Europol
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EU ropes in intelligence agencies for enhanced border checks targeting Afghan nationals
Intensified border security checks targeting Afghan nationals have been agreed by the Council of the EU, with the procedures requiring the extraction of mobile phone data and significant coordination with national intelligence agencies – despite the EU having no competences in the realm of “national security”.
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MEPs poised to vote blank cheque for Europol using AI tools
This week, MEPs recognised the dangers of certain uses of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in criminal justice. A strong majority rallied around the landmark AI in criminal matters report by the European Parliament's Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE) committee, which opposes AI that 'predicts' criminal behaviour and calls for a ban on biometric surveillance.
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How Europol’s reform enables ‘NSA-style’ surveillance operations
“More than 100 million”. That’s the number of encrypted messages that French and Dutch law enforcement announced they had collected after infiltrating Encrochat in 2020, a company selling encrypted communication services and devices, writes EDRi's Chloé Berthélémy.
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Europol inches closer to increasing its powers despite lacking accountability
Europol was caught breaking the law and developing new initiatives without any proper legal basis (e.g. Europol’s innovation lab). Many proposed changes to Europol's mandate show an attempt to legalise the agency’s unlawful activities. In addition, this revision is happening even before the first implementation evaluation of Europol’s Regulation, planned for 2022, has been carried out. Without this evaluation, it is impossible to assess whether the current rules impede the fulfilment of the Agency’s missions and whether its working practices respect fundamental rights.
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Europol: Non-accountable cooperation with IT companies could go further
There is an ongoing mantra among law enforcement authorities in Europe according to which private companies are indispensable partners in the fight against “cyber-enabled” crimes as they are often in possession of personal data relevant for law enforcement operations. For that reason, police authorities increasingly attempt to lay hands on data held by companies – sometimes in disregard to the safeguards imposed by long-standing judicial cooperation mechanisms.
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EU worries over the possibility of losing wiretapping powers
5G telecoms networks could render obsolete the “lawful interception” techniques that police is traditionally using, unless the European Union and national governments take action. This was revealed in internal EU documents obtained by EDRi member Statewatch, that has published a new analysis explaining the issues and calling for a public debate. “It is unsurprising that […]
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All Cops Are Blind? Context in terrorist content online
The battle for the control of content and devices online has been at the centre of European policy-makers’ attention since the internet was created, but it has only increased in the recent years. Without any consideration for scientific literature on violent radicalisation factors, the current paradigm in the area of counter-terrorism leads to a proliferation […]
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ENDitorial: The European Commission is talking “tough on terror”. Again.
The European Commission plans to issue a Regulation on 12 September 2018 that will get tough on internet companies in the fight against terrorism.
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ENDitorial: The fake fight against fake news
The new danger is no longer yellow, but red once more: fake news. It helped getting Trump elected. It paved the highway to Brexit. Even local European elections are not safe. The greatest danger to our democracy in modern times must be fought by all possible means.
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Hermes Center demands investigation of NAT-related data retention
On 27 March 2018, EDRi member Hermes Center for Transparency and Digital Human Rights filed a request with the Italian Data Protection Authority (DPA) to investigate on the widespread practice of logging Network Address Translations (NAT) by most of the telecommunication operators.
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Europol: Delete criminals’ data, but keep watch on the innocent
Under the Europol Regulation, the agency must “support Member States' actions in preventing and combating forms of crime” such as terrorism and racism. However, much of the criminality that Europol works on is not harmonised on a EU level.
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EU Commission’s Recommendation: Let’s put internet giants in charge of censoring Europe
On 1 March 2018, the European Commission proposed a "Recommendation" on the surveillance and filtering of the internet by online companies.
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