German Data Retention Law Ruled Unconstitutional 129
mseeger writes "The German Federal Constitutional Court has ruled the country's current data retention law unconstitutional. All stored telephone and email communication data, previously kept for six months in case it was needed by law enforcement, now must be deleted as soon as possible. The court criticized the lack of data security and insufficient restrictions for access to the data. The president of the court said continuing to retain the data would 'cause a diffusely threatening feeling of being under observation that can diminish an unprejudiced perception of one's basic rights in many areas.' While it doesn't disallow data retention in general, the imposed restriction demands a complete reworking of the law."
An anonymous reader contributes the Court's press release and more information on the ruling, both in German.
Great Precedent (Score:5, Insightful)
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Great news from our big neighbors.
If only our mainstream media would pick it up, then someone would actually know about this.
The Free World or the Corporate World (Score:2)
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Maybe a few years of a fascist government supporting global total war and orchestrated genocide would give the US people a renewed taste for personal liberties.
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This guy really appears to be crazy. Mussolini had a newspaper. Glenn Beck has TV.
I assume he is nothing but a person to astroturf a hate movement to avoid public riots, outcry and irrational actions against the bankers and economical leaders in the aftermath of severe economical turmoil, job loss and so forth. In 1929 it was the jews from next door which took the blame and we witnessed the sudden rise of the nazi movement to contain the communists. Beck explicitly appeals to anti-bank tin foils and turns t
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Not really. For example, the Mövenpick corporation owns the Free Democratic Party. [earthtimes.org]
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"Burned" is not the right word for it.
FDP was made fun of for about a month but not much else happened as a consequence.
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I am from Germany (not originally but for the last 16 years).
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But that is not socialism in most parts of the world. That is the unique American reality distortion together with paranoia towards socialism. So we made our negative experiences with socialism and know what we oppose. But American anti-socialism is mostly ideological without any experience.
I mean, no one seriously opposes health care insurance. That is just a crazy mind reform in the States which makes the scum defend the economical interests of the upper percentile.
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No one is ever totally wrong. That is the danger of it all.
I suppose there were good reasons to vote the Nazi party in 1932. When you read Lenin it also sounds very reasonable. Many Westerners admired the ambitions of Chairman Mao...
But regardless what you think of it, "socialism" is nothing but saying we take the social problems serious. In that sense each German party more or less serves you well.
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I mean, no one seriously opposes health care insurance. That is just a crazy mind reform in the States which makes the scum defend the economical interests of the upper percentile.
I oppose health care insurance being handled by the Fed. I have absolutely no problem with individual states having their own "public options" and such. Hell, if it worked well in one state I would want it in my state. Get it done right in one state, and it will spread like wildfire throughout the union.
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Ah! ok.
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Although I sympathize with your view on the role of corporations in politics. In this specific case it is all about independent and reasonable judges. Also something to cherish.
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Speak for yourself.
Re:Great Precedent (Score:4, Informative)
To be honest, we weren't the first ones. The Constitutinal Courts of Romania and Bulgaria (not sure of the second country) already ruled the EU data retention law unconstitutional.
Re:Great Precedent (Score:4, Insightful)
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Thanks to both ACs for correcting me and the explanation about the Bulgarian case.
Re:Great Precedent + a reason (Score:1)
Pyrrhic victory? (Score:5, Insightful)
Unfortunately, the explanations given by the Federal Constitutional Court can be read as an instruction manual on how to create a data retention law 2.0 that will pass the courts muster. Shouldn't take those politicians too long to come up with the new version. :/
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Yes, but if you read the verdict as a set of requirements, you'd see the blueprint of a mission impossible.
The same was true for "computer assisted voting".
However, the requirements are so high, that they can't be fulfilled.
Re:Pyrrhic victory? (Score:5, Informative)
That aside, thank the FSM for our constitutional court. They basically struck down every security-theatre related law in the last couple of years. I am starting to think about a three-strikes law for politicians - vote for three unconstitutional laws and you are out. Loss of eligibility for any political office for 4 years at last. Ahh, well, a man can dream...
