Oh, irony. Only a day after WikiLeaks revealed that the NSA has been spying on the past three French presidents as well as many French officials, France’s lower house adopted the very controversial surveillance law. According to politicians from all parties, France needs a comprehensive intelligence law following the Charlie Hebdo attacks. Yet, in many ways, this law is even broader than the Patriot Act.
Source: TechCrunch
‘Draconian’ French Charteur des Snoopeurs gets senate approval:
Yesterday, the Projet de Loi Relatif au Renseignement – the bill described as France’s own Patriot Act – was passed by the country’s upper chamber.
The fast-tracked law will give French intelligence services lots of new snooping superpowers, with little or no judicial oversight.
Civil liberties organisations have described the new bill as an assault on human rights: “This is the third time in little over a year that France has expanded its surveillance powers,” said Estelle Massé, policy analyst at Access. “This draconian legislation is a dangerous assault on privacy and freedom of expression.”
Access denounces the passage of the so-called “French Patriot Act” by the Senate in France. After widespread opposition from civil society groups and tech companies, the Information Bill (projet de loi relatif au renseignement) was passed by the upper chamber of Parliament.
“This is the third time in little over a year that France has expanded its surveillance powers,” said Estelle Massé, Policy Analyst at Access. “The bill is a dangerous assault on privacy and freedom of expression.”
French MPs say Oui to Le Charteur des Snoopeurs. You think only Yankees can have a Patriot Act? Think again mon brave.
Today the French National Assembly approved a dangerous new proposal which would allow intelligence services to violate user privacy and harm freedom of expression. The so-called “French Patriot Act” was first introduced shortly after the killings at the newspaper Charlie Hebdo in January of this year. Sadly, the government used the killings as a pretext to push forward legislation that will give the intelligence services the ability to monitor communications with almost no judicial oversight. […]
As we have seen in the U.S. with the USA PATRIOT Act, and in other countries around the world, once a repressive bill is passed it can be used for decades to target users. The world mourned after the Charlie Hebdo attacks, but allowing mass surveillance of all citizens is the wrong response.
The bill was approved by a vote of 438 to 86. You can read more about the troubling provisions in the text at our blog post here.