The German cabinet has approved more stringent oversight of the country's foreign intelligence service, the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND). This follows a series of embarrassing revelations about the BND's spying activities, including snooping on EU politicians and companies, as well supplying the NSA with copious quantities of information from its secret files. However, the actual spying powers of the BND are largely unaffected by the new rules.

Oversight of the BND will now be carried out directly from the German Chancellor's office, which will inform a new board consisting of three top judges and lawyers about major spying operations. As the German news magazine Der Spiegel explains, one of the key powers of the oversight board will be its ability to carry out random checks on the BND's "selectors"—identifying telephone numbers, e-mail, and IP addresses. This is to prevent the frequent use of selectors provided by the NSA, one of the problems that recently emerged.

The Guardian writes: "While intelligence-gathering from EU institutions or partner states will not be explicitly banned, it will be limited by law to 'information to recognise and confront threats to internal or external security'. Economic espionage is barred." Confusingly, though, the "elucidation of economically significant events may be necessary," which would seem to allow economic espionage of some kind.

Similarly, cooperation with international partners—not least the NSA—is allowed, provided certain conditions are met. For example, Der Spiegel mentions that joint operations can be carried out "to counter threats to internal and external security, to preserve the capacity of Germany to act, or to gain 'other findings of foreign and security policy significance,'" which seems to provide Germany's spies with plenty of scope.

Although oversight has been strengthened, the snooping powers of the BND are largely unaffected. According to an analysis of a leaked copy of the new BND rules, obtained by the German blog Netzpolitik.org earlier this month, many of the changes are about legalising existing activities, rather than curtailing them.

In this respect, Germany's move is very similar to that of the UK government with its Investigatory Powers Bill. As its nickname suggests, the Snoopers' Charter is not about reining in the UK's intelligence services, but about putting hitherto-secret snooping powers on a firmer legal footing.

The new law still requires approval by the German parliament, but this seems assured. Both of the major parties there were closely involved in the long-drawn out discussions over what form the new rules governing Germany's foreign intelligence agency should take.