A report submitted by the Article 29 Part, that is an independent committee set up to monitor data and privacy issues for the European Union. According to this panel, social networks such as Facebook, Twitter and MySpace operating in the European Union have to now practice more stringent norms for the protection of online rights of the EU users.

The new laws and policies laid out by the EU panel have their roots from the European Union Directive on Data Protection of 1995, that strictly prohibits social networking organizations from accumulating personal information without the express consent of the users. Among other restrictions, this directive also doesn’t allow employers to read their employee’s private e-mails and furthermore, the online companies can no longer share user information with approval from the users.

However, these guidelines are quite vague in terms of their enforcement. For example, according to one guideline, the companies cannot use the user information for any other purpose, other than legitimate reasons. Now, the application of this guideline may be interpreted by different companies in different ways. Social Networks are required to explain their privacy policies in detail to the users, and also need their express permission before divulging their personal information to third parties.

According to a MySpace statement,

“MySpace considers the privacy of its users a top priority. As an industry leader in safety, security and privacy, we proactively worked with the European Union and the Article 29 Working Party to provide input into their recommendations based on the privacy best practices that we already deploy for our users. We look forward to continuing to engage in an open dialogue with the European Union on these issues.”

Via TechCrunch.