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I am starting to think about a three-strikes law for politicians - vote for three unconstitutional laws and you are out. Loss of eligibility for any political office for 4 years at last.
In light of the usual way this is implemented, your solution wouldn't be fair, though. It would be better to enact your proposed restrictions when a politician was accused of not handling in the voter's best interest by any citizen three times.
Re:Pyrrhic victory? (Score:4, Funny)
Sounds great! We'll need to ask all of the citizens if their interests have been taken care of well or not. Since what I consider taking care of me might be the opposite of what taken care of is for you, we'll need to go by majority. Also, since we can't spend the time and money to ask every day, how about ever 2-4 years we get together and vote on how well our politicians are doing? I wish there was a political system that did that!
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Your idea sounds nice in theory, but I've heard that it has been tried and didn't work out that well (as described in the article these postings are attached to for instance).
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It would be better to enact your proposed restrictions when a politician was accused of not handling in the voter's best interest by any citizen three times.
There's already a formal method in place for voters to make it clear that a politician is not handling their best interests appropriately. It's called "voting".
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no central storage of the data under direct government control,
But then they let the providers pay for the storage and we all know that this will lead to central storage, either through outsourcing or simply by pushing smaller companies out of the market.
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They tried, but the wheelchair outran them.
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Maybe we need a web site to record all unconstitutional laws and demand sanctions against the ministerial officials.
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That aside, thank the FSM for our constitutional court.
The Flying Spaghetti Monster -- is there anything that he cannot do?
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One of the restrictions the Federal Constitutional Court has imposed is that such data may only be saved decentralized. Additionally they have to be stored securely and must only be used for very severe crimes. The court is very careful: Technical possibilities change very quickly and they want the verdict to be still useful in 10 or 20 years. That's why they avoid saying "such data cannot be stored securely, therefore data retention is for all times unconstitutional".
In another verdict the court has ruled
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On the other hand, there's an EU directive which demands that a data retention law gets passed.
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However, it imposed rules that no e-voting system in the near future is able to fulfill: Every citizen must be able to verify the correctness of the vote without specific technical knowledge. Not even open source e-voting systems meet this requirement.
And IMO I would not go that far, but...
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But than again I can't remember the last time that the BVerG (Bundesverfassungsgericht = Federal Consitutional Court) ruled a law straight as "unconstitutional" and demanded all records to be removed immediately. Most of the time it grants a grace period in which the parlament needs to come up with a revised version of the law. This isn't the case this time. The law was basically ruled as "null and void/has never existed". So they can't just "adjust" the current law to meet the court's requirements. They ne
A great victory (Score:5, Informative)
In my story submission [slashdot.org], I included a few more details. 35,000 citizens filed a class-action against this law and now after two years we finally see this law voided.
The "Bundesverfassungsgericht [wikipedia.org]" has once again proven that is the most significant institution in Germany that protects citizens' constitutional rights - in this case the right of informational self-determination [wikipedia.org].
problematic politics (Re:A great victory) (Score:2)
I do not have first hand experience of many other countries, but this is just a stepping stone for the government - it will not deter the government from continuing in the same direction. In the last decade or so, it has been my distinct impression that there has been rise of cases where the German government first pushes through some (partially harsh) legislation, only to have it challenged at the Bundesverfassungsgericht and just continuing on with however much the judges let them get away with.
All this l
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Many of those politicians are legal professionals themselves. If they ever claim ineptitude in this matter, I want to see their degrees in Law revoked and their diplomas recycled into toilet paper.
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Ewww... I'm afraid that toilet paper'd give you a rash...
Rashes are temporary, but justice is forever.
Pandora's box is open (Score:1, Interesting)
Data retention without prior suspicion hasn't been ruled unconstitutional, so we've stepped onto the slippery slope and opened Pandora's box. From now on, we're only going to be haggling over how much data can be retained and what it can be used for. This is not a victory.
ACTA (Score:5, Interesting)
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I am not sure whether ACTA plays into this but a quick look at the court's press release indicates that they had to do quite a bit of work to prevent legal intimidation by the European Union:
The regulations under scrutiny are to be understood as an implementation of the European Parliament's and Commission's directive 2006/24/EG about data retention from the year 2006.
