European member states have failed to align national laws with the European Media Freedoms Act.
A European Union law intended to shield journalists from spyware and surveillance has taken effect amid skepticism from press freedom groups over its effectiveness.
According to The Record, critics say member states have failed to align national laws with the European Media Freedoms Act (EMFA) despite a year's notice, and warn that last year's amendments weakened core protections.
Initially, EMFA largely barred spyware use against journalists except for rare national security cases. However, a June 2023 revision gave governments wider authority to deploy commercial surveillance tools under broader state function claims, a change watchdogs say limits judicial oversight.
Written by
Dan Raywood is a B2B journalist with 25 years of experience, including covering cybersecurity for the past 17 years. He has extensively covered topics from Advanced Persistent Threats and nation-state hackers to major data breaches and regulatory changes.
He has spoken at events including 44CON, Infosecurity Europe, RANT Forum, BSides Scotland, Steelcon and the National Cyber Security Show, and served as editor of SC Media UK, Infosecurity Magazine and IT Security Guru. He was also an analyst with 451 Research and a product marketing lead at Tenable.
