Yes, but those are already illegal. That does not (or at the very least should not) mean politicians get to dictate what kind of technology is allowed. You cannot outlaw a technology (or require a backdoor) simply because it may not support deletion as a feature by virtue of being decentralized.

He's the most tech-focussed minister we have. He's pushing tech pretty hard, so for him to be saying this should be a clear signal to the industry.

See also the consultationn for the online harms white paper: https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/online-harms-whi...

It's really weird that this extremist position ("any removal of content is censorship, and censorship is always bad") is so prominent on HN whenusers of products have shown, every single time, they they don't want it.

Public opinion heavily depends on context and evolves continually. Of course people are going to get behind the idea of preventing teen suicides, particularly when it seems that the solution might be preventing a huge, corporate giant do as it pleases.

Given the context of government censorship, which is happening and is likely to increase and become a larger problem in the future, and myriads of smaller, independent entities, people might react differently.

In any case, I don't think it's a good nor strong enough argument to abandon decentralization and anti-censorship efforts.