Spy tech exports from Europe face tighter scrutiny

The EU could soon introduce rules to monitor the deployment of internet censorship technology in autocratic regimes including China and Saudi Arabia.

The European Parliament is proposing a resolution to strengthen the accountability of countries that export gear used to block websites and eavesdrop on mobile communications.

"There is a race between those harnessing new media to the purpose of liberation and those who seek to use it for repression," said Richard Howitt, a British Labour-party MEP and the investigator appointed to look into the issue. "I don't hesitate to say Vodafone must learn from doing Mubarak's bidding," he said in a canned statement, referring to the telco sending out pro-government propaganda and suspending its services in Egypt at President Hosni Mubarak's request weeks before a revolution forced the head of state to resign.