olijfboom is committed to fair peace in Palestine with equality for all citizens.

PAX uses their expertise to help protect civilians from war violence and build inclusive peace.

Together they have worked to protect the rights of people who speak out against the genocide in Gaza. Bits of Freedom notices that the freedom of expression and the right to demonstrate is under pressure for these groups, including through the bill. The organizations have raised awareness about the bill and mobilized resistance.

Felipe Rodriquez was a very passionate pioneer around the start of the Dutch internet. He is the founder of XS4ALL, the first internet provider for individuals, because he wanted to make the internet accessible to everyone. He is also one of the founders of The Digital City, which was of great importance in the formation of an inclusive online community in the Netherlands. Rodriquez invented the Child Porn Reporting Center in 1995 that has become a crucial tool in combating child abuse. He also played a major role in the creation of Bits of Freedom. After his early death in 2015 this prize was created in his spirit, for someone who stands out positively in defending our privacy and online freedom.

The police themselves are very unclear about the function and status of these house visits. As a result, people do not know whether they are suspected of anything, or whether the conversation counts as an interrogation, what triggers the home visit, what is being done with what they say and what their rights are at the time. "The police's lack of awareness about this unequal power relationship is appalling," says Evelyn Austin, Director of Bits of Freedom. "In addition, unannounced house visits are extremely intimidating. It can set a threshold for people to exercise their right to demonstrate or to express themselves. You want to prevent the police from knocking on your door."

"Of the circa 100 algorithms used by the Dutch tax authority, half of them do not comply with the legal rules."

According to the expert jury members, the Big Brother Awards offers an excellent opportunity to draw attention to violations that may already be known, but which nevertheless receive too little attention. In that light, the jury designates the Dutch Tax Administration as the winner of the Expert Prize. She also gives a special mention to Microsoft, who was nominated for her contribution to the genocide in Palestine from her data center in the Netherlands. According to the jury, it's important that we pay much more attention to this.

The Dutch Tax Administration gets this award for the unlawful use of algorithms. Of the 100 algorithms used, half do not comply with the legal rules. "We spoke with unanimous indignation about the actions of the Dutch Tax Administration," explains the four-headed jury in a report. "It is shocking to see that the Dutch Tax Administration - after the enormous damage of the child benefits scandal - still uses illegal algorithms. Precisely because we know the serious consequences of using discriminatory algorithms by the Dutch Tax Administration, the current use of such algorithms appears to be malicious. It is highly problematic that the Dutch Tax Administration does not learn from her mistakes." If it is up to us, then the tax authorities must immediately comply with the law.

The Big Brother Awards was organised by us for the twentieth time this year. With this evening we investigate how privacy and internet freedom are doing in the Netherlands.

The immediate result of this is that since the beginning of this year, most Facebook and Instagram users in the Netherlands have been able to choose between two feeds. One compiled by Meta, based on the profile created about you. The other is a feed with posts from the accounts you follow in chronological order.

In the appeal, Meta no longer contested the violation of the DSA. The company withdrew all substantive objections one working day before the hearing. It only asked the court to rule on a number of procedural points. Most importantly, Meta contested the urgent nature of the lawsuit. It also considered the deadline it had been given by the judge to implement the requested changes too short. On both points, the judge upheld the initial verdict.

With this judgement, users' freedom of choice remains intact. The Court of Appeal, like the preliminary relief judge, “is of the opinion that the claims are urgent in nature.” Bits of Freedom has a continuing urgent interest in the claim due to the "continuing unlawful conduct [...] in violation of the DSA”, precisely because it concerns the freedom of information gathering. The Court of Appeal increased the penalty to 10 million euros because the maximum set in the summary proceedings was “an insufficient incentive for compliance”.

“The urgency of the case is confirmed by this ruling,” says Evelyn Austin, Executive Director of Bits of Freedom. “Meta has an enormous impact on our freedom of communication and public debate. It is therefore very important that the company complies with our European rules. This judgment shows once again that Meta is not above the law.”

