Singapore Airlines denies snooping with seatback cameras

Yahoo – AFP, 21 February 2019

Singapore Airlines says the cameras on its latest inflight entertainment systems
have been disabled

Singapore Airlines insisted Thursday that cameras on its planes' entertainment systems had been disabled after an outcry online from worried passengers who spotted the tiny lenses peering at them.

Travellers took to Twitter and other social media to raise the alarm over the cameras at the bottom of seatback screens on a number of the Singapore flag carrier's newer aircraft.

"Just found this interesting sensor looking at me from the seat back on board of Singapore Airlines. Any expert opinion of whether is a camera?" passenger Vitaly Kamluk tweeted.

His tweet was accompanied by photos of the monitor with the embedded camera.

Another passenger urged the airline in a tweet to "notify all your passengers and get their consent, particularly EU residents, that you are doing this, why, what are you doing with the data and how long you keep it".

The airline confirmed that some of its latest inflight entertainment systems did have fixed cameras -- but assured passengers that they had been disabled.

"These cameras have been intended by the manufacturers for future developments. These cameras have been permanently disabled on our aircraft and cannot be activated on board," the airline said in a statement.

"We have no plans to enable or develop any features using the cameras."

MEPs can keep their expenses secret, European Court of Justice rules

DutchNews, September 25, 2018

MEPs do not have to publish details of how they spend their monthly expenses allowance of €4,300 a month because it would be in breach of their privacy, the European Court of Justice said on Tuesday. 

Journalists from all 28 EU member countries, including Dutch public broadcaster NOS, had gone to court in an effort to have MEPs’ expenses made public. MEPs are given the money, which is supposed to fund a home office, every month in addition to their salary of €8,848. 

The European court upheld several earlier votes by the European parliament not to open expenses to public scrutiny, citing privacy rules. In addition, redacting bills and invoices to remove personal information would, the court said, be an ‘excessive administrative burden’ given the volume of documents. 

Dutch Socialist MEP Dennis de Jong said the court’s decision is ‘a slap in the face’ for all Europeans. ‘MEPs are representatives of the people and they should show what they spend the money on,’ he said. 

Lobby group Transparency International said it is ‘enormously disappointed’ in the court’s decision. 

In 2017,  journalists also made a public appeal for MEPs to volunteer information about their expenses to the public. In the Netherlands, the VVD, the fundamentalist Christian SGP and the anti-EU PVV refused to comply. 

In addition to their salary and standard expenses package, MEPs have their travel expenses between Brussels and Strasbourg paid, they get a car allowance of 50 cents a kilometre and an extra €306 for every day they attend official meetings – totalling some 168 meetings a year.

EU, US agree on 'Privacy Shield' to protect data transfers

Brussels and Washington have agreed upon a new system to protect data transfers from Europe to the US. The new deal replaces "Safe Harbor," a 15-year-old framework struck down by the European Court of Justice last year.

Deutsche Welle, 2 February 2016

EU Justice Commissioner Vera Jourova announced the latest deal in a message on Twitter.

Goodbye #SafeHarbour! Follow press on new EU-US data protection framework agreed. Press conf live @ 16.30CET https://t.co/qq0qTiipUr

— Věra Jourová (@VeraJourova) February 2, 2016

The new deal, called the EU-US "Privacy Shield" would replace the older "Safe Harbor" agreement, Jourova told journalists in Brussels on Tuesday.

The US had given "binding assurances" for the first time and said public authorities' access to data would be subject to "clear limitations, safeguards and oversight mechanisms," the commissioner said.

Companies would be expected to abide by data protection rules and would be threatened with expulsion if they fail to comply. Citizens would also have several avenues to redress their complaints, if they felt their data had been misused. If the company in question did not resolve the problem, citizens could raise their issue with EU data protection authorities.

We will prepare clear guidelines for Europeans when they want to lodge a complaint so they know what to do – @VeraJourova #privacyshield

— EU Justice (@EU_Justice) February 2, 2016

An arbitration mechanism was also being planned for such complaints, Jourova added. Additionally the US judicial redress act, once passed, would give EU citizens the right to approach courts in the US with their complaints.

