EU's Chat Control Advances: Centralized VPNs at Risk – Why Nym's Mixnet is the Future of Surveillance Resistancehttps://forum.nym.com/uploads/default/optimized/2X/9/9a23b1d8040a8a09d62f94c0557e627ec7863916_2_923x1024.jpeg
With the EU Council adopting its mandate for Chat Control (CSAR) on November 26, 2025, we’re entering a new phase of digital surveillance that could make traditional VPNs obsolete for true privacy. This regulation, aimed at combating CSAM, introduces mandatory risk assessments where VPN use is flagged as “high-risk,” potentially leading to subpoenas, logging mandates, or even bans on centralized providers like NordVPN and ExpressVPN. Their single-hop models leave metadata exposed to analysis, which Chat Control could exploit through client-side scanning and age verification.
From a surveillance angle, this normalizes mass monitoring—false positives up to 50%, chilling effects on free speech, and erosion of anonymity. But Nym’s decentralized mixnet shines here: No central entity for regulators to target, multi-hop routing with noise to obscure patterns, and community-run nodes that resist coercion. It’s not just a VPN; it’s a tool built for high-stakes privacy in an adversarial world.
My thoughts are that they may later put pressure on Nym too, because NymVPN is a VPN provider. No matter what you do, privacy costs money and you may be later have
to pucharse two devices, like a litte GPD MicroPC from China and a German Linux based
Volla Phone for anonymous and encrypted communications over the Tor Network, because over the years for all those privacy disturbing and regulatory proposals they have never targeted the Tor Network, because it is mainly not used on smartphones.
You will then later have to encrypt/decrypt on the GPD MicroPC and send/receive für the Linux Volla Phone.
But there’s still a massive difference between other VPNs and Nym. Suppose they arrest Nym’s CEO, Harry Halpin, it won’t harm user privacy because there’s nothing for the company to hand over. Nym’s mixnet doesn’t store logs, user identities, IPs, or metadata. Even if governments force a ban on the app or demand KYC, it still wouldn’t enable tracking or tracing because the network is decentralized and the app itself has no personal account system. Nym is based in Switzerland, technically part of the EU, but the mixnet is run globally by independent operators. That’s the key difference: corporate VPNs are centralized businesses that can be pressured into logging or shutting down. Nym is infrastructure, open-source, permissionless, and without control over nodes. Even under extreme regulations like Chat Control, Nym users retain full privacy and anonymity because the architecture itself eliminates any single point of surveillance or compliance. Correct me if I am wrong. I am just a theoretical person.
I guess you are wrong with the assumption that NymVPN is decentralized. All VPNs, including NymVPM are centralized, because they are paid apps run by companies, who can be forced to modify or shut-down their services, if required by laws. The only decentralized VPN app I currently know is the free AmneziaWG VPN app, which you can set-up on you own VPS, thus bypassing the need of large scale VPN providers, including Nym, which can be regulated, because of their large user bases, fitting into the VLOPs (Very Large Online Platforms) requlations.
If regulators pressure Nym to shut down the app or modify it, the underlying mixnet continues operating because it’s not controlled by any single entity. Your traffic still routes through independent nodes run by community members in different jurisdictions. Compare that to ExpressVPN or NordVPN: one company owns all the servers, operates all the infrastructure, and holds all the user data. One subpoena, one legal order, and everything can be logged, handed over, or shut down. AmneziaWG on a personal VPS is just you running your own VPN, it’s not decentralized, it’s isolated. You control one point. If your VPS provider gets a subpoena, they hand over your logs. Nym’s decentralization isn’t about the app being free or paid; it’s about the network being run by independent operators with no central point of control. That architectural difference is what makes regulatory pressure ineffective. The app being proprietary changes nothing about that fundamental design. Because that’s all that matters, you can operate everything even from North Korea. The network doesn’t care about jurisdiction; regulators can’t shut down what they don’t control.
The Nym community, en large, does not know how to use the Nym Mixnet, without NymVPN, because I like to say that from a long time ago, when Nym was new, they changed their strategy from being an “.org” to .com (commercial) to make money, instead like torproject.org to been donation based. So what would the Nym team do if they have a regulated and commercial NymVPN app at the end, which people may no longer trust? I think it was a mistake by the Nym team, like Harry, Claudia etc. to make it a commercial product (NymVPN), with incentives (Nym tokens and staking) and not like the really decentralized Tor ecosystem. Well, just my two cents, but I hope the best for the Nym community in the future.
Maybe the Nym team could leave the EU, stay anonymous, and operate everything like a non-profit organization from anywhere, they could do that tomorrow. Privacy will continue at 100% because the infrastructure is fully decentralized. It will remain even after they leave.
As per Chat Control laws, all I can see is that centralized VPNs can face damage, but decentralized ones are relatively safe. Regulators would need to turn the EU into North Korea to control decentralized tech, and even then, success isn’t guaranteed. I believe people in the EU will fight back. I think now is the right time people need to value decentralized products. I know ideally Nym isn’t perfectly decentralized to some people, but the tech says it’s decentralized. The code says it’s decentralized. The infrastructure says it is decentralized. For true decentralization, first people need to believe in decentralization. United people are the core part of decentralization.
I give you a short example of decentralization. My Onion Courier Tor Hidden Service Mixnet, for example is fully decentralized, because people can run their own public or anonymous Onion Courier Mixnet, with family and friends, without a high learning curve, where nobody knows how many mix nodes really exits on the Internet. On the other hand the Nym Mixnet is centralized, because like older Mixnets, they have a Network Explorer which exactly shows you how many gateways, nodes etc. are available on the Mixnet. This is what I would like to call centralized, even if nodes etc. are in different locations.
BTW. Onion Courier mix nodes and their endpoint servers can communicate with each other, regardless if one Mixnet is anonymous or publicity reachable. With Nym currently as it is, I see no way of run mutliple Mixnets, interacting with each other. Maybe I am wrong.
- “Chat Control Is EU Reality: Why Top VPNs (NordVPN, ExpressVPN) May No Longer Protect Your Privacy” https://x.com/BrownTiger_Bik/status/1994149049105334451?t=ch3wjFBYcxa0d9O5bkfi0Q&s=09
