Actu
Surveillance law: France carefully listening to the world! (at last...)
October 2015 by La Quadrature du Net
French Senate has approved last night the [bill on international surveillance (fr)][1], legalising mass surveillance beyond French borders, incidentally affecting numerous French people. La Quadrature Du Net salutes French consistency in terms of serious violations of Human
Rights.
© Falko Matte
Rather than listening to human rights defenders, France will genuinely begin _to listen_ to the entire world thanks to the Senators’ [courageous vote][2].
With this vote, they have joined their counterparts from the French National Assembly in a bold promotion of French surveillance technologies abroad.
After months of repeatedly [argued denunciation][3] by [Human Rights NGOs][4], International Organisations, [rapporteurs][5] from the UN or the Council of Europe, "amateurs" from the European Parliament or lawyers’
unions, French national representatives continue to turn _a deaf ear_.
France, self-proclaimed model of human rights, will thus be able to export and enlarge its expertise in the field of international mass wiretapping, nonexistent control of its intelligence services, and massive privacy violations. A bright future for _French Tech_, so often praised by the president and Manuel Valls’ government!
Although an obstacle still remains to our country’s promising drift for our
country: the text approved tonight by the French Senate - after being referred to the _Comission Mixte Paritaire_, a joint parliamentary committee responsible for reaching a compromise between the lower and upper house - must be formally approved by the French National Assembly and the French Senate.
A final leap to hear the criticisms made against it, and turn it down? It is time for the votes to cease being done in empty disillusioned nocturnal hemicycles.
Subsequently, the last remaining recourse will obviously be to take this fight for fundamental freedoms before European judiciary institutions, where it will finally be taken seriously.
* References *:
[1]: http://www.senat.fr/dossier-legislatif/ppl15-006.html
[2]: http://www.senat.fr/cra/s20151027/s20151027_5.html#par_589
[3]: https://www.laquadrature.net/en/node/9533
[4]: https://www.laquadrature.net/en/Civil-rights-groups-condemn-draft-mass-surveillance-bill-to-be-adopted-in-France
[5]: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/28/opinion/europe-is-spying-on-you-mass-surveillance.html?_r=0
