{"id":35292,"date":"2025-04-20T09:54:22","date_gmt":"2025-04-20T09:54:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/35292\/"},"modified":"2025-04-20T09:54:22","modified_gmt":"2025-04-20T09:54:22","slug":"anti-spying-phone-pouches-offered-to-eu-lawmakers-for-trip-to-hungary-politico","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/35292\/","title":{"rendered":"Anti-spying phone pouches offered to EU lawmakers for trip to Hungary \u2013 POLITICO"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Hungary has previously come under fire from EU lawmakers for its <a href=\"https:\/\/pro.politico.eu\/news\/138363\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">use of spyware<\/a>. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.europarl.europa.eu\/committees\/en\/parliament-establishes-inquiry-committee\/product-details\/20220816CHE10529\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The Parliament&#8217;s special inquiry committee into the use of spyware<\/a> (PEGA) in 2023 conducted a <a href=\"https:\/\/multimedia.europarl.europa.eu\/lt\/video\/press-conference-by-jeroen-lenaers-epp-nl-pega-chair-and-sophia-int-veld-renew-nl-rapporteur-following-the-visit-of-the-pega-delegation-in-budapest-hungary_I237248\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">fact-finding mission<\/a> after revelations that intrusion software had been used against opposition figures, journalists and civil society in the country.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Hungary also faced EU scrutiny after Belgian and Hungarian media reported late last year that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.eu\/article\/hungary-viktor-orban-cia-spy-wiretap-hack-laptop-eu-officials-information-office-budapest-olaf\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">its intelligence agency had spied on EU officials<\/a> visiting the country in 2015-2017, searching their hotel rooms and recording their phone conversations. The Hungarian government dismissed the reports. <\/p>\n<p>Budapest and Brussels have been on a collision course for years over EU criticism that the government led by Prime Minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n has curtailed fundamental rights and democratic checks and balances. The EU <a href=\"https:\/\/www.consilium.europa.eu\/en\/policies\/article-7-procedures\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">triggered a formal Article 7 procedure<\/a> over rule-of-law issues against Hungary in 2018.<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/multimedia.europarl.europa.eu\/et\/video\/libe-rule-of-law-mission-to-budapest-hungary-arrival-of-the-delegation-statement-by-tineke-strik-greensefa-nl-head-of-the-delegation-and-meeting-with-ngos-and-organisations_I270602\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">delegation<\/a> of civil liberties lawmakers this week is headed by Dutch Greens&#8217; member Tineke Strik. It includes Belgian liberal member Sophie Wilm\u00e8s, Spanish left-wing member Pernando Barrena Arza, Polish social democrat member Krzysztof \u015amiszek and Polish center-right member Micha\u0142 Wawrykiewicz.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Faraday bags are used to keep devices safe from interference from hackers, as well as from other kinds of tracking or surveillance, by blocking incoming and outgoing signals.<\/p>\n<p>Two officials with knowledge of the Parliament&#8217;s security policies, granted anonymity to discuss internal protocols, told POLITICO that the use of the pouches was not common for members&#8217; trips and travel.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hungary has previously come under fire from EU lawmakers for its use of spyware. The Parliament&#8217;s special inquiry&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":35293,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5174],"tags":[2001,4601,3457,6511,2002,2000,299,5187,2190,2817,13510,20424,6512,7338,20425,20426,2322,53,11586,20427],"class_list":{"0":"post-35292","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-eu","8":"tag-communications","9":"tag-cyber-espionage","10":"tag-cybersecurity","11":"tag-data-protection","12":"tag-espionage","13":"tag-eu","14":"tag-europe","15":"tag-european","16":"tag-hungary","17":"tag-intelligence","18":"tag-malware","19":"tag-pernando-barrena-arza","20":"tag-privacy","21":"tag-rule-of-law","22":"tag-sophie-wilmes","23":"tag-state-backed-hacking","24":"tag-surveillance","25":"tag-technology","26":"tag-telecoms","27":"tag-tineke-strik"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114369689333446990","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35292","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35292"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35292\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35293"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35292"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35292"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35292"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}