Users in other European countries will have to wait longer before they, too, are given more freedom of choice. The Dutch court only rules on the situation in the Netherlands. Austin: "We are pleased that Meta now to a degree seems to be in compliance with the law in the Netherlands on this point. But it is unacceptable that they continue to violate the law in other European countries. Europe deserves better, and we will fight hard to ensure that European citizens get what they deserve."

Previous research shows that gamification features play a role in attracting and retaining the attention of users. For example, research from  Monge Rofarello et al. (2023) points out attention capturing damaging patterns. These patterns exploit users' attention, causing them to spend more time on a platform than they want. This is accompanied by loss of awareness of time and regret afterwards. Moreover, these patterns can facilitate or even reward excessive smartphone use.

We investigated whether young people, who may be extra sensitive to these patterns than adults, experience such negative effects when using Snapchat gamification features. The focus was on:

• Snapstreak: counts each consecutive day that two users send each other a Snap. The number appears on their chat, accompanied by a fire emoji. When one of the users misses a day, the streak is broken.
• Friend emojis: These emojis appear on a chat with another user and are assigned based on the interaction they have with each other. For example, there is a Friend emoji indicating whether two users are "besties", which means they send each other the most Snaps.
• Snapscore: This score is on the user's profile, visible to friends. The more activity on the app, the more points are added to their score.
• Games in chat conversations: When recording a Snap, the user chooses a lens (a sort of filter) with a game built in. The receiver can answer this Snap with the same lens, in order to compete in the game.

"I have Snapstreaks with people I just keep, because otherwise I'm afraid they'll get angry because the streak is already so high."

With this research, we want to create more insight into the impact of these gamification features on young people; what significance do they have in their social life and what influence do these features have on the estimation of their own screen time?

This helps us provide policy advice and underpin our position on the upcoming European regulation on addictive elements of social media: the Digital Fairness Act (DFA). We argue that techniques aimed at constantly attracting and retaining attention from users undermine their autonomy. That is why users should be able to choose whether or not to use these features.

We conducted both quantitative and qualitative research among young people aged between 13 and 21. This meant that we asked 300 young people questions in an online questionnaire and interviewed eight young people. This enabled us to make statements about percentages of the target group who had a certain experience and to provide underlying explanations. In both studies, the questions were about screen time on Snapchat, their experiences with the Snapstreak, Friend Emojis, the Snapscore and games on Snapchat, how they affect their screen time, and if they want to be able to choose whether or not to use these features.

"Sometimes, if I haven't been on my phone for a long time (12 hours), I'm afraid I will lose some Snapstreaks and I go on my phone, and often I stay on my phone afterwards."

