Secure encryption and online anonymity are now at risk in Switzerland – here’s what you need to know chiara.castro@futurenet.com (Chiara Castro) | usagoldmines.com

• Switzerland is considering amending its surveillance law to add new types of monitoring and information collection
• The change would widen the reach to VPNs and secure messaging providers
• Consultations are now open until May 6, 2025

Switzerland is considering amending its surveillance law to expand into new types of monitoring and data collection.

The changes – which experts argue will put people’s anonymity and secure encryption at risk – would widen the net of impacted service providers to virtual private networks (VPNs), messaging apps, and social networks, having previously only impacted mobile networks and internet service providers (ISPs).

Consultations are now public and open until May 6, 2025. Speaking to TechRadar, NymVPN has explained how it’s planning to fight against it, alongside encrypted messaging app Threema and Proton, the provider behind one of the best VPN and secure email services on the market.

More data, less security

Authorities’ arguments behind the need for accessing more data are always the same – catching criminals and improving security. Yet, according to Nym’s co-founder and COO, Alexis Roussel, being forced to leave more data behind would achieve the opposite result.

“Less anonymity online is not going to make things better,” he told TechRadar. “For example, enforcing identification of all these small services will eventually push to leaks, more data theft, and more attacks on people.”

The amendment aims to expand the number of service providers targeted to include so-called “derived service providers.”This categorisation would aim to include any online service with a turnover of $100 million or more than 5,000 active users.

As per the official announcement, “three types of information and two types of monitoring are also being created as a result of this revision.” Put simply, the likes of NymVPN and Proton VPN would be forced to modify how they handle their encryption technology and their privacy policies around securing the anonymity of their users.

Considering the pushback against encryption backdoors, Switzerland seems to be taking a different approach. Yet, according to Roussel, this is more of a “play on words.”

“It’s not about end-to-end encryption. They don’t want to force you to reveal what’s inside the communication itself, but they want to know where it goes,” Roussel explains. “They realize the value is not in what is being said but who you are talking to.”.

“The whole point of security and privacy is not being able to link the usage to the person. That’s the most critical thing.” Roussel told TechRadar.

What’s next?

It’s important to note that the current amendment is not subject to a parliamentary vote or public referendum under Swiss law. Nonetheless, a public consultation is now ongoing, so everyone can partake.

Nym confirmed to TechRadar that the team has already started to build a strategy to fight against it with Proton and Threema – and they hope more people will follow suit.

The plan focuses on showing the damage these changes will have for citizens’ online security and the wider Swiss tech industry.

“Nym is still small, but Proton and Threema are really very prominent companies in Switzerland,” said Rousseld, pointing out how the Swiss Army itself is using the latter service exactly for its well-known high level of security.

“I think we have good arguments, and I think the best argument we have is to show them that they would lose in front of a tribunal.”

You might also like

• Encryption backdoors: privacy can be misused, “but the cost of a world without is so much higher”
• France rejects controversial encryption backdoor provision
• New EU Chat Control makes scanning encrypted chats optional – but privacy experts are still worried