In the wake of the Paris attacks, France's finance minister, Michel Sapin, says that European authorities need better access to Swift data in the fight against terrorism.
Europe currently relies on US authorities to collect and analyse payments data from the Swift interbank system in the search for clues related to issues such as terrorist financing.
"We Europeans don't have the capacity to exploit our own data. I don't think this can carry on this way," Sapin told a news conference on Monday, according to Reuters.
"Since we do not have the means to analyze the data located in Europe, we transfer all of this data to the Americans, who have the capacity to analyse it."
Swift is currently required to hand over data from its European server to the US for "the purpose of the prevention, investigation, detection or prosecution of terrorism or terrorist financing".
Access to Swift data has been a source of tension between the US and Europe since it emerged in 2006 that in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, the Bush administration began using emergency powers to access data on suspect wire transfers sent over Swift.
France's concerns over the ability to trawl Swift data comes as the messaging network publishes a paper into how money laundering and terrorist financing regulation can be applied to third party payment providers and virtual currencies.
The Payment Services Directive and the fourth Anti-Money Laundering Directive are a step in the right direction when it comes to bringing new payments options under the microscope, but "certain aspects remain unclear and need further attention," says Swift.
Prepaid cards are seen as a particular problem in terrorist financing because of their relative anonymity. The Paris attackers are understood to have used them to pay for hotel rooms the night before their assault.
According to the Financial Times, France is set to tighten rules which currently mean that single-use cards of up to EUR250 and those that are refilled up to a total value of EUR2500 a year do not require users to show ID.
Meanwhile, Sapin also wants to give the finance ministry's AML arm, Tracfin, the go ahead to track the bank accounts of people who are under suspension of intelligence authorities, even if they have not committed any crimes.