• Although most young people are satisfied with their screen time on Snapchat, some (26% of respondents) find it is too high. This is mainly due to the many messages they receive and want to view from friends, and the pressure they feel from their friends to respond quickly.
• If young people were able to choose which gamification features they want to use, more than half of the interviewees wouldn't choose Friends-emojis, the Snapscore and games in chat conversations. A substantial proportion (42% of respondents) would also choose to get rid of the Snapstreak.
• Meanwhile most young people (40% of the respondents) are neutral about the idea of getting more freedom of choice when it comes to gamification features in Snapchat, for example by being able to turn them on and off. Some explain that, if one does not like or does not want to use these functions, they simply do not have to pay attention to them. But others think that it would be good for young people who are more sensitive to it, and indicate that this was true for them when they were younger.
• Some of the young people (33% of those with a Snapstreak) experience that the Snapstreak affects their screen time. With many, the continuation of the Snapstreak happens automatically, because they chat and Snap with their friends daily. But for some, extending Snapstreaks is actually a reason to open Snapchat every day. Sometimes it's just about not losing the streak, instead of wanting to share something with the other person. For example, they take a picture while they cover the camera, so the interaction actually has little meaning. Then they are distracted by other parts in the app or on their phone. The Snapstreak can really work as a trigger to be on their phones, without adding much value.
• Many young people are actively maintaining Snapstreaks (86% of respondents). Among other things, this is due to the fact that they find it a waste to break a high streak because it takes a lot of time to reach the same number again. They also feel pressure from others to extend the streak: they are afraid to disappoint them and sometimes get actively reminded by the other person. They also think it is a nice representation of how long they are friends with each other, and it takes little effort to extend the streak.
• Moreover, 51% of those who have Snapstreaks, would feel bad if the other person breaks the Snapstreak. 25% of them have paid at least once to restore a broken Snapstreak (that costs €0.99 per streak).
• The respondents cared less about the other gamification features (Friend Emojis, Snapscore and Games in chat conversations) and these therefore have minimal influence on their screen time. However, these elements cause some users to compare themselves with others and to judge others. For example: some try to maintain the status of '#1 best friends' by continuing to send each other the most Snaps (Friends Emojis). To some, it feels like a waste to lose this status, just like the Snapstreaks. If they do lose the Friend Emoji, they get curious with whom the other person is now "best friends". With regard to the Snapscore, there are certain stigmas to having a very low or very high Snapscore. A low Snapscore indicates a fake account or having no friends, and a high score indicates someone who flirts with a lot of different people. Because of misogynistic views, the latter is considered particularly negative for women.

"It's a bit tacky to have a very high Snapscore. It means she talks to a lot of boys."

The majority of participants in this study do not notice any significant effect of the specific gamification features (in isolation) on their screen time. This aligns with previous research into addictive design. This showed that the emergence of an addiction is highly dependent on the person, and that a specific design technique alone (such as a gamification feature) can not be assigned as 'addictive'. Instead, it involves the interplay of all design choices within an app that can stimulate excessive smartphone use.

Although the majority of respondents do not experience a negative impact of the gamification features, it is important to pay attention to the group that is affected. Some of them experience more pressure and screen time on Snapchat than they want. Legislation and policy should protect vulnerable groups. Our recommendations are:

• Define gamification features on social media platforms in legislation;
• Make gamification features on social media optional;
• Provide transparent information to users about how gamification features work.

"I might also turn these elements off myself. Then people maybe won't say that I have to respond because they want to have points."

The upcoming European Digital Fairness Act offers an excellent opportunity to include measures on gamification for social media. The purpose of this law is to formulate measures surrounding manipulative and addictive design on online platforms. We have send this research report to policy makers so they can take the results into consideration when developing this law.

 Read the full report here.

The consequence is that Meta, at this moment, legally no longer disputes having violated the Digital Services Act (DSA). And that is, of course, a victory. The changes that Meta has been forced to implement under the court’s order will remain in place for now. Because the Dutch court, obviously, only has jurisdiction in the Netherlands, users in other European countries will have to wait a little longer before they have the same freedom.

Although all Meta’s substantive grounds for an appeal are off the table, many other matters were discussed during the hearing. Is a certain menu, as designed by Meta, actually a menu for users? Can only Meta in Ireland be held liable for the violations, or also Meta’s entities in the Netherlands and the United States? And do we, as Bits of Freedom, have an urgent interest? That is probably the most important point: if the judge does not recognise it, we could not have started the summary proceeding in the first place.

We are not worried. The judge that ruled in our summary proceedings was very clear on this matter. The freedom to gather information is a fundamental right which is part of the freedom of expression. This right is protected for the sake of a healthy public debate, which in turn is essential for a democratic society. The judge in his ruling: “In that light, the claims brought in these summary proceedings are, by their nature, urgent.”

On April 7th we will receive the judgment of the appeal. In the meantime, Dutch users of Facebook and Instagram can decide for themselves which information they want to see.

