ISP Wants European Commission To Take Action Against Sweden For Refusing To Halt Data Retention
from the good-luck-with-that dept
Back in April, Mike wrote about the decision of the Swedish ISP Bahnhof to delete all user log files in the wake of the judgment from the EU Court of Justice that the present EU data retention requirements are "invalid". According to an article in Computerworld UK, Bahnhof did this with the permission of the Swedish Post and Telecom Authority (PTS), which agreed that the Swedish law implementing data retention was problematic. However:
in mid-August the PTS ordered Bahnhof to start retaining data again, Bahnhof CEO Jon Karlung said. The PTS has made a 180-degree turn in policy by ordering Bahnhof -- and Tele2, which also stopped retaining data for a while -- to resume doing so.
Bahnhof is not only fighting this reversal of policy in the Swedish courts, but also calling on the European Union to take action against the Swedish government for its refusal to halt data retention:
According to a PTS spokesman, it was the government that ordered the PTS to start enforcing the Swedish data retention law again. "They appointed a commissioner to investigate if the Swedish national legislation could still be applied" despite the CJEU's ruling, he said. The commissioner came to the conclusion that the national legislation stands, and from that point on, the PTS has been enforcing the law again, he said.Bahnhof, the renowned Swedish network operator and internet carrier joins forces with 5th of July Foundation to urge the EU Commission to initiate proceedings against the Kingdom of Sweden for blatantly ignoring the judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union on April 8, 2014, which declared the Data Retention Directive invalid. Sweden now fails to fulfil its obligations according to The Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, articles 7 and 8, ‘Respect for private and family life’ and ‘Protection of personal data’.
It's rather a long shot, since the European Commission has given no indication it wants to get rid of data retention, and so is unlikely to help Bahnhof in its battle with the Swedish authorities. Still, it's nice change to have an ISP willing to stand up for its users time and again, as Bahnhof has done; long may it continue to do so.
Follow me @glynmoody on Twitter or identi.ca, and +glynmoody on Google+
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: data retention, eu court of justice, europe, sweden
Companies: banhof
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
Amen
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
We used to say that here in the US, until the corporations took over.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
The right to forget is just a wonderful example of this insane move to a level of privacy that could only be obtained by actually removing part of people's memory.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Can't find the status of the different reported challenges to it. There were at least 3 different groups going to court over it.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Kids, prohibit your politicans to visit US embassy on your country and then we can fix this shit you created.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
funding
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: funding
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]