#EU citizens will for the 1st time have access to #US Courts in the context of personal data used by law enforcement services – @VeraJourova

— EU Justice (@EU_Justice) February 2, 2016

The agreement still needs to be approved by the EU's 28 member states before it comes into force.

Until now, companies were using "Safe Harbor" to conduct their business across the Atlantic. The pact was established in 2000 and regulates data sharing between EU and US companies. It was struck down last November after the European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruled that the deal did not safeguard the interests of EU citizens.

Distrust regarding transatlantic data transfers cropped up in 2013, after revelations that US intelligence agencies had conducted mass spying.

mg/ng (dpa, AFP)

EU court rules against Facebook over transatlantic data deal

Yahoo – AFP, 6 Oct 2015

The 'Safe Harbour' agreement reached by the United States and European 

Commission in 2000 was based on the premise that US laws offered similar 

privacy protection to those in the European Union (AFP Photo/Leon Neal)

Luxembourg (AFP) - The European Union's top court on Tuesday ruled that a key transatlantic data sharing deal relied on by companies such as Facebook was invalid in the light of spying revelations in the Edward Snowden scandal.

In a major blow to US tech firms, the court said the 2000 "Safe Harbour" agreement between the United States and the EU did not sufficiently guarantee the protection of Europeans' personal data and must be struck out.

The stunning decision stems from a David-and-Goliath complaint against social media giant Facebook lodged against Irish authorities by Max Schrems, an Austrian law student privacy campaigner.

Austrian right-to-privacy activist Max

 Schrems waits for the verdict at the

 European Court of Justice (SCJ) in 

Luxembourg on October 6, 2015

 (AFP Photo/John Thys)

"The Court of Justice declares that the (European) Commission’s US Safe Harbour Decision is invalid," the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg said in its three-page judgment.

The court said Irish authorities now had to decide whether transfer of data from Facebook's European subscribers to the United States should be suspended "on the ground that that country does not afford an adequate level of protection of personal data."

"YAY," Schrems tweeted after the judgment.

He later said in a statement that the decision was a "milestone when it comes to online privacy."

"It clarifies that mass surveillance violates our fundamental rights. This decision is a major blow for US global surveillance that heavily relies on private partners," he said.

Schrems filed the case against Ireland's data protection authority because Facebook's European headquarters are based there.

Major US web giants including Facebook and Apple have set up headquarters in Ireland to take advantage of favourable tax laws. Facebook data is then transferred to servers in the United States.

'Inaccurate assertions'

But Schrems had argued that the 15-year-old Safe Harbour deal is too weak to guarantee the privacy of European residents in the wake of details provided by former US National Security Agency (NSA) contractor and whistleblower Snowden.

The data deal allows data transfers by thousands of businesses on the grounds that US laws offer similar protection to those in the 28-nation European Union.

The European Commission -- the executive arm of the EU -- is widely expected to announce the imminent agreement of a new version of the Safe Harbour pact with the United States.

There was no immediate reaction to the judgment from Washington, but last month the United States said an opinion by the EU court's top legal counsel which reached similar conclusions was based on "inaccurate assertions".

Former NSA contractor Edward 

Snowden leaked details of the vast

 surveillance programs (AFP Photo)

The case comes amid widespread tensions between Brussels and Washington on issues of regulation, with several EU anti-trust probes currently underway into US tech firms.

"The United States does not and has not engaged in indiscriminate surveillance of anyone, including ordinary European citizens," the US mission to Brussels said in a statement last week.

"We fully respect the European Union's legal process; however, we believe that it is essential to comment in this instance because the Advocate General's opinion rests on numerous inaccurate assertions about intelligence practices of the United States."

Snowden, who remains wanted by the United States and currently lives in Moscow, opened a Twitter account last week, just days before the judgment.

His revelations showed that the NSA's PRISM programme used Silicon Valley giants Apple, Google and Facebook to gather user data.