In recent years, the large scale data collection practices and the development of technology has made it easier to link data together. By combining different data sets, it becomes possible to even trace anonymized data back to a person. Think of travel data, for example. Someone who keeps taking the same route to work, can quite easily be identified. Because of this, there are high standards for anonymization, which requires taking into account the possibility that someone may still be identified. The European Commission is now completely ignoring this by wanting to exclude pseudonymization from the GDPR. And that has significant consequences for individuals in Europe, because encrypted data is collected at a large scale. Now safeguards need to be taken to protect the data, which includes the consideration that data does because traceable to a person. With this proposal, all these safeguards disappear.

Currently, the GDPR prohibits the processing of special categories of personal data. This includes, for example, data about a person's health, ethnicity, religion, sexuality, and biometric data. This prohibition exists because the processing of such data is inherently risky for the people it concerns. For example, a person's fingerprint or facial identification data are unique to that person. Misuse of this data can have serious consequences for the person themselves and/or for society at large. For example, if AI applications are used to create deepfakes that make someone do or say something that they didn’t do or say, or be somewhere where they haven’t been. Data about someone's ethnicity, religion, or sexual orientation can be misused to discriminate against them. And data about someone's health can reveal a lot about their personal life. It is therefore logical that there is a ban on processing this data. But if it is up to the European Commission, that ban will be lifted for the development and use of artificial intelligence. This is completely incomprehensible, because it is precisely in AI applications that we see human rights risks, including the rights to equal treatment, freedom of religion, and freedom of expression. Lifting the ban on the processing of personal data with demonstrably bigger risks, is contrary to the goal of the GDPR.

Lifting the ban on the processing of personal data with demonstrably bigger risks, is contrary to the goal of the GDPR.

The AI Act was adopted in 2024, after years of negotiation and following a democratic process. Even before the AI Act has fully entered into force, the European Commission is trying to weaken important rights. For example, it proposed to abolish the registration requirement for high-risk systems, if the provider itself does not see any “significant” risk to health, safety, or fundamental rights. So even if an AI application is considered high-risk under the law, the provider can decide that the risks are not so bad, and choose not to include it in the register. As a result, people, NGOs, and regulators will no longer be able to monitor which high-risk AI applications are being used.

The European Commission also wants to delay the ability of regulators to impose fines on those that put dangerous AI applications on the market. This turns the AI Act into a paper tiger, even before the law has fully entered into force.

The European Commission says its goal is to promote innovation and economic growth. It also promises that fundamental rights will be protected. But nothing could be further from the truth. The proposals made by the European Commission have little to do with simplification and the reduction of administrative burdens. And if these proposals are adopted, the most important fundamental rights in these laws will be irreparably weakened. This will not only have a huge impact on the way we view and apply these laws. It will also radically change our society and private lives. Because if your most sensitive and intimate personal data can be used for AI, and your data can be processed on a large scale in encrypted form without anyone having to comply with the obligations of the GDPR, what protection remains?

Because if your most sensitive and intimate personal data can be used for AI, and your data can be processed on a large scale in encrypted form without anyone having to comply with the obligations of the GDPR, what protection remains?

The Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs also warns that the European Commission's proposals pose too great a risk to fundamental rights. Moreover, the Ministry also sees that the proposals do not fully correspond with the European Commission's stated objectives. The Netherlands therefore wants to ask for clarification on the proposals. We think that this will not make much of a difference. To prevent our rights from being taken away, more is needed than a friendly conversation. The Netherlands and other EU Member States must send these poor proposals back to the Commission. Weakening and undermining laws that have been established through a democratic process does not suit the European Union. Nor is undermining the rights of European citizens and businesses through backdoor measures and false pretenses.

]]> Last November, the European Commission published the Digital Omnibus. A collection of proposals for laws that threaten to undermine all kinds of important digital rights. In this article, we dive deeper into what these proposals entail.

