In dangerous times - whether during conflict, unrest, or disinformation - encryption isn’t a luxury. It’s a life-saving layer of security for individuals and societies. Weakening it doesn’t make us safer; it makes everyone more vulnerable. And no one is safe until everyone is safe. A few words on #encryption and #Egypt's context: 1. On decryption assistance mandates and Egypt’s context Decryption assistance mandates - as in forcing companies or individuals to provide access to encrypted data - don’t really function in practice, whether in Egypt or elsewhere. In Egypt’s case, we don’t see explicit legal mechanisms for ‘lawful access’ like those proposed in Western debates, but we do see functional equivalents through other means: broad surveillance powers, vague national security clauses, pressure on service providers, infrastructure ownership by the state, and granting isps and mobile operators secret licenses that gives the security full access to backend. There’s no clear overs...