In the wake of the scandal, the EU and Washington began talks to revamp Safe Harbour.

EU Ministers upset businesses with new data protection rules

EU ministers have agreed to give more power to a pan-European body of Internet regulators. The move upset tech businesses and countries who say it will result in unncessary bureaucratic hurdles.

Deutsche Welle, 13 March 2015

The European Union's interior and justice ministers agreed on Friday to grant more powers to regulators to enforce a new data protection law, upsetting businesses who hoped the power would instead be devolved to the regulators in each individual country.

Initially, the new EU law would have established a "one-stop-shop" mechanism, meaning that a business operating across the whole 28-nation bloc would only have to deal with one protection authority - in the country where it has its headquarters or European base, even if the issue affected citizens in another EU country.

However, this upset some countries which do not what their national authorities to lose all jurisdiction over big technology companies like Apple and Facebook, which are based in Ireland. In the past, Ireland has been accused of going soft on large multinationals in order to remain an attractive place for doing business, something Dublin has denied.

Under pressure from the concern nations, the EU ministers agreed that henceforth if one country's authority is "concerned," they can appeal any ruling to an as-yet-uncreated board of all 28 regulators who could then come to a binding decision.

New rules will encourage "capricious referrals"

"The proposed mechanism will be more cumbersome than the existing procedures, resulting in unnecessary administrative burdens, including delayed decisions for citizens," said the Industry Coalition for Data Protection, which includes major technology firms Apple, Google, and IBM.

EU diplomats had previously agreed to scrap an adjoining proposal that at least one-third of the national regulators would have to raise an objection before a case would be referred to the European Data Protection Board (EDPB).

Member states such as Ireland, Great Britain, and the Netherlands had supported the numerical threshold, saying it would have "greatly reduced the risk of capricious referrals," according to Ireland's justice minister.

Friday's agreement is still subject to change until June, when ministers will review the entirety of the proposed new data protection law - the General Data Protection Regulation, meant to update decades-old statutes that have not kept up with the development of the Internet.

Germany's Justice Minister Heiko Maas called the new data law "one of the most important projects under discussion in Brussels at the moment."

es/msh (AFP, Reuters)

Germany cancels Verizon contract over snooping fear

BBC News, 26 June 2014

German Chancellor Angela Merkel types on a smartphone

Related Stories

• Germany opens Merkel bugging probe

The German government has cancelled a contract with Verizon over concern that US firms may be giving data to US authorities.

Verizon has provided internet services to a number of German government departments and the current contract was due to run out in 2015.

The firm did not comment on the move.

There was anger in Germany over allegations that a US agency bugged Chancellor Angela Merkel's phone.

Earlier this month Germany announced an investigation into those allegations which were made by a former contractor of the US National Security Agency (NSA), Edward Snowden.

There is no suggestion that Verizon was involved, but the controversy has put pressure on US technology firms doing business in Germany.

High level security

German Interior Ministry spokesman Tobias Plate said: "There are indications that Verizon is legally required to provide certain things to the NSA, and that's one of the reasons the cooperation with Verizon won't continue".

"Furthermore, the ties revealed between foreign intelligence agencies and firms in the wake of the US National Security Agency affair, show that the German government needs a very high level of security for its critical networks," he said.

Verizon is the second biggest US telecoms company after AT&T.

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Germany opens inquiry into claims NSA tapped Angela Merkel's phone

US to extend privacy protection rights to EU citizens

China Said to Push Banks to Remove IBM Servers for Security

US to extend privacy protection rights to EU citizens

EU and human rights and privacy groups welcome pledge, which follows pressure in wake of Snowden revelations

theguardian.com, Ewen MacAskill, defence and security correspondent, Wednesday 25 June 2014

Eric Holder, the US attorney general. Photograph: Gary Cameron/Reuters

The Obama administration has caved in to pressure from the European Union in the wake of Edward Snowden's revelations on surveillance by promising to pass legislation granting European citizens many of the privacy protection rights enjoyed by US citizens.