We are also happy with the suggestions you made. It turned out that some of you missed a few steps: what about alternatives to Windows as an operating system or an Office suite, for example? Since a number of questions came up frequently, we are happy to address them here. We aren't offering a step-by-step transition guide like we did for the previous steps, but we are sharing our recommendations.

Windows (by Microsoft) is by far the most widely used operating system for computers worldwide, followed by macOS for Apple computers. For smartphones, Android (Google) and iOS (Apple) are the most common. There are alternatives for these as well. Switching simply requires a bit more effort than just replacing an app. Moreover, a new operating system can feel a bit unfamiliar at first.

Our recommendation? Linux. This is a group of open-source operating systems that has many variations. Each version is developed with a specific goal. One version of that is Ubuntu, a free and very user-friendly operating system. At Bits of Freedom, we work with Ubuntu ourselves, and it is one of the most popular Linux versions. Another recommended alternative is Linux Mint, which is based on Ubuntu and looks very similar to Windows. This is handy if you are used to the Windows interface.

You can install Linux operating systems on any computer that also runs Windows or macOS. They often still run well on older hardware. So, if you have an old computer lying around that you no longer use: install Linux and give it a second life.

Not all software that runs on Windows or macOS is available for Linux, so before switching, check which apps are necessary for you and available. However, there are almost always open-source alternatives. For example, GIMP is an alternative to Adobe Photoshop (which does not work on Linux). If you want to check for yourself if there are open-source alternatives for a specific program, consult: https://alternativeto.net/.

Do you want to switch to Linux? We recommend looking up a guide for the specific version, such as the one for Ubuntu. It is quite a project, so you could also ask around to see if someone can help you.

Already running on Linux? Maybe you can help others in your network with their Linux installation.

Microsoft has Office, Excel, and PowerPoint; Google has Docs, Sheets, and Slides; and Apple has Pages, Numbers, and Keynote. Whether we like it or not, we spend a significant amount of time inside those programs. Fortunately, there is a very good open-source alternative for this: LibreOffice.

The advantages of LibreOffice:

• Can open all file types;
• Can also save files in .docx format;
• Saves files by default as .odt, an open file format, which can also be opened by others in Google Docs or Microsoft Office.

If you want to collaborate with others in documents, look for an online solution. All the options we advise in the step for a privacy-friendly cloud have text processors available. We have had particularly good experiences with Nextcloud and the accompanying Nextcloud Office, which has everything you need: a text processor, spreadsheets, and editing tools for presentations.

Where do you jot down your thoughts and tasks? Apple Notes, Microsoft OneNote, or Google Keep? Switch to one of these open-source alternatives:

• Joplin
• Standard Notes (by Proton)

Are you completely done with Microsoft Teams or Google Meet? In this area, there are alternatives too, of course! We recommend the following services when you want to make video calls:

• kMeet from Infomaniak;
• Signal.

What you write down can be sensitive, and it can be stored indefinitely by grammar and spelling checkers or translation websites. The following tools do not do that:

• LanguageTool: For grammar and spelling checks, but also advice on style and paraphrasing.
• LibreTranslate: An open-source translation website.

Spotify is busy promoting AI-generated music, pays artists almost nothing when their music is listened to, and invests in weapons. Alternatives are:

• Deezer;
• TIDAL.

Keeping up with news, blogs, and all kinds of feeds can be time-consuming. Fortunately, there are (RSS) feed readers, where you can collect different ‘feeds’, so that you keep one clear overview. This works for many news websites and blogs, but also for Reddit or a YouTube channel. This way, you can keep following a YouTube channel without creating an account with YouTube itself. We recommend:

• Feeder for Android;
• NewsFlash for Linux;
• NetNewsWire for iOS and Mac.

To show that you have switched to social media without the intervention of Big Tech, you can download the badge and social media posts below. You can also include the badge in your email signature, for example. Hopefully, this encourages others to switch too! Do you want to do this offline as well? Order the sticker set in our webshop!

