A top EU official says mass surveillance by the U.S. National Security Agency is a business problem for European Internet service providers.
Paul Nemitz, a European Commission official, said Monday anyone in the United States using a European-based email service risks having the NSA reading his or her messages. Nemitz said that under U.S. law, the NSA basically can grab any data it wants as the information enters the United States.
His comments come as the EU and the United States are renegotiating a data-sharing agreement that helps U.S. companies do business in Europe.
A report from the Council of Europe Monday says continued mass data collection by the U.S. makes it more likely other countries will insist that their data be routed and stored locally.
The report says this would create national barriers to a global network and would slow down Internet speeds.
The European Commission is pushing for Washington to guarantee that it will only access Europeans' personal data for national security reasons, as it says it does with U.S. citizens' data.