EU Parliament Supports Suspending US Data Sharing

New submitter egladil writes "As seen previously here on Slashdot, the European Parliament was to vote on 'whether existing data sharing agreements between the two continents should be suspended, following allegations that U.S. intelligence spied on E.U. citizens.' With the votes now having been cast, the result is 483 in favor of the resolution and 98 against, while 65 abstained. The resolution in question in part called for the U.S. 'to suspend and review any laws and surveillance programs that "violate the fundamental right of E.U. citizens to privacy and data protection," as well as Europe's "sovereignty and jurisdiction."' It also decided that the E.U. should investigate the surveillance of E.U. citizens, and finally gave backing to the European Commision in case they should decide to suspend the data sharing deals currently in place with the U.S., such as the Passenger Name Record and Terrorist Finance Tracking Program agreements. The question now is whether the E.U. commision will go through with suspending these deals or not."

Re:... More effort than ... ?

[Jade_Wayfarer]

Right, even if that doesn't look truly sincere and likely will have no long-lasting consequences for anybody it is still something. Maybe it's one of the positive sides of having this many parties in EU - if "bigger fish" would try to ignore this issue, smaller parties will get more support on the next elections, so everybody has to do something (or, at least, pretend to do something good enough). Pirate Party is surely going to rally their supporters over this issue.

Re:... More effort than ... ?

[Anonymous Coward]

if moving money for criminals was actually hard then I doubt usa would be having such a mexican gang problem...

the question is - why can't we get american raw banking data? note that you could always request specific data and law enforcement co-operation. but in fundamental it's kinda stupid if the fbi has more access to banking data of poland than what german cops have, don't you think?

They authorized the European Commission?

[Anonymous Coward]

I guess that's the end of that. The European Commission has a track record of giving a flying shit about voters and the parliament. It is just interested in keeping the money flowing and won't do anything that would create a hiccup with that.

Without getting ordered by the parliament at least three times in a row, they won't touch any of the agreements in question.

Re: ... More effort than ... ?

[Mabhatter]

You cannot file suit agains these because they are SECRET. A suit has to have DEFINATE act toons and personnel. Some lines on a PowerPoint won't cut it.

The NSA and CIA are not "police" and they were chartered outside the Constitution way back in the 50's and 60's when FREEDOM was at its peak! to prove damage, a citizen would have to have a CRIMINAL TRIAL EFFECTED by this illegally obtained information. You only have rights against the government USING illegally obtained information in courts. As these are SPIES, that's not going to happen.

You can fault the Patriot Act for mixing up spy works and anti-terrorist work, and regular police work. as well as mixing up the terminology used improperly by media and regular police to "sound like" they were "national security" agencies. These programs are owned by the NSA and not even subject to the petty FISA court playtime.