The EU should suspend the Safe Harbour agreement amid US spying allegations, says Euranet guest of the week, Axel Voss. The German member of the European Parliament argues that the data sharing agreement in the harbour pact, which allows US companies to transfer European data without any EU oversight, is too intrusive. Voss does, however, agree with the European Commission that the financial data sharing within the Terrorist Finance Tracking Programme (TFTP) should be kept in place.

The Safe Harbour pact gives US American businesses the right to transfer European data to the US without any major EU control. Following the US spying allegations, German MEP Axel Voss argues that the pact is too intrusive and the EU should suspend it as soon as possible. This would force the the US officials to sit down with their European counterparts and decide on common standards for data protection.

Axel Voss does not, however, think that the EU should suspend the financial data sharing within the TFTP, used to track down terrorist money. Earlier this fall the European Parliament asked for such a suspension amid allegations that US intelligence services collected financial data without using the TFTP agreement, but by launching a cyber attack against the Belgium based world wide interbank network, SWIFT.

No proof of an American cyber attack?

Last week the EU Commission decided to continue with the programme after getting assurances from the US that no agreement had been breached. The decision provoked some angry voices in the parliament, saying that the so called investigation by the Commission was a sham. The Commission simply asked the US authorities if they did anything wrong and trusted them when they said no.

Axel Voss sees the TFTP as an important tool in the fight against terrorism and he argues that the company that runs Swift has made its own investigation without finding any proof of an American cyber attack.

“EU should suspend US data sharing in the Safe Harbour pact” by Euranet Plus – Official