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Content type: News & Analysis
To read Privacy International's take on the ruling, go here.
What does the decision actually say?
The primary question that the Court was asked to consider was whether Google Search has obligations under the Data Protection Directive 1995, the EU legal framework regulating how public bodies and businesses deal with individuals’ personal data.
There were three primary issues at hand: the first was whether Google Inc., the international entity which operates Google Search, was under the…
Content type: News & Analysis
Since the European Court of Justice in May ruled in the “right to be forgotten” case, there has been a dizzying amount of debate about the decision, and its implications for privacy and free expression.
A main thread within these discussions is an old story that US Industry loves to tell and has told for some time: Europeans love privacy law, and Americans love free speech, and the twain shall never meet.
The Google Search case at the European Court of Justice has fuelled this view…
Content type: Press release
Privacy International, Reporters Without Borders, Digitale Gesellschaft, FIDH, and Human Rights Watch welcome news that the European Commission will move ahead and add specific forms of surveillance technology to the EU control list on dual use items, thus taking steps to finally hold companies to account who sell spy equipment and enable human rights abuses.
These important steps demonstrate that policymakers are beginning to wake up to the real harm that exists…
Content type: News & Analysis
Last year, UK-based surveillance company Gamma TSE sold the Indonesian military US$ 6.7 million worth of equipment as part of the military's weapons modernisation effort. As early as 2005, Indonesian officials were soliciting the advice of a close partner of Gamma, Germany-based Elaman, to create technical surveillance unit (TSU), according to a white paper published as part of the WikiLeak SpyFiles and found in the Surveillance Industry Index.
Gamma and Elaman are…
Content type: News & Analysis
3 June 2014
The following article written by Carly Nyst, Privacy International's Legal Director, originially appeared on the Future Tense blog on Slate:
The news that the CIA is no longer using vaccination programs as a front for spying operations may come as a relief to many humanitarian workers. Yet their fears should not be completely assuaged, because the CIA’s activities—which undoubtedly threatened the safety of humanitarian workers and those they seek to help—pale in…
Content type: Press release
The ruling today from the European Court of Justice, invalidating the European Union’s 2006 Data Retention Directive policy, was strong and unequivocal: the right to privacy provides a fundamental barrier between the individual and powerful institutions, and laws allowing for indiscriminate, blanket retention on this scale are completely unacceptable.
As the Court states, it is not, and never was, proportionate to spy on the entire population of Europe. The types of data retained under this…
Content type: Press release
World leaders must commit to keeping invasive surveillance systems and technologies out of the hands of dictators and oppressive regimes, said a new global coalition of human rights organizations as it launched today in Brussels.
The Coalition Against Unlawful Surveillance Exports (CAUSE) – which includes Amnesty International, Digitale Gesellschaft, FIDH, Human Rights Watch, the New America Foundation’s Open Technology Institute, Privacy International, and Reporters without Borders – aims to…
Content type: News & Analysis
Surveillance companies selling mass and intrusive spy technologies to human rights-abusing governments often are benefitting from the financial and institutional support from their home government, revealing a more closely-linked relationship between the sector and the State than previously believed.
Recent revelations concerning the funding of Hacking Team's surveillance technology with public money highlights the role of states in funding the development of surveillance…
Content type: News & Analysis
Facing intense scrutiny from a Swiss government inquiry into the human rights impact of the commercial surveillance trade, companies have packed up and are no longer attempting to export their spying technology from Switzerland.
Speaking with St. Galler Tagblatt, one of Switzerland’s largest German-language daily newspapers, government spokeswoman Marie Avet confirmed that the companies have cancelled export applications for surveillance technology - including all applications for…
Content type: News & Analysis
Only a few days after it was reported that intrusive surveillance technology developed and sold by Italian surveillance company Hacking Team was found in some of the most repressive countries in the world, Privacy International has uncovered evidence which suggests the company has received over €1 million in public financing.
It has come to Privacy International’s attention that Hacking Team appears to have received €1.5 million from two venture capital funds originating from the Region of…