The proposed law would apply to data on European citizens being transferred to the US for what Washington says is law enforcement purposes.

After the first Snowden revelations appeared in June last year, the Obama administration irritated many by insisting that while US citizens were protected by law from snooping by US spy agencies, this did not apply to non-Americans.

On Wednesday the US attorney general, Eric Holder, promised at a US-EU meeting of home affairs and justice ministers in Athens that legislation would be sent to Congress to extend the US Privacy Act to EU citizens.

The EU, as well as human rights and privacy groups, welcomed Holder's announcement but coupled it with expressions of scepticism, describing it as a vague promise.

Viviane Reding, the EU justice commissioner, said it was an important step in the right direction but added: "Words only matter if put into law. We are waiting for the legislative step."

Human rights groups said the US Privacy Act, in spite of being touted as a beacon for the rest of the world, had a relatively weak regulatory framework. They said Holder's pledge did not address many of the other issues raised by mass surveillance worldwide by the NSA and its partners, including Britain's GCHQ.

Speaking after the Athens meeting, the EU home affairs commissioner, Cecilia Malmstrom, said: "EU-US relations have been strained lately in the aftermath of the Snowden revelations but we have worked very hard to restore trust."

Holder said: "The Obama administration is committed to seeking legislation that would ensure that … EU citizens would have the same right to seek judicial redress for intentional or wilful disclosures of protected information and for refusal to grant access or to rectify any errors in that information, as would a US citizen under the Privacy Act.

"This commitment, which has long been sought by the EU, reflects our resolve to move forward not only on the data protection and privacy agreement but on strengthening transatlantic ties."

The US and the EU have been negotiating for three years over personal data protection, but the discussions took on a new immediacy with the Snowden revelations.

Emotions have been strongest in Germany, given the history of mass surveillance by the Stasi, and this was compounded when it was revealed that the US had been snooping on Angela Merkel. The German government has pressed Obama, Holder and other members of the US administration to set out how they would curb spying on non-Americans.

Over the last year Obama has made repeated overtures to Merkel and other EU leaders only to be rebuffed. European governments, as well as the European parliament, has called for concrete action rather than just soft words. Even a speech in January in which Obama said he had asked Holder and the intelligence community to develop safeguards for foreign citizens met with scepticism.

Holder said the data protection agreement under discussion related to personal data shared with the US by European countries for law enforcement purposes. He framed it in the context of transnational crime and terrorism, in particular fighters travelling to and from Syria.

"One consistent theme ran through all our discussions: in a world of globalised crime and terrorism, we can protect our citizens only if we work together," Holder said. "At the same time, we must ensure that we continue our long tradition of protecting privacy in the law enforcement context."

Gus Hosein, executive director of Privacy International, said: "It is a good step forward. Nonetheless, there are three massive impediments to achieving equivalent protection under law. First, Congress needs to act on this and we haven't seen many positive steps on protecting non-Americans' rights."

Secondly, Hosein described the US Privacy Act as "an unfortunately weak legal regime" and, thirdly, he wanted worldwide privacy protections against what he said was the accumulation of massive amounts of data by US intelligence against non-Americans.

Cynthia Wong, senior internet researcher at Human Rights Watch, said: "It may be a small step in the right direction but much more needs to be done to address data protection in the US and to rein in the sheer scale of what the NSA is collecting."

Google receives thousands of European requests to 'be forgotten'

Internet giant Google has received more than 12,000 requests from people in Europe wanting past information from their lives to be "forgotten" in online searches. The case pits privacy against freedom of information.

Google opened up an online form late this week that allowed people to ask for certain information to be removed from the search engine's results. Within the first 24 hours, Google confirmed late on Friday, more than 12,000 requests were submitted, sometimes at a rate of more than 20 entries per minute.

Google was responding to a European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruling from May 13, which found that citizens should be able to request this of the company. The ruling applies to the 28 EU member countries, although Google agreed to broaden the catchment area to include Switzerland, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway.

"The court's ruling requires Google to make difficult judgments about an individual's right to be forgotten and the public's right to know," a Google spokesman said.

