Bulgaria's Constitutional Court Rules Bulk Data Retention Unconstitutional; EU Says No New Snooping Directive Coming

Privacy

from the surprising-but-welcome-victory dept

Tue, Mar 17th 2015 1:14am — Glyn Moody

Just last week we reported that a Dutch court had set aside the country's national data retention law; now Bulgarian judges have done the same:

Bulgaria's Constitutional Court ruled on March 12 to declare provisions in the Electronic Communications Act mandating the bulk collection of telecommunications data as unconstitutional.

The challenge to the national law came soon after the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) had ruled that the European data retention directive was "invalid". The assumption has always been that the European Commission would put together a revised version of the directive to deal with the court's objections, but in a surprise move, the EU Commissioner responsible announced that no new snooping law would be proposed: "On the data retention directive, the European Commission does not plan to present a new legislative initiative," Dimitris Avramopoulos told a news conference in Brussels.
It's worth emphasizing that this does not mean bulk data retention is dead in the EU. As an earlier Techdirt post explained, the EU's Member States can still bring in national laws requiring data retention, but those can be challenged in the courts in the light of the CJEU decision, as is already happening. In practice, this means that there is likely to be a wide range of requirements for data retention across Europe, ranging from the most extreme in the UK, for example, to those countries that accept that such mass surveillance is not just intrusive but also ineffectual.

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Filed Under: bulgaria, data retention, eu, privacy

10 Comments

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Anonymous Coward, 17 Mar 2015 @ 1:57am

FBI's Comey came to its neighbor Romania recently and told the president and the new local "NSA" chief there that they NEED a data retention law if they want to collaborate well with US in the future.
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- Glyn Moody, 17 Mar 2015 @ 2:13am
  
  Re:
  Interesting - do you have a link for that please?
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Anonymous Coward, 17 Mar 2015 @ 3:26am

Chilling effect
"mass surveillance is not just intrusive but also ineffectual."

Ineffectual for it's usual stated purpose, that is. Still useful for it's real purpose of creating a chilling effect on the sheeple.
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Padpaw (profile), 17 Mar 2015 @ 6:17am

now to just wait for the EU to get caught spying after they promised not to
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Michael, 17 Mar 2015 @ 6:53am

Bulgaria - land of the free and the home of the brave.

How'd that happen?
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- Ninja (profile), 17 Mar 2015 @ 8:30am
  
  Re:
  Seems the previous country left in a hurry for the polar opposite and nobody is willing to take the place.
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MondoGordo (profile), 17 Mar 2015 @ 9:10am

"no new snooping law"
How about a "new no-snooping law" ? That'd be much better!
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Anonymous Coward, 17 Mar 2015 @ 10:17am

I envy EU states. They actually appear to follow their constitutional laws. Which is more than I can say for the lawlessness happening in the United States.
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- Anonymous Coward, 17 Mar 2015 @ 7:51pm
  
  Re:
  The US government says that the US constitution means whatever the US government says it means. What kind of accountability is that? None.
  
  The Constitution should be interpreted by the people and those in government held accountable to *that* interpretation, not the government's own.
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  - Pragmatic, 18 Mar 2015 @ 3:27am
    
    Re: Re:
    Which means actually getting involved in the democratic process and holding the government to accountable, i.e. getting on first name terms with your Congresscritter. What actually happens is we outsource democracy to these people, leave them to get on with it, complain about it when they get it wrong (but not to them personally), then vote them in again because we don't like the other party.
    
    Better to hold these people to account personally. Keep their feet to the fire and make them afraid of losing their jobs if you want to see change.
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