Europe May Impose Sanctions against the US

The EU Justice Commissioner may suspend a commercial data-sharing agreement between the European Union and the United States if the latter fails to stop its mass surveillance. According to the statement of the Commissioner made to EU lawmakers, the so-called Safe Harbour agreement, which allows companies to transfer personal information to the US, can be suspended in case the negotiations between the EU and the US go nowhere.

According to the strict data protection laws of the European Union, businesses may only transfer personal information outside the 28-member bloc if a country is believed to have adequate safeguards for that information. At the moment, only a few countries in the world meet the required standards, and the United States is not in the list.

14 years ago, the European Union adopted the agreement under which American companies certify themselves that they meet the abovementioned data privacy standards. But after the revelations about mass US surveillance programs over the European citizens, this agreement was actually nullified, because Snowden’s revelations showed that the American tech companies were simply handing over information to spooks.

Given the fact that the negotiations with the United States are tough now, the industry experts expect that the situation will worsen when Jan Philipp Albrecht of the Greens group takes over in November as the new Justice Commissioner. Everyone knows that the Greens hate the spying antics of the United States.

Over 3,200 companies were certified under Safe Harbour agreement – for example, Google and Facebook. In the meantime, the Commission announced a review of the agreement a year ago, after Edward Snowden revealed details of the US eavesdropping on Europeans’ phone calls, including those of Angela Merkel.

As a result, the Commission provided Washington with a 13-point list of issues to address before putting forward a revised agreement. For example, one of the issues was that the United States would use the national security prerogative to access EU citizens’ data only in case of a strict necessity and in response to a specific threat. It is clear that this issue is causing a problem because America considers everyone a threat, including loyal allies.

Finally, the EU Justice Commissioner asked for more time to continue developing a constructive spirit in the negotiations with the United States and building on the progress made so far.