The case of a Spanish man who objected to the fact that searches of his name revealed links to an old newspaper article about the repossession of his home prompted the ECJ to issue the advisory ruling. Data protection representatives from the EU's 28 members are due to discuss the ruling's implications in a two-day meeting next week.

Any data "forgotten" by Google, which mostly provides links to material published by others, is not deleted or removed from the Internet - only from Google search results.

Past privacy rulings

Advocates hailed the decision as an advancement of personal privacy in the Internet age, while critics have either said it amounts to censorship, or that it could serve to help the rich, powerful or criminal to conceal information.

In January, a German court ordered Google to block search results in German linking to photos of a role-playing sex-party, set in a prison environment, involving former FIA President Max Mosley. France had issued a similar court order to Google on the Mosley case late last year.

The former head of motorsport's global governing body, also a key Formula One figure for more than a decade, survived an FIA members' vote of confidence in 2008 related to the scandal, first reported in Britain's now-defunct Sunday paper the News of the World. However, in 2009, Mosley agreed not to run for a fifth term as FIA president.

msh/rc (AFP, AP, Reuters)

Merkel and Hollande mull secure European communication web

Deutsche Welle, 16 February 2014

Chancellor Angela Merkel has voiced enthusiasm for a secure European network in light of concern about US mass data surveillance. The idea would be to circumvent the need for data to be transferred across the Atlantic.

Merkel said on Saturday that she planned to discuss the idea of a regional network with French President Francois Hollande when the pair meet on Wednesday.

In her weekly video podcast, Merkel said she did not approve of companies like Facebook and Google basing their operations in countries where data protection was compromised.

"Many countries have lower levels of data protection than Germany, and we do not want our privacy laws to be watered down," she said.

"We'll talk with France about how we can maintain a high level of data protection. Above all, we'll talk about European providers that offer security for our citizens, so that one shouldn't have to send emails and other information across the Atlantic."

In response, Hollande's office confirmed that Paris and Berlin had already been discussing the matter, with France also keen on the idea. "It is important that we take up the initiative together," a French official said.

Concern about the activities of the US National Security Agency (NSA) came to the fore last year with the release of information from former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. According to leaked documents, the agency had indulged in "mass surveillance" of electronic communications of European Union citizens. Merkel's own communications were found to have been compromised with the revelation that the chancellor's mobile phone had been monitored.

Berlin has said it is keen to reach a "no spy" agreement with Washington, although this has so far been in vain.

In her podcast, Merkel also said she planned to discuss climate protection with Hollande, ahead of a global climate change conference in France next year. Security policies, particularly with respect to Africa, were also set for discussion.

rc/lw (dpa, Reuters)

Related Article:

Internet governance too US-centric, says European commission

NSA and GCHQ activities appear illegal, says EU parliamentary inquiry

Civil liberties committee report demands end to indiscriminate collection of personal data by British and US agencies

theguardian.com, Nick Hopkins and Ian Traynor, Thursday 9 January 2014

NSA and GCHQ operations have shaken trust between countries that considered
 themselves allies, the report says. Photograph: Alex Milan Tracy/NurPhoto/Corbis

Mass surveillance programmes used by the US and Britain to spy on people in Europe have been condemned in the "strongest possible terms" by the first parliamentary inquiry into the disclosures, which has demanded an end to the vast, systematic and indiscriminate collection of personal data by intelligence agencies.

The inquiry by the European parliament's civil liberties committee says the activities of America's National Security Agency (NSA) and its British counterpart, GCHQ, appear to be illegal and that their operations have "profoundly shaken" the trust between countries that considered themselves allies.

The 51-page draft report, obtained by the Guardian, was discussed by the committee on Thursday. Claude Moraes, the rapporteur asked to assess the impact of revelations made by the whistleblower Edward Snowden, also condemns the "chilling" way journalists working on the stories have been intimidated by state authorities.

Though Snowden is still in Russia, MEPs are expected to take evidence from him via video-link in the coming weeks, as the European parliament continues to assess the damage from the disclosures.

