Top EU court says phone data cannot be held 'indiscriminately'

By Gabriela Baczynska

BRUSSELS – The European Union’s high court docket dominated on Tuesday that nationwide authorities can't retain