Die angegriffenen Vorschriften verstehen sich als Umsetzung der Richtlinie 2006/24/EG des Europäischen Parlaments und des Rates über die Vorratsdatenspeicherung aus dem Jahre 2006. (The regulations under scrutiny are to be understood as an implementation of the European Parliament's and Commission's directive 2006/24/EG about data retention from the year 2006.)
Furthermore they state that the German data retention act goes way beyond what would have been required by the European Commission and that t
Re:ACTA (Score:5, Informative)
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The next step would be to challenge the EU directive itself, but that is a lot more diff
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I really try hard to keep the legalese out of slashdot comments
Come on, we can talk about the "Kompetenzkompetenz" of derivative subjects of international law here... ;)
Anyway, the idea of a constitutional core seems pretty strong in Germany, given that the constitution itself defines such an irrevocable core. I think we will see clarification on that issue in the next decade or so, at least if the European integration continues,
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German is a sovereign nation. It can do what ever the hell it likes to EU directives rules.
The general principle is that EC law is superior to national laws. For directives, the EU members can decide for themselves how they are going to implement them but usually there is a timeframe set and if they do not implement them in time there are consequences. Under specific circumstances directives can even be enforced directly if a member state fails to implement them in time.
Its not like any country follows all of them.
While not all members have implemented all directives (y
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Yes, but there are infringement proceedings against some member states because they don't apply the directive, there are other constitutional courts which rejected it, so a simple recast of the directive is required by the Commission anyway because the directive is wrecked [europa.eu].
ACTA certainly deserves more attention but there are other FTA with such provisions as well.
SETI (Score:1, Offtopic)
oops (Score:3, Funny)
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Well, the aliens will come and sue SETI for data retention and analysis without a court order. :-)
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They'd get counter-sued by the MPAA and James Cameron for stealing his ideas. Better stay at least a light year from Earth.
All hail the Chaos Computer Club (Score:5, Informative)
Re:All hail the Chaos Computer Club (Score:5, Insightful)
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So the real problem is: Who is deciding who is an expert and who not?
I mean just think of the case of the media industry.
Freakin’ hard to be a judge, if you ask me.
Is there some mechanism to choose experts?
The only one I know is the trust mechanism. Which has a whole area of criminal science dedicated to it, called “social engineering”, and more holes than the Internet Explorer.
So what else?
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Just recursify the problem: Ask an expert.
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I think you are arguing from the perspective of Common law which does not apply in Germany. Here, judges and courts in general have much more freedom in discovering the truth during trials, they may ask questions, they may ask for more information. And we are happy they do so.
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Re:All hail the Chaos Computer Club (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't say they know shit. They knew enough to know that their expertise didn't suffice and that's why they invited specialists (including the CCC which of course loved to help). They've carefully heard this case for two years and now they've come to an excellent decision. /. story of a judge who didn't know what the Internet was and had it explained to him before he judged? You don't have to know everything, you just have to know when you should educate yourself.
The Federal Constitutional Court did exactly the right thing, that's what is important. It's not their job to know everything about computers and technical measures of data retention. Remember the
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If you come to the Congress - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_Communication_Congress [wikipedia.org] - you can join right at the door, and get your ticket discounted immediately.
Domestic spying unconstitutional? (Score:3, Interesting)
There can be only logical solution: Change the constitution.
Anyone taking bets that this will be the solution rather than to throw the unconstitutional domestic spying out the door?
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IMHO it would be difficult, since the ruling is based on the concept of "informational self-determination", which the constitutional court established based on specially protected fundamental rights in the German constitution. Plus, it is quite unlikely that they would find the necessary support for a change of the constitution in the parliament. Several parties are against the law (at least in current form), including the Liberal party (FDP) which is the junior partner in the coalition government right now
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IMHO it would be difficult, since the ruling is based on the concept of "informational self-determination", which the constitutional court established based on specially protected fundamental rights in the German constitution.
If it's one of fundamental human rights, then AFAIR it's in the section of the Basic Law that is immutable and cannot be amended in any way?
