US, Germany To Enter No-Spying Agreement

itwbennett writes "The German Federal Intelligence Service said in a news release that the U.S. has verbally committed to enter into a no-spying agreement with Germany. The no-spying agreement talks were announced as part of a progress report on an eight-point program proposed by German Chancellor Angela Merkel in July with measures to better protect the privacy of German citizens. In the progress report, the German government found that U.S. intelligence services comply with German law. Also, the operators of large German Internet exchanges and the federal government did not find any evidence that the U.S. spies on Germans, the government said."

Comments

yeah, right

[Black Parrot]

and no one will ever cheat.

Re:yeah, right

[dkleinsc]

In other words, a verbal commitment is worth the paper it's written on.

Re:yeah, right

[bill_mcgonigle]

I, for one, trust James Clapper to not lie to the Bundestag.
 

Re:yeah, right

[Trikenstein]

They pinky swore that's like totally, totally binding you get warts if you break a pinky swear

Re:yeah, right

[Opportunist]

Hey, the last time someone made an oral commitment in the oval office it almost lead to impeachment. We can only hope.

Re:yeah, right

[Anonymous Coward]

you get warts if you break a pinky swear

I hear that's how we ended up with Texas.

Re:yeah, right

[Seumas]

Exactly. I was going to say "don't fall for this, Germany -- we have an agreement for our government not to spy on us, too... it's called the Constitution... which our current Constitutional Lawyer president and former presidents have completely shit upon".

Re:yeah, right

[penix1]

Essentially the problem boils down to that the president doesn't have the mandate to enter into an international treaties and other nations tend to not know this.

Poppycock! In fact, the President is the ONLY one in the federal government with a mandate to enter into treaty with other nations. Article 2 Section 2 gives him the power with the advice and consent of the Senate. Without the President initiating it, you have no treaty.

"Article 2 Section 2 Clause 2: He shall have the power, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to make treaties..."

It doesn't get any clearer than that. It's the President who does the negotiating with the Senate. It starts with the President.

I want one too

[Kasamir]

Can I get a no-spying agreement with the U.S. government?

Re:I want one too

[Anonymous Coward]

We have one, it's called the fourth amendment.

See how well that turned out for us?

What's not to believe?

[intermodal]

It's not like the US intelligence groups ever go beyond what laws allow, nor do they ever lie about such things...

Sure, can America not spy on Americans too?

[Nadaka]

Sure, can America not spy on Americans too?

That sure would be nice.

Don't worry USA!

[Anonymous Coward]

The UK will spy on Germany for you!

Mutual spying agreement

[Dr.Dubious DDQ]

I read this as a "spying exchange agreement". The US promises not to spy on Germans, and the Germans agree not to spy on Americans.

Instead, if the NSA wants spy data on German citizens, they'll metaphorically "extradite" data that the German government has collected on its citizens (and vice versa).

That would be my guess, anyway.

No problems ...wink wink

[arcite]

The US will just contract out the spying to a third party (or country, ally). No harm no foul. Money talks.

fools

[Tom]

Please get a real journalist on this, not some blogger. A tiny bit of research will tell you a few interesting things that put things into perspective.

For example, we have an election upcoming, so obviously the government has to appear to be doing something about it, because the people don't like it. My bets are firmly on this dragging out until the election (of course, with constant reminders and "progress" reports) and afterwards, it'll quickly be forgotten.

For example, there are still laws in place from the end of WW2 and the times of the foundation of the Federal Republic of Germany that guarantee the allies spying rights. One of those agreements has just been revoked, to great PR effect. Almost all the mainstream media ignored that other agreements to the same effect still stand.

For example, the german equivalent, the BND, has been accused of working closely with the NSA, to the point of providing them with raw data. And our current prime minister would sell the whole country to her american friends if it gave her a benefit (a friendly hug would probably suffice). So one likely result is that they will agree the US stops spying, then the NSA lents its spy stations to the BND, who shares the data with the NSA, so everything remains the same, but technically, the NSA isn't spying within Germany anymore.

If you think the government or the current breed of corrupt egomanics that have taken over politics is there to protect you, you've been living under a rock the past twenty years.

Re:No problems ...wink wink

[isorox]

The US will just contract out the spying to a third party (or country, ally). No harm no foul. Money talks.

Yes, the US will contract out it's Euro spying to Germany.

Meanwhile Germany will contract out it's America spying to the US.

Job done.