Committee MEPs voted overwhelmingly on Thursday to have Snowden testify, defying warnings from key US congressmen that giving the "felon" a public platform would wreck the European parliament's reputation and hamper co-operation with Washington.

While 36 committee members voted to hear Snowden, only two, both British Conservatives, voted against. It is not clear yet whether Snowden will testify. If he does, it will be via a live video-link rather than pre-recorded as initially planned.

"Snowden has endangered lives. Inviting him at all is a highly irresponsible act by an inquiry that has had little interest in finding out facts and ensuring a balanced approach to this delicate issue," said Timothy Kirkhope, the Conservative MEP. "At least if Snowden wants to give evidence, he will now have to come out of the shadows and risk his location being discovered."

The Lib Dem MEP Sarah Ludford denounced the Conservative position. "To ignore [Snowden] is absurd. The issue of whether the intelligence services are out of control merits serious examination in Europe as in the US. The Tories' ostrich-like denial is completely out of step with mainstream opinion in both continents, including Republicans in the US and Merkel's centre-right party in Germany. But their line is consistent with the obdurate refusal of Conservatives at Westminster to clarify and strengthen safeguards on snooping by GCHQ."

The Moraes draft describes some of the programmes revealed by Snowden over the past seven months – including Prism, run by the NSA, and Tempora, which is operated by GCHQ.

The former allows the NSA to conduct mass surveillance on EU citizens through the servers of US internet companies. The latter sucks up vast amounts of information from the cables that carry internet traffic in and out of the UK.

Delivering 116 findings and recommendations, the report says western intelligence agencies have been involved in spying on "an unprecedented scale and in an indiscriminate and non-suspicion-based manner". It is "very doubtful" that the collection of so much information is only guided by the fight against terrorism, the draft says, questioning the "legality, necessity and proportionality of the programmes".

The report also:

• Calls on the US authorities and EU states to prohibit blanket mass surveillance activities and bulk processing of personal data,

• Deplores the way intelligence agencies "have declined to co-operate with the inquiry the European parliament has been conducting on behalf of citizens",

• Insists mass surveillance has potentially severe effects on the freedom of the press, as well as a significant potential for abuse of information gathered against political opponents,

• Demands that the UK, Germany, France, Sweden and the Netherlands revise laws governing the activities of intelligence services to ensure they are in line with the European convention on human rights, and

• Calls on the US to revise its own laws to bring them into line with international law, so they "recognise the privacy and other rights of EU citizens."

The draft, still to be voted on by the chamber, has no legal force and does not compel further action, but adds to the growing body of criticism and outrage at the perceived intelligence abuses.

Separately, the European parliament has drafted new legislation curbing the transfer of private data to third countries outside the EU and setting stiff conditions for the information transfers. But hopes of getting the new rules into force before elections for the parliament in May are fading because of resistance from the UK and EU governments.

"This is a tough issue, even thorny," Greece's justice minister, Charalampos Athanasiou, told the Guardian. Greece took over the running of the EU for six months this week. "There are different views in the member states. I can't be sure about being successful."

Moraes condemns the way the Guardian was forced to destroy the Snowden files it had in London, and says the detention at Heathrow of David Miranda, the partner of the former Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald, constituted "an interference with the right of freedom of expression" under article 10 of the European convention on human rights.

The report is also highly critical of the data exchange scheme Safe Harbor, which allow swaps of commercial information between US and European companies. The draft also questioned the Swift scheme supplying European financial transactions information to the Americans to try to block terrorist funding and the supply of information on transatlantic air passengers.

The European commissioner Viviane Reding says the Safe Harbor scheme is flawed and may need to be frozen.

She wants to make it harder for the big US internet servers and social media providers to transfer European data to third countries. She also wants to subject the firms to EU law rather than secret American court orders.

The Moraes report says the web companies taking part in Safe Harbor have "admitted that they do not encrypt information and communications flowing between their data centres, thereby enabling intelligence services to intercept information".

