Watchdog questions mass US data grab The draft agreement on handing European citizens' bank account details to the US needs tightening up to better protect privacy, according to the European data watchdog. The agreement was released in draft form by the European Commission last month. It now needs approval from the Council before negotiations with the US begin. …
Rather than passing all this stuff over to the US, why don't us Europeans ask the US what it is they are looking for and search for it ourselves, and tell the US if we find it? That way, we can vet what the US is searching for and we don't end up passing the 99.999% of innocent data to them?
We could even charge the US for providing the service.
Alternatively, is now a good time for everyone to move their bank accounts to somewhere outside the EU to avoid being snooped on?
If the Europeans process this data it will be slightly harder for the US government to leak out data about the financial transactions of European corporates to their US competitors. Commercial support is, after all, the primary activity of most external intelligence agencies.
If the snooping Septics want to keep pushing for this data then the very minimum demand is that all EU states also have unfettered bulk access to all US bank transactions, that will leave the whole plan dead in the water.
If the US want to see ours, then European states get to to see theirs.
Unless the agreement is 100% reciprocal, then forget it.
If they're worried about 'terrorists' moving money around in Europe, surely Europeans have the right to investigate 'terrorists' moving money around in the US.
There's more history of US citizens supporting terrorist organisations than the other way around.
Name me a politician who does not have some shady financial deal in his past... I'm not one for judging, we nearly all have something to hide, it's just that the sorts of people who make proper political deals (rather than being fucked over by PFI) seem to have learned their trade at a somewhat sharper end of the business. We will always be open to shady sponsorship allegiances, since we cannot find a fair way of publicly financing political parties.
Now, give all the data to the Americans, and let's wonder why certain politicians suddenly appear slavishly intent of following the CIA line, I'm looking at you Tony.
I'm no great conspiracy theorist, but its been on record that the American spooks consider the commercial success of US business an equal priority to the defense (sic) of the nation. There is no way that this information will not be mined by the best brains they have for any potentially useful "Intel".
Knowledge is power, only a complete fuckwit cretin would hand it all over to a potential adversary.
The Americans aren't a 'potential' adversary. They're a continuing threat to Britain and Europe. Their special relationship with the UK is - and has always been - a one-sided fraud. Their military, in concert with their friends in the Fourth Reich (sorry, Israel) has half the world in turmoil, and their commerce has already done us all hugely more harm than Al Qaida. Not to mention their cultural fascism dumbing down most of the planet.
That's how it's always been since WW2, it's how it is, and it's how things are going to stay. America's definition of a 'friendly' country is one that does as it's damn well told - and we all know how 'unfriendly' countries end up, whether they're in Latin America or the Middle East. They're NOT friends of ours - they never play any game unless it's by their own rules, and they get to change those as they please.
UK and European politicians need to grow some balls and decide if Europe is a political entity or just another vassal of a USA. Best not to hold your breath, I fear.
... that's what they chose 65 years ago, at the end of WWII. In the old days, geopolitics and balance of power considerations would have guaranteed that the whole world unite against America regardless of mere ideological differences.
Fortunately for the Americans, Europe is war-weary after two wars, and the Soviet Union provided a nice diversion they can concentrate on. With the fall of the Soviet Union, America has set up too far a lead, Europe is too far in America's jaws, the comfort of 50 years of low military budgets, and the indoctrination that Russians = Bad to raise an utter.
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