President of the European Parliament Roberta Metsola attends the European Parliament session in Strasbourg, France, Wednesday (local time). EPA-Yonhap The European Parliament on Thursday voted in favour of temporarily allowing companies such as WhatsApp, Microsoft and Google to continue to scan private chats for signs of child sexual abuse material.A previous arrangement allowing messaging services an exemption from EU data protection rules to monitor for signs of child abuse expired in April, after the European Parliament refused to extend it without amendments.European Parliament President Roberta Metsola then put the debate on a transitional arrangement back on the agenda, while negotiations on a long-term framework continued.The interim arrangement is set to apply until April 2028. Before it can come into force, the European Commission must respond to the parliament's proposals and member states must give their final approval.While the regulation is explicitly not intended to allow the breaking of end-to-end encryption — which is now standard on apps such as WhatsApp and Signal — the member states' proposal permits automated scans on end devices.Experts refer to this process as "client-side scanning," where software on a smartphone or computer checks the content of messages, photos and videos directly before they are encrypted and sent.The European Parliament largely refuses to support this, insisting that even content yet to be encrypted must remain untouched.The parliament also wants to ensure that material that has not previously been identified as online child sexual abuse material is not reported to law enforcement authorities without human confirmation.