The European Commission has issued a series of recommendations aimed at restoring trust after the revelations of widespread spying by US intelligence services of private communications in the EU. In addition to a quick adoption of the pending reform of the EU's data protection directive, the EC wants a reform of the existing Safe Harbour agreement that controls the transfer of private data used for commercial purposes between the the EU and US. A report published simultaneously on the functioning of the agreement shows the scheme "deficient in several respects", the EC said. It wants improvements to the system in place by next summer.
The EC also called for the proposed agreement on the exchange of data between law enforcement and judicial officials to be completed soon. This is expected to give EU and US citizens the same rights in protecting their data, notably allowing EU citizens not resident in the US access to judicial redress there. The EC also called on US officials to stick to existing channels for requesting legal assistance, such as the Passenger Name Records Agreement and Terrorist Financing Tracking Programme, rather than going directly to private companies to obtain information on individuals.
In addition, the EC wants the US to incorporate the rights of EU citizens in its ongoing review of the national security authorities' activities. The most important changes should be extending the safeguards available to US citizens to EU citizens not resident in the US, increased transparency and better oversight. Finally, the US should accede to the Council of Europe's Convention for the Protection of Individuals with regard to Automatic Processing of Personal Data, the EC said.
The recommendations form part of a strategy paper published by the EC on trans-Atlantic data flows that sets out the challenges and risks following the revelations on US intelligence collection programmes. In addition the EC published an analysis of the functioning of the Safe Harbour scheme, a report on the findings of the EU-US Working Group on Data Protection set up in July and the EC's review of the existing agreements on Passenger Name Records and the Terrorist Finance Tracking Programme. The Commission also underlined that standards of data protection will not be part of the ongoing negotiations for a trans-Atlantic trade agreement.
The EC's recommendations follow a meeting a week earlier in Washington attended by European Commissioners Viviane Reding and Cecilia Malmstrom that resulted in a joint statement by the EU and the US affirming their willingness to work towards rebuilding trust, including on data protection issues, and reinforcing cooperation on justice and home affairs issues.