Unenviable comparison (Score:5, Interesting)
It's dangerous to praise a decision with political ramifications - something good can be twisted into something bad on the next iteration. Still and all, the language is encouraging, and poses the rhetorical question:
"How messed up is the US when we have to take cues on privacy laws from, of all people, the Germans?"
As another poster pointed out about informational self-determination, the Germans are discussing the implications of privacy. US courts are still diddling over whether privacy expectation is even "constitutional".
Re:Unenviable comparison (Score:5, Insightful)
> of all people, the Germans
What do you mean? Germany is one of the best countries in terms of privacy protection.
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Now. Part of it wasn't, until about twenty years ago. None of it was, about seventy years ago.
Then again, Romania, of all countries, had a very interesting decision upholding the peoples right to privacy lately. Who'd have thunk?
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You don't know shit. Germany was the first country to give itself a significant set of laws about protection of personal data, nearly fourty years ago. Other European countries followed and this led, for the EU, to Directive 95/46/EC on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data [wikipedia.org].
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To find bad shit in the US you can just look at now, why bother going back :)
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Re:Unenviable comparison (Score:4, Interesting)
Two important differences come into play here. First, where the rights overlap (such as freedom of expression) the German Basic Law (constitution) affirmatively establishes rights. The US Constitution only restricts the government from passing laws to abridge constitutional rights.
Second, the German Basic Law is founded on a concept entirely absent from the US Constitution: the right to dignity. It's the first article in the German constitution, and has been described by the German Constitutional Court as the right from which all other constitutional rights emanate.
Article 1 [Human Dignity]
(1) Human dignity is inviolable. To respect and protect it is the duty of all state authority. (2) The German People therefore acknowledge inviolable and inalienable human rights as the basis of every human community, of peace, and of justice in the world. (3) The following basic rights are binding on legislature, executive, and judiciary as directly valid law.
Re:Unenviable comparison (Score:5, Informative)
"How messed up is the US when we have to take cues on privacy laws from, of all people, the Germans?"
Actually, the Germans, "of all people," have the advantage of knowing precisely just how bad things can get.
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I just thought about this "advantage" some short while ago and came to the conclusion that if you need a totalitarian regime to let you come to senses, you may get another one as soon as society has forgotten how that felt like.
We (the Germans) frequently talk about never forgetting the third reich, but that alone is already worrisome. We almost implicitly admit that we have no better idea than to not forget (I like to exaggerate). It would be a good idea if it worked, but for instance that latest financial
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"How messed up is the US when we have to take cues on privacy laws from, of all people, the Germans?"
Yeah, because we are exactly like our great-grandparents.
And we did not completely flip to the other side of left extremism and shame for our nation in general, or started to care more about privacy.
</sarcasm> (or is that cynism?)
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You know what is ironic? This constitution came into existence, because the US and their British and French allies issued an order in July 1948 to get one written.
So the German people elected 65 members of a parliament board. These 65 (only four women among them) drafted what became the equivalent of the German constitution.
That's a terrific quote (Score:5, Insightful)
"...a diffusely threatening feeling of being under observation... can diminish an unprejudiced perception of one's basic rights in many areas."
^^ This.
Someone gets it.
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Scary how good that sounds even after being translated, isn't it?
Bonus!!! (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Bonus!!! (Score:4, Interesting)
Yep. And in Germany, privacy laws apply to you even if you're not the government.
Lame. (Score:1, Informative)
All this means is that the standard for corporations and government are even farther apart.
Sure it protects personal privacy, but this protects corporations from lawsuits, and their bottom line even more.
I was having a conversation with a consultant on Risk/Threat assessment of an IMS project we are working on. The difference in retention is amazing. Because I work in government, we are expected to keep stuff around for YEARS, usually 5 to 7 locally, and then maybe decades in an archive. This is for transpa
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Can we borrow that court (Score:2)
Champagne, please! (Score:2)
And a really huge thanks to Prof. Papier, the Chief Justice, who will retire soon. Thank you, man. That guy has been one of the few people in our republic who constantly held up civil liberties.