this post was submitted on 15 Apr 2026
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Clearly, if you're really from Europe (and not just a paid propagandist or troll), you're not from one of those countries which freed themselves from some dictatorship or other recently enough for most people in that country having themselves or their parents been alive during the dictatorship days.
One thing is some kind of passive ID, be it in a card or in digital format, another very different thing is software running on your devices which is capable of automatically reporting to the authorities everything you do.
As the US is showing right now, it doesn't take much to go from absolutelly legit activity - say having an abortion - and innocent apps with some kind of "phone home" ability - say something to help women track their periods - doing no harm to anybody, to extreme prison sentences (for murder, even) and said apps being used to catch and prosecute women for it.
Anybody who has even just heard the stories from their parents and grandparents about whatever the version of the Stasi in their country used to do in the Dictatorship days would be profoundly against any "report to the authorities" software even if it's sold by politicians as "think of the children".
This is true.
This would be my only government app that is NOT capable of doing that, because it's open source. If they start doing that, it will be all over the media.
I already have at least 7 apps where that could do that and get away with it. That should be the concern, not this new app.
If our government was like yours (even the way it was before Teump), I would be as concerned as you are. But it's not.
I'm making the bet that if the government changes, I will have time to adapt. (Yes, I could be wrong.)
Yeah, but that's not what's happening here, so I don't feel like discussing that here.
The thing with data is that once it's out, it's out.
If tomorrow whatever you do today starts getting deemed a perversion or even a crime, the data related to you doing sent out today will at the very least put you at the front of the list of people to be investigated for it.
Best to have as little as possible about me and my activities (no matter how innocent) out there in an easy to access form, IMHO. If I have to trade a bit of convenience for it, so be it.