WIKILIBE inquiry into PRISM and Tempora
On 4th July 2013 the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs was charged with the mandate, by the European Parliament, to investigate the mass surveillance of European citizens. The mandate was announced after it was revealed by NSA contractor Edward Snowden that the US intelligence service, in cooperation with British intelligence service GCHQ, had deployed mass surveillance programmes Tempora and PRISM, to spy on thousands of non- US citizens.
The inquiry will consist of 10-15 hearings, the schedule and agenda of each can be found on the committees event page. The first was held on 10th July 2013.
The purpose of the hearings are “to conduct an in-depth inquiry into the matter, in collaboration with national parliaments and the EU-US experts and to report back by the end of the year”. [1] Claude Moraes MEP has been appointed as the Rapporteur commissioned to write a report when the investigation is concluded. [2]
All hearings are broadcast live on their website, links can be found under the individual press releases.
The sixth hearing has now been uploaded (video starts automatically).
The committee asked for a study to be conducted to provide some preliminary background on the of the surveillance programme. The study titled "The US surveillance programmes and their impact on EU citizens' fundamental rights", has been published in pdf version online.