Lex Nokia storms into the Finnish Parliament

By EDRi · February 25, 2009

This article is also available in:
Deutsch: [Lex Nokias Einzug ins Finnische Parlament | http://www.unwatched.org/node/1304]

This article is also available in:
Macedonian: [Лекс Нокиа влегува во финскиот парла… | http://www.metamorphosis.org.mk/content/view/1392/4/lang,mk/]

Government bill dubbed as Lex Nokia, also known as the snooping law, entered
the Parliament for debate on 24 February 2009. The bill has been widely
criticized for heavy-handed treatment of fundamental rights, granting
companies more rights than the police, suspicion of undue corporate pressure
and vagueness and unclarity.

The proponents of the law have continued making embarrassing gaffes:
Communications Minister Suvi Lindén has said in an interview in Tampere
newspaper Aamulehti that an employer currently has the right to order a
strip-search of an employee if there is suspicion that the employee is
leaking company secrets. Furthermore, Finance Minister Jyrki Katainen, has
stated that he is not familiar with the contents of the bill, but supports
it firmly, regardless.

Yesterday’s parliamentary debate consisted mainly of opponents of the law
raising various concerns regarding fundamental rights, usefulness of the
bill, increasing surveillance, bad drafting process etc. The defenders of
the law kept repeating how opponents of the bill are ill-informed of its
actual implications and how the bill improves the status of employee rights.
The Left Alliance and the Social Democrats were calling for rejecting the
bill and sending it back for a complete overhaul.

TV news on 24 February reported about the law, stating that it is meant to
prevent three things:
* leakage of trade secrets
* copying of copyrighted materials
* disruption of corporate networks with attachments and malware.

Unless this is some kind of mistake made by the news, this sheds a new light
on the purpose of the bill.

Government party lines seem to be holding, only the Greens (14 seats) are
split on the issue. If the lines are not broken any further, the bill will
pass even if all Greens vote against it, since the National Coalition (51
seats), the Centre (51) and the Swedish People’s Party (10) have a majority
in the 200-member strong parliament.

The Greens have proposed limiting the bill so that the email log data is
allowed to be examined only in cases where a company is investigating
leakage of trade secrets. The content of the law is expected to be voted
upon today, 25 February. The final vote, whether to pass or reject the bill,
is expected next week.

Lex Nokia Debate Ignites Parliament (24.02.2009)
http://yle.fi/uutiset/news/2009/02/lex_nokia_debate_ignites_parliament__569512.html?origin=rss

Labour Ministry official confirms threat of Nokia leaving Finland over law
on electronic communications (24.02.2009)
http://www.hs.fi/english/article/Labour+Ministry+official+confirms+threat+of+Nokia+leaving+Finland+over+law+on+electronic+communications/1135243785748

Lex Nokia furore fuelled further by minister´s strip-search remark
(13.02.2009)
http://www.hs.fi/english/article/iLex+Nokiai+furore+fuelled+further+by+ministers+strip-search+remark/1135243506947

EDRi-gram: Snooping law, “Lex Nokia”, proceeding slowly but surely in
Finland (17.12.2008)
http://www.edri.org/edri-gram/number6.24/nokia-law-finland-snooping

(Contribution by Leena Romppainen – EDRi-member Electronic Frontier Finland)