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ACLU letter to President of the EU's Article 29 Working Group

Barry Steinhart, director of the ACLU Technology & Liberty Project: April 16, 2008 Letter from the ACLU to the President of the European Union’s Article 29 Working Group urging investigation of NSA spying.

  • “We would like to take this opportunity to raise with you and your colleagues our concerns regarding new extrajudicial surveillance of European and other foreigners’ activities that is being conducted by the United States on the basis of traffic data and content communications. We believe that this surveillance contravenes the requirements for the protection of the private life under article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights and accordingly the EU Directive 1995 on the processing of personal information and the 2002 E.Privacy Directive. Telecommunications service providers across Europe and around the world that provide communications services to Europeans are likely to be in breach of these laws. And the communications privacy of European citizens and those persons, including Americans, with whom they communicate, is in significant jeopardy.”

    Because much of the world’s communications travel through switching points in the United States, Internet transactions and email between Europeans is increasingly sent through servers in the U.S. This greatly aids the NSA in its surveillance. (This amazing map on Wired News pretty much conveys the situation in a single glance.)”

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