Stop Csam Act of 2025

Floor Speech

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Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, child sexual abuse materials are a toxic plague on the internet. Congress should act as soon as possible to give law enforcement officials the resources they need to find and prosecute criminals responsible for exploiting children and spreading vile abuse materials online. In addition, Congress should act as soon as possible to provide robust resources that help prevent children from becoming victims in the first place.

However, instead of focusing on stopping online predators, S. 1829, the STOP CSAM Act, weakens the single strongest technology protecting children and families online: strong encryption. The bill explicitly allows courts to punish companies that offer strong encryption. It will make it easier to punish sites that use encryption to secure private conversations and personal devices. It will also encourage scanning of content on users' phones or computers, before information is sent over the internet, which has the same consequences as breaking encryption.

Weakening encryption is probably the best gift you could give to the predators and creeps who want to stalk and spy on children. Sexual predators will have a far easier time stealing and extorting photographs of children, tracking their phones, and spying on their private messages once encryption is breached. Doing so threatens the privacy and security of every single law-abiding American.

Last Congress, I made progress with the bill's sponsors to address some of these concerns. Indeed, I compromised on a version of this bill and had agreed to remove my hold to let that version pass by unanimous consent. It is unfortunate that the sponsors have chosen to abandon those efforts and instead advance a dangerous bill that makes internet users unsafe. However, I remain open to revisiting those conversations.

For these reasons, I will object to any unanimous consent agreement to take up or pass the STOP CSAM Act of 2025.

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