I couldn’t find any other sources reporting on this and was interested in the context for the remarks, so I tracked down the streamed version of the hearing on the European Parliament web site. The exchange on spyware begins at 17:15:48. I have transcribed it below. I apologize for any errors; I’m unfamiliar with EU sub-organizations and jargon (e.g. is “plenary debate” right?) and the speakers are originally Finnish (Virkkunen) and Belgian (Bricmont), which may mean I’ve understood them incorrectly.

S. BRICMONT

I’m really happy, Madam Virkkunen, that you finally make it to our committee and thank you very much for your previous answers to the questions of the colleagues.

I would like to focus my intervention on the use of illegal spyware both in the EU and by third countries. Since 2021, there have been many revelations about illegal use of spyware in the EU, including with Pegasus and Predator. Thousands of victims have been identified in Europe and beyond. Even members of the Commission, of this house, colleague of ours have been spied upon, endangering our work. And unfortunately, new revelations continue to fall. Recently, the use of Paragon–presenting itself as the transparent version of Pegasus, and it’s apparently not the case–in Italy, have been disclosed in the last weeks, adding new victims to the list and bringing rather confused, or confusing, answers from Meloni government. Unfortunately, we know that it will not stop there.

We established under the last mandate, an inquiry committee. It led to many important recommendations, both for the European Commission, for the Council, to circumvent the use of spyware and prevent illegitimate uses. And unfortunately, we see very few if no follow-up on these recommendations. And so, I also see that it disappeared from the working program of the Commission, although a communication was announced in June '24 and then end '24 and nothing more.

I think if the European Commission is really serious about tech sovereignty, democracy and security and protecting our democracies, it should consider illegal spyware as a top priority. So, can you tell us what you plan to do in these regards? Do you plan to address the European Parliament inquiry committee recommendations? Will they inspire an action plan in the coming EU security strategy? I also wonder what is or will be your political reaction and answer to the recent revelations. And finally, are you aware that there will be new revelations in the coming days? And we asked for a plenary debate in March in Strasbourg. Thank you.

H. VIRKKUNEN

Thank you very much. In fact, I was also member in this inquiry committee in the European Parliament that we had recently, and of course I am very aware of the recommendations also the committee made. But this is very serious, of course, what you were also underlining: the importance of the citizens, to make sure that illegal spyware is not used against them. And, of course, in the European Union, we want to make sure that our digital rules and our societies are very much based to privacy and safety and democracy and also fair environment. And, of course, that kind of violations, if spyware is used illegal way against our citizens, of course this is something that we can’t accept.

So, this very serious topic you were underlining, and we will look now into commission side, that what will be the next step from our side in this. In the same time, when technologies they are playing very important role in our security, it’s also very easy to threaten our security and unstabilize and create distrust among our citizens by using technologies illegal way in our societies. So I will come back to that and we will now looked at what will be the next steps from the commission side, 'cause like you said, there has been communication on that already, but now we have to really looked at what will be the next steps. Thank you for you for tabling this.

S. BRICMONT

If I may, there have been an announcement of a communication, if I may correct you, and nothing is coming. So we really much expect the Commission from coming at least with a communication or strategy, or even better, proposals to implement the recommendations and to put an end to those kind of illegal spyware. Thank you.

H. VIRKKUNEN

Yeah, there has been announcement on communication, but now we have to look really at what will be the next step, but that has been announced. Yeah.