> In Europe they are

Where specifically? I've been working as a "Software engineer" for multiple decades, across three countries in Europe, and 2-3 countries outside of Europe, never been sued or received a "big fine" for this, even have had presentations for government teams and similar, not a single person have reacted to me (or others) calling ourselves "software engineers" this whole time.

In Germany. I have a degree in mechanical engineering and am thus allowed to call myself an engineer, even though I write software professionally. Colleagues who have studied computer science cannot, as it is not considered an engineering, but a science degree. This is why most people talk about "software developers" and not about "software engineers" (in German) to avoid this problem. That being said, most people would not actually care.