He calls for the suspension of information sharing until companies can show they have taken the all necessary steps to protect privacy.

The report calls on the European commission to present by this time next year an EU strategy for democratic governance of the internet, and warns there is currently "no guarantee, either for EU public institutions or for citizens, that their IT security or privacy can be protected from intrusion by well-equipped third countries or EU intelligence agencies".

It adds: "Recent revelations in the press by whistleblowers and journalists, together with the expert evidence given during this inquiry, have resulted in compelling evidence of the existence of far-reaching, complex and highly technologically advanced systems designed by US and some member states' intelligence services, to collect, store and analyse communication and metadata of all citizens around the world on an unprecedented scale and in an indiscriminate and non-suspicion-based manner."

EU lays down steps US must take to protect data

Google – AFP, 27 November 2013

A pictures shows binary code reflected from a computer screen in a

woman's eye on October 22, 2012 (AFP/File, Leon Neal)

Brussels — The EU on Wednesday laid down steps Washington must take to restore trust after a huge spy scandal, including giving EU citizens the right to US legal redress to protect personal data.

"Massive spying on our citizens, companies and leaders is unacceptable," EU Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding said, adding there was "now a window of opportunity to rebuild trust which we expect our American partners to use".

An umbrella agreement being negotiated on EU-US data protection "has to give European citizens concrete and enforceable rights, notably the right to judicial redress in the US whenever their personal data are being processed in the US," Reding said in a statement.

EU Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding

 speaks during a press conference in

 Brussels, on September 17, 2013 (AFP/File,

John Thys)

At the same time, EU Home Affairs Commissioner Cecilia Malstroem said she was satisfied that separate EU-US accords on the transfer of airline passenger and financial transaction data were working properly.

A key concern in Europe -- where memories of surveillance by fascist and communist dictatorships remain alive -- is the pressure Washington exerts on giant US companies to hand over personal data, including those of EU citizens, on national security grounds.

Up to now, Brussels and Washington have reconciled their differences in a 2001 'Safe Harbour' agreement meant to ensure US companies respect EU norms on commercial use of personal data.

In the EU, personal data protection is considered to be a basic right whose commercial use must be carefully controlled.

Safe Harbour now needs to be tightened up, Redding said, setting a deadline of mid-2014 to agree the changes with Washington.

Among 13 suggested changes, she included a provision requiring US companies to make clear the extent to which US authorities have the right to collect and process personal data they may have gathered.

The "national security" justification often cited for such government access must also be used only if strictly necessary.

Reding said the EU should conclude reform of its own data protection laws and be actively involved to ensure that US reforms promised by President Barack Obama "also benefit EU citizens".

Highlighted by the reported US tapping of German Chancellor Angela Merkel's mobile phone, data protection has become a hugely sensitive topic since intelligence leaker Edward Snowden released evidence of a massive network of US spy operations on friend and foe alike earlier this year.

The uproar prompted the European Parliament to call for talks on a massive free trade deal with the United States to be scrapped, along with the Safe Harbour system.

Data protection has become a hugely

sensitive topic since intelligence leaker

Edward Snowden described a massive
network of US spy operations on friend
and foe alike earlier this year (AFP/File,
Prakash Singh)

But the European Commission stressed again Wednesday that data protection standards would not be part of the negotiations on the planned Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership.

Malstroem meanwhile said the Commission, the EU's executive arm, would not suspend data protection accords "just because of press articles" -- an apparent reference to reports based on Snowden's leaks.

The Passenger Name Record (PNR) system for airline passengers and the Terrorist Finance Tracking Programme (TFTP) "provide effective safeguards to protect the fundamental rights of European citizens," Malstroem said.

The "clear and effective guarantees in place" allow the Commission to "make sure that the US authorities stick to agreed rules," she said.

The EU will continue alert and monitor "the lawful implementationof EU-US agreements on data transfers," she added.

US Senator Christopher Murphy (r) congressman Gregory Meeks speak
in Berlin over the NSA scandal. Photo: dpa

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