The European Court of Justice has ruled against the requirement to retain user data in telecommunications, declaring the relevant EU directive invalid
“The Court of Justice declares the Data Retention Directive[1] invalid,” the court said in a statement.
[1] DIRECTIVE 2006/24/EC OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL of 15 March 2006 http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ%3AL%3A2006%3A105%3A0054%3A0063%3AEL%3APDF
The data retention directive was introduced in March 2006, following the bombings on public transport in Madrid and London. The aim was to give authorities better tools to investigate and prosecute organised crime and terrorism.
It required telecommunications service providers to retain traffic and location data (and metadata) and other information needed to identify the user, but not the content of the call. The records were to be kept for six to 24 months.
An Austrian and an Irish court asked the European Court of Justice to rule on whether the law was in line with the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union. The law also caused public outcry in Germany.
The Court's reasoning was that although the directive and the legislator aim to best address serious crimes (organized crime and terrorism), they do not ensure in a strict and controlled manner the protection of the individual's privacy and personal data, in accordance with the requirements of fundamental rights.
The court explains in three paragraphs those points that it considered to require review and better clarification from the said directive. It concludes that the directive is incomplete in terms of its clarity and the existence of some mechanism of protection and strict control.
“The Court considers that, by requiring the retention of such data and by allowing the competent national authorities access to such data, the directive seriously interferes with the exercise of the fundamental rights to respect for private life and the protection of personal data. Furthermore, the fact that the retention and subsequent use of the data take place without the subscriber or registered user being aware of it is liable to give the persons concerned the feeling that their private life is being constantly monitored.”.
“Furthermore, the retention of data with a view to their possible transmission to the national competent authorities does indeed meet an objective of general interest, namely the
fight against serious crime and, ultimately, public security.
However, the Court considers that, by adopting the Data Retention Directive, the Union legislature exceeded the limits imposed by compliance with the principle of proportionality,” it ruled.
Read the court's decision in Greek:
Court of Justice of the European Union
PRESS RELEASE No. 54/14
Luxembourg, 8 April 2014
Judgment in Joined Cases C-293/12 and C-594/12
Digital Rights Ireland and Seitlinger and Others
Court declares data retention directive invalid
This directive entails a very extensive and particularly serious interference with the exercise of the fundamental rights to respect for private life and the protection of personal data without this interference being limited to what is strictly necessary…
[PDF file, 3 pages] https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2014-04/cp140054el.pdf
—–
From: REUTERS, “EU court rules against requirement to keep data of telecom users”, BRUSSELS Tue Apr 8, 2014 4:28am EDT
https://www.reuters.com/article/2014/04/08/us-eu-data-ruling-idUSBREA370F020140408
(Reporting by Jan Strupczewski, editing by Philip Blenkinsop, Larry King )
Image: An illustration picture shows a network cable next to a pack of smartphones in Berlin, June 7, 2013.
CREDIT: REUTERS/PAWEL KOPCZYNSKI
Pirate Party of Greece
