Data retention in EU Council Meeting

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Deutsch: [EU-Ministerrat diskutiert Vorratsdaten | http://www.unwatched.org/EDRigram_9.10_EU-Ministerrat_diskutiert_Vorratsdatenspeicherung]

The EU Council Working Group of Justice and Home Affairs had a first
discussion on 12 May 2011 on the European Commission implementation report
on the data retention directive.

The Commission agreed that the implementation has been uneven, both in terms
of retention periods, as well as in respecting data protection principles.
The working group discussed issues related to a common definition of
“organised crime”, that was opposed by some, on the basis of infringing the
rights of Member States to govern their own affairs on entirely internal
processes (“subsidiarity”).

This was just a preliminary discussion, where some member states claimed
that data retention was necessary, favouring a two year retention period.
Only a few countries brought forward the idea of the “quick freeze” as
an alternative solution.

The next schedule presented by the Commission includes several public
meetings, the first with civil society on 8 June 2011. After that, the
impact assessment should be finalized after the Summer and, by the end of
2011, the European Commission wishes to present its proposal to amend the
data retention directive.

Press release: 3085th Council meeting – Justice and Home Affairs
(12.05.2011)
http://www.consilium.europa.eu/uedocs/NewsWord/en/jha/121967.doc

EDRi-gram: Top 10 misleading statements of the European Commission on data
retention (20.04.2011)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number9.8/data-retention-evaluation