> Most likely Snapchat's E2EE is just a facade, they probably have a dictionary of "funny" words on the device (and/or the server) and automatically flags the message in the internal systems when certain stopwords are being used.
On device content scanning notifies Snapchat of a certain type of threat, that + metadata goes to a real-time law-enforcement system which combines it with other sources to decide whether a lawful intercept is warranted - if so, Snapchat pulls the cached messages off the device and forwards them on.
It’s arguable that would be reasonable and legal, depending on the watchlist.
Well - it’s reasonable for a government to seek to stop absolute privacy subverting the prevention and detection of crime … I think, so a state has to find some way to be able to construct reasonable suspicion and then lawful search on routine internet activity. (Opinions vary, obviously)
On device content scanning notifies Snapchat of a certain type of threat, that + metadata goes to a real-time law-enforcement system which combines it with other sources to decide whether a lawful intercept is warranted - if so, Snapchat pulls the cached messages off the device and forwards them on.
It’s arguable that would be reasonable and legal, depending on the watchlist.