Experts say Commission is ‘fanning the flames’ of the continent’s own Watergate

An arsenal of angry European Parliament members (MEPs) is demanding answers from senior commissioners about why EU subsidies are ending up in the pockets of spyware companies.

The group of 39 politicians referred to recent investigations that revealed countries such as Italy, Greece, Hungary, and Spain have funnelled millions of taxpayer euros at a time to help support commercial spyware-makers’ finances.

They wrote: "According to these findings, entities such as Intellexa, Cy4Gate, Verint and Cognyte – whose technologies have been linked to unlawful surveillance of journalists, human rights defenders and political actors in the EU, as well as in third countries with dreadful human rights records – have benefitted from public financing, including EU programmes.