EU Moves Forward with Data Retention

KokoBonobo writes " euobserver.com reports on controversial proposals to require EU service operators to retain data about telephone calls and e-mails as part of an overall fight against crime and terrorism. The retained data would not only consist of logs, but of entire conversations and contents of the e-mails and SMS messages. This document from the European Commission's Information Society goes into further detail."

Comments

my own direct experience on this topic

[tuxette]

I participated in an open hearing (in Norwegian only, sorry) on this very topic last year in Oslo. Participants included representatives from telecom companies, top IT companies, government agencies, interest groups, etc. While there was sympathy for the need to fight terrorism, nobody was in favor of long-term storage of traffic data. The reasons varied, all from privacy concerns to costs to contractual expectations. Nobody was able to see how this long-term data storage would be useful for fighting terrorism. Yes, they understood the alleged theories, but were able to slam these theories with real world examples.

The one representative who was supposed to speak in favor of it never showed up (remember Inger Marie Sunde?), nor did she send a replacement. Now what kind of message does that send? It gives the impression of "the majority doesn't care for long-term storage of traffic data, but we don't care what the majority thinks. We're going to impose our way on you whether you like it or not."