Thursday, February 11, 2010

Bank Data R Us (not anymore)

The European Parliament voted down a temporary agreement that allowed US agencies to access information on bank transfers of EU citizens. Strong privacy concerns were the driving motivation behind the parliaments decision to stop the data access.

The decision is interesting for EU citizens in several aspects: One is the strong emphasize on data privacy and data protection, the second one is that the EU parliament made use of its veto powers and shot down a decision of the EU council, indicating that it cannot be ignored in the future.

(For those not living in the EU, here is more background on the EU Parliament. The members are directly elected by the EU citizens.)