Eurojust supports wire-tapping of Skype conversations - by Valentina Pop
EU's judicial cooperation agency Eurojust will take the lead in finding ways to help police and prosecutors across Europe to wiretap computer-to-computer phone conversations enabled by programs such as Skype. "We will sit together with all member states to see how this can be done technically and legally," Joannes Thuy, Eurojust spokesman told this website. Mr Thuy stressed that the wiretapping would not affect "normal users", but would have to be carried out only as part of a criminal investigation. Eurojust's talks with prosecutors and police officials from member states, as well as legal experts would be led by Italian prosecutor Carmen Manfreda. "There are 30 different legal systems all across the EU, so we expect the talks to take several months before first results are presented," Mr Thuy added. Skype, an Danish-Swedish business developed by Estonian programmers that was sold to E-Bay in 2005 and has over 350 million customers worldwide, is said to be un-spyable by intelligence services.
In its press release, Eurojust says that "Skype has so far refused to share its encryption system with national authorities." However, Skype claims that it has "extensively debriefed Eurojust on our law enforcement program and capabilities."
"Skype says it cooperates with law enforcement where legally and technically possible. Note EU-Digest: Based on EU privacy laws this seems very controversial and should not be approved.
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