You probably use your phone or laptop every day, so you surely want to know your data is stored safely. In 2021, media organisations broke the story that several EU and non-EU governments had used Pegasus commercial spyware against journalists, politicians, diplomats, law enforcement officials, lawyers, business people and civil society actors. Pegasus is designed to breach mobile phones and extract vast amounts of data, including text messages, call interceptions, passwords, locations, microphone and camera recordings, and information from installed apps.
While other institutions shied away from action, the European Parliament responded immediately. It set up a Committee of Inquiry (the Committee of Inquiry to investigate the use of Pegasus and equivalent surveillance spyware – PEGA) to investigate the use of Pegasus and equivalent surveillance spyware. During its mandate, the committee interviewed over 215 interlocutors, commissioned studies, held hearings with experts and people who had been targeted, and organised fact-finding visits to Israel, Poland, Greece, Cyprus, Hungary and Spain. In March 2023, PEGA adopted a 145‑page report with the results of its investigation; Parliament adopted its final recommendation in June 2023.
Parliament found that both EU and non-EU countries had used Pegasus and similar spyware for political and even criminal purposes. Parliament was concerned that some Member States had spied on targets under the pretext of ‘national security’ to escape EU oversight. It concluded that Greek and, in particular, Polish and Hungarian legal frameworks and practices violated Union law and did not offer citizens sufficient protection. Parliament also made specific recommendations for Spain and Cyprus. Parliament envisaged stronger institutional and legal safeguards to ensure fundamental rights-compliant use of spyware, such as conditions for ordering, authorising, executing, and overseeing spyware operations. It also advocated a clear definition of ‘national security’. Parliament called on the European Commission to enforce existing laws more stringently and to follow up on possible abuses. It also tasked the Commission with drafting new laws, such as common EU standards for the use of spyware and a regulation on commercial spyware on the EU market.
Although the PEGA committee terminated on 9 June 2023, the chair and rapporteur announced that Parliament would continue working on the topic, for instance, within the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs.
Parliament used its powers of oversight and scrutiny to immediately take action to protect European citizens. Parliament’s powers fall broadly into six, often overlapping, domains: law-making, the budget, scrutiny of the executive, external relations, and, to a lesser extent, constitutional affairs and agenda-setting. This graphic shows more examples of areas where Parliament used one or more of its different powers to influence legislation:
For a fuller picture of the European Parliament’s activity over the past five years, take a look at our publication Examples of Parliament’s impact: 2019 to 2024: Illustrating the powers of the European Parliament, from which this case is drawn.
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