Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2012-10-23-Speech-2-605-000"
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"en.20121023.48.2-605-000"2
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"Mr President, I also very much appreciate that we are having this debate today and it gives me the possibility, hopefully, to clarify a few issues and to explain our intentions.
The Commission is indeed, as has been announced many times (also in the evaluation report from last year), planning to propose reforms to the Data Retention Directive, but it will not be for this year. Ever since the Commission originally tabled this proposal in 2005, it has acknowledged that telecommunications data are an integral part of evidence-gathering in investigations and prosecutions of very serious crime and that such data may be crucial in serving the needs of justice and protecting victims against harm. It was, and remains, necessary to guarantee that, within the bounds of proportionality and subject to appropriate safeguards and controls, these data are available for a limited period of time if police and prosecutors need to assess them.
The limitation and procedures for data retention should be as harmonised as possible to minimise the negative impact on the internal market while, at the same time, respecting the legitimate and varying requirements of national circumstances. It was also necessary to have a solid European data protection level for this. All but two Member States have now transposed the directive.
In the Commission’s evaluation of last year, evidence from Member States and Europol on the value of the measures of combating serious crime was presented. We have continued to press Member States to provide credible and comparable statistics and case studies to demonstrate this, and we have received quite a lot of information. Law enforcement and judicial authorities throughout the EU have repeatedly stressed the importance of knowing that data will be available if there is a need. However, as has been pointed out by different stakeholders – yourselves, different representatives of the data protection community, the industry, NGOs and different professional groups including journalists and lawyers – the Commission is also of the view that data retention has a significant impact on the right to privacy and the protection of personal data.
There are a number of areas in the current directive that ought to be improved. These areas are set out very clearly and in the evaluation report and they have been further examined during consultation. For instance, a reduced and more harmonised data retention period; a scope which is clear and exhaustive in terms of the type of data to be retained; and a clearer purpose limitation for which the data may be used. We also need minimum standards for access and use of the data, better accountability on the part of authorities for the data which they access and the statistics they provide, stronger data protection and a consistent approach to reimbursing the operator’s costs.
There is also – and this is very important – a need to be coherent between the obligation to require data retention in this directive – the Data Retention Directive – and the possibility that Member States have today to require, or to allow, data retention provided with the ePrivacy Directive. It is necessary to ensure that Member States cannot use retained data for other purposes than the ones in the Data Retention Directive. Currently Member States have this possibility in the ePrivacy Directive, so this is a loophole. The Commission has already announced that we will analyse the need to review the ePrivacy Directive once negotiations on the new general data protection framework are over.
So we are working towards a reform of the Data Retention Directive to be presented at the same time as the future revision of the ePrivacy Directive. Given the technical and legal complexity and the political sensitivity of this, it is likely to take some time, and I cannot give you a concrete timetable today. But I would like to mention that we very much appreciate your support and your input in this, which has contributed very constructively to our work and that of the data retention expert group."@en1
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