Starting this year, dutch users are offered a choice again. When you open Instagram or Facebook, you can choose Meta’s timeline (‘for you’) or a chronological timeline based on accounts you follow (‘following’). And that choice is saved. For instance, when you switch between you direct messages and then switch back to the timeline, or when you close and reopen the app, the following timeline is still the one that you see. This is true for the landing page, when you open the app, as well as the Reels page and the overview of reactions on content.

No endless scrolling. No rabbit hole. No time drain. In short: more control over what your attention is drawn to.

This new ability to choice hasn’t remained unnoticed. We’ve been flooded with messages from people who are incredibly happy with the friend-only timeline. People seem to experience it as a relief. The content doesn’t include psychological tricks to keep you hooked, which results in users reporting less time spend online. And foremost, the endless scroll isn’t possible anymore. No rabbit hole. No time drain. In short: more control over what your attention is drawn to.

Meta obviously didn’t make the change of their own accord. The company always puts her own interest first. You as a user and we as a society come second at best. Meta has every interest in getting to deciding what you see. That way she can keep you on her platforms longer, generating more income from advertisments. Meta uses every kind of sneaky trick to keep you hooked and redirect your attention back to her timeline. That was a violation of the law.

Meta implemented changes because we forced Meta. We’re happy the judge agreed with us; Meta had to update her platforms. She was given until the end of 2025. Taking stock of the situation now, we see that Meta has largely complied with the judge’s orders. The coming period we will ensure Meta fully complies with all orders.

When the European Commission published its fine for X for non-compliance with DSA transparency requirements, the Committee on the Judicial called the decision a "secret [...] censorship order"Through a statement on X. and promised: "The Committee will continue investigating to protect American innovation and American speech from foreign censors."

Yesterday, on 3 February 2026, the House Committee published its second reportFull report (PDF): "The Foreign Censorship Threat, Part II: Europe’s Decade-Long Campaign to Censor the Global Internet and How It Harms American Speech in the United States". Among other things, the report makes mention of the round table that the Dutch Authority for Consumer and Market, responsible for overseeing the DSA in the Netherlands, organised in the run up to parliamentary elections late last year. The report frames the meeting as an attempt to censor and calls the NGOs present, including Bits of Freedom and Justice for Prosperity, "censorious". The report does not offer any further explanation.

The report is a deliberate attack on our democratic rule of law, on how we organise, how we make agreements and how we enforce those agreements. The US does this by undermining the legitimacy of the legislator, regulators and European civil society. This is pure harassment and undermines our autonomy; we must be able to decide ourselves how to organise our society. If US companies want to operate in Europe, they have to comply with our legislation. The United States are entitled to their opinions, but actively interfering goes too far. If we dance to the US' tune, citizens will pay the price: less transparency, more (political) manipulation on platforms and less protection against doxxing and hate campaigns.

The focus on the Digital Services Act also shows how powerful this law is, as a means to curb Big Tech. It also shows the need for rapid enforcement. Moreover, the dominance of American technology in our society shows how vulnerable we are to foreign interference and censorship and how our autonomy is at stake.

It is important that the European Union continues to speak out against intimidation that undermines our democratic processes. The European Commission must keep its back straight and uphold the law. Authorities should continue or even intensify enforcement. It is also important to ensure that authorities are mindful of the increased threat level surrounding DSA enforcement and protect civil society organisations, which are crucial to enforcement, against risks. Finally, Europe must reduce its dependency on US technology.

As described above, five sanctions have already been imposed through entry bans (visa measures) against Europeans involved in DSA enforcement and research and criticism of platform power. It shows that framing around 'censorship' can easily turn into threats and personal repercussions. We call on the European Commission and the Dutch government to now visibly push back and show up for authorities, civil servants and civil society organisations.

Correction February 10th, 2026: in this article, we previously wrote that in January 2026 five Europeans were denied entry to the United States, but this actually occurred in December 2025.