American eavesdropping

MEPs call to halt EU-US data exchange deal

Published on 10 September 2013
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In the wake of new allegations of American spying, three MEPs are leading the call for the suspension of the Terrorist Finance Tracking Programme (TFTP), a deal which allows the European Union to share financial data with the US as part of an effort to identify cash used to fund terrorism, writes the EUobserver.

The documents leaked by former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor Edward Snowden, suggest the NSA secretly monitored Brazil’s state-run oil firm Petrobras and bank transfer giant, the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, better known as SWIFT.

Belgian Liberal MEP Guy Verhofstadt, Dutch liberal Sophie in ’t Veld and German Green Jan Philipp Albrecht are pushing for the European Commission to halt the financial data exchange deal until the US clarifies the truth of the claims. The news website continues –

The EU signed off on the TFTP agreement with the US in 2010 under the condition that strict privacy rules would be met. The Commission at the time said the agreement includes data protection guarantees restricting US use of the information.

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