Chat Control is back on the menu. To highlight the corruption behind the proposal, Mullvad VPN now present "And Then?" A film directed by Jonas Åkerlund.Chat Control is once again back on the menu. In the Council of the EU (the member states), several countries continue to work on new versions of the bill. The latest draft in November 2025 was presented with different branding and different semantics, but it would result in mass surveillance, AI-scanning of private data, ID requirement to use messaging services and – with vague legislative text – risk of mandatory scanning (even for end-to-end-encrypted services) in the future.As long as the Council refuses to reject the bill (the way the European Parliament did), the Chat Control proposal could still become law – despite violating EU law and fundamental human rights.To highlight the effects of mass surveillance and remind people of the corrupt history (full story below) behind the Chat Control proposal, we now present the film "And Then?" A film directed by Jonas Åkerlund.Your browser does not support the video tag.And then: short versions.These are broadcast in EU countries, to oppose the Chat Control proposal. They are also broadcast in other countries, where mass surveillance has gone too far, to remind people of the absurdity of systems where people are monitored without warrants and without suspicion of a crime.Your browser does not support the video tag.Your browser does not support the video tag.Your browser does not support the video tag.Your browser does not support the video tag.Your browser does not support the video tag.Your browser does not support the video tag.Your browser does not support the video tag.It’s time to end the Chat Control proposal and other dishonest initiatives like ProtectEU. We don’t need more mass surveillance. On the contrary, we need to move away from dragnet systems and bulk data collection. This goes for countries all over the world, if they want to be free and open societies.Demand transparency from your politicians, and privacy for the people.The backstoryFirst, Ashton Kutcher (yes, the actor) convinced the EU Commission that they could scan everything on an EU citizen’s phone or computer (messages, photos, emails, phone calls, all of it) for child sexual abuse material without, at the same time, looking at the content of other types of communication. This could be done in a secure way, Kutcher told European politicians, and he would know (sure), since he was running a tech organization called Thorn.And then?And then EU Commissioner Ylva Johansson presented the legislative proposal called Chat Control, which aims to scan everything on every EU citizen’s phones and computers (including conversation in end-to-end-encrypted messaging services). The message from the Commission was: we will only search for child sexual abuse material (CSAM).And then?And then the proposal was slammed by both the Council of Minister’s and the European Commission’s own legal service, as well as by the European Parliament’s Data Protection Board. The UN Human Rights Council described Chat Control as incompatible with fundamental human rights and stated that the proposal would lead to mass surveillance and self-censorship. Former judges at the European Court of Justice said that the proposal was in breach of the EU Charter of Rights and 465 researchers joined forces to warn of the consequences.And then?And then Ylva Johansson claimed that anyone calling the proposal “mass surveillance” was just trying to smear it. Experts from all over the world explained to her that the kind of scanning she was talking about (as Ylva described it: a drug-sniffing dog that can detect illegal content in a message without reading the message) simply cannot be done safely, and that Chat Control would mean the end of privacy and pose a security threat to all Europeans. Ylva responded with: “what about the children?”And then? And then it was revealed that Thorn, the organization founded by Ashton Kutcher and which had been lobbying for Chat Control from the beginning, was selling the kind of scanning technology that could be used for Chat Control – despite being registered as a charity organization in the EU’s lobbying registry.And then?And then it was revealed that Thorn, together with the EU Commission, had also started and funded “children’s rights organizations” that had publicly supported the proposal. On the boards of these children’s rights organizations sat the EU Commission, non-European intelligence services, and representatives from Thorn. What appeared publicly to be charitable organizations were in fact lobby groups that – according to internal documents – operated in line with this strategy: “once the EU Survivors Taskforce is established and we are clear on the mobilised survivors, we will establish a list pairing responsible survivors with Members of the European Parliament – we will ‘divide and conquer’ the MEPs by deploying in priority survivors from MEPs’ countries of origin.”And then? And then it was revealed that Europol wanted unlimited access and wanted to use the scanning for more than just child abuse crimes, saying that all data – also unfiltered and innocent material – should be stored because it “could at some point be useful to law enforcement”.And then?And then politicians in Brussels wanted to exempt themselves from the scanning.And then?And then the European Parliament, in an almost historic consensus, voted against the proposal and called Chat Control nothing but mass surveillance. As one of the members of the parliament said: “The Commission wasn’t focusing on protecting children but wanted mass surveillance.”And then?And then Ylva Johansson’s office tried to win the battle in the Council of the EU (law proposals must go through both the Parliament and the Council) by using illegal micro-targeting on social media. Ylva Johansson was summoned to a hearing in the European Parliament and questioned about Thorn's involvement in the law proposal, the illegal micro-targeting, and the Commission's unwillingness to release public documents regarding the relationship between Thorn and the EU commission. Ylvas answer: think of the children.And then?And then the EU Commission realized that Chat Control was slipping out of their hands. So, they launched the initiatives Going Dark and ProtectEU – projects once again aiming to gain lawful access to people’s private conversations and data. They had abandoned the excuse “think about the children” and now went broader, claiming the surveillance is crucial to stop organized crime.And then?And then the fight continues for private and secure communication in the EU (and other parts of the world as digital communication is global). The EU Council is still trying to agree on a common position on Chat Control (more than three years have passed and they still haven’t reached one). If Chat Control won’t become law, we can expect ProtectEU to be the next attempt. Once again, non-European intelligence services are involved in the process, and the arguments are the same ones used by Ashton Kutcher and Ylva Johansson: if we don’t get access to everything, we are going dark (this expression comes originally from the FBI). And then?And then it’s up to the people of Europe to make their voices heard. Otherwise, we risk ending up with a system that means total mass surveillance, massive security threats and zero privacy for the vast majority of people in the EU (as well as other parts of the world).And then?