Jay D @AcrobaticOutcom

Joined July 2026

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Paul Walsh @Paul__Walsh

2 weeks ago

Read the comments under my post below if you want to see how quickly surveillance and control is becoming normalised. People are persuaded that removing their own privacy is necessary for safety. Apple removed Bitchat from its Indian App Store after a demand from India’s Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology under Section 69A. Apple’s notice said “the app contained content that was illegal” in India, but Bitchat is decentralised messaging software. The app can’t contain illegal content any more than its own Messages app. This wasn’t the first attempt to restrict it. In July, Indian authorities targeted Bitchat’s open source repositories because the software can operate without internet access, continue working when the government shuts down the Internet. Indian digital rights lawyers question the legal basis for targeting an app because of what its architecture allows rather than because of specific illegal material. A lot of the replies to me amount to the same argument: terrorism, crime or national security means the government should be allowed to remove private communication tools. That argument should frighten people far more than Apple’s censorship. India isn’t unique. The same political conditioning is happening in the US, UK, Australia and across Europe. Governments are telling people that less privacy, more identity verification, more interception and more monitoring are necessary for safety. People are being encouraged to believe that surveillance protects them and private communications protect criminals. Once a society accepts that premise, every privacy technology becomes suspicious by design. Encryption becomes obstruction. Anonymous communication becomes evasion. Offline messaging becomes a way to bypass government controls. Refusing to identify yourself becomes something that needs explaining. That’s how private communication stops being treated as a normal civil liberty and starts being treated as a privilege government can withdraw. Some of the replies have also become personal and racial because people appear to have decided what I must think about India based on what they assume about me. So let me make that part clear. I’ve spent years working directly with communities in India. My daughter is half Indian. I’ve travelled there many times. The charity I co-founded 14 years ago held FCRA status and worked at grassroots level because we wanted money and decisions to stay with the communities we were helping. We helped people open bank accounts, taught financial literacy, worked with families affected by domestic violence, and helped women and girls gain access to their own sanitation. Each village and slum decided who needed help most. Our CEO was local and had spent 20 years working in related fields, which meant communities trusted him. Community federations shared in the low-interest repayments so they could continue operating locally. When loans were repaid, the money funded more loans. No money was taken out of India. Even though we no longer operate there, that money continues to be recycled so more toilets can be built and more small businesses can be funded. When somebody couldn’t repay, which was rare, we supported them instead of treating them like a failed account. Our CEO also regularly had police turn up looking for bribes. We eventually stopped because operating legitimately became extraordinarily difficult. I can care deeply about India and still criticise its government. Caring about the people of a country is why I care when their government removes technology that allows them to communicate privately, especially when it’s designed to keep working when the government shut down the internet to extinguish freedom of speech and civil liberties. Criticising surveillance isn’t criticism of Indians. And Indians deserve privacy and civil liberties every bit as much as people in the US, UK, Australia or Europe.

Paul Walsh @Paul__Walsh

2 weeks ago

India did not pull BitChat from the App Store. Please change how you report this. Apple censored their own customers in India by responding to an illegitimate request from an authoritarian government. Apple was not legally obliged to comply. Apple’s own communication to @jack

Jay D @AcrobaticOutcom

Paul Walsh @Paul__Walsh

Paul Walsh @Paul__Walsh

Jay D @AcrobaticOutcom

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