Dutch MEP Petitions To Ban Export of Surveillance Software

Trailrunner7 writes with this excerpt: "A Dutch member of the European parliament is supporting a grass-roots effort to restrict the export of surveillance software such as FinFisher and others, which are used by some governments and law-enforcement agencies to monitor their citizens' activities. The effort, dubbed Stop Digital Arms, is supported by Marietje Schaake, a member of the EU Parliament's International Trade committee. The petition itself is on the Change.org site, and it calls upon members of the European Union 'to give the European Commission the mandate to draft the laws and develop initiatives necessary to stop digital arms trade' ... In a report called 'For Their Eyes Only' released earlier this year, the Citizen Lab at the Munk School of Global Affairs at the university of Toronto detailed the spread of this software around the world and identified a slew of FinFisher command-and-control servers in countries such as Australia, Bahrain, Canada, Germany, the Netherlands and the United States, among many others."

Comments

Actual Headline

[Anonymous Coward]

To translate: Dutch politicians attempt to ruin their own software industry, do nothing to stop digital surveillance.

Re:Actual Headline

[erikkemperman]

To translate: Dutch politicians attempt to ruin their own software industry, do nothing to stop digital surveillance.

Well the proposal would be for a EU wide export ban, but I see your point and tend to agree it wouldn't solve much.

Still, it makes sense to try and change some things that are within ones own reach, at least for starters. And in the Netherlands, there is quite a bit of development of this type of surveillance software going on.

I worked for one of these companies for about a month until I figured out exactly how badly it disgusted me. The Netherlands is among the worst countries when it comes to phone taps, which is what this company specialized in, but they happily exported to places like China and worse.

So, is this enough? No. Is it a start in the right direction? Maybe.

Good luck with that

[davidwr]

It may be possible to ban the SALE or TRADE of such software, but you can't very well stop someone from GIVING it away. After all, they can stand on the border and hold up printouts of the source code and invite people standing 5 feet away from them to take photos of it.

Well, I guess you COULD ban it if you are in a country that doesn't have or even pretend to have free-speech protections.

All any such ban will do would be to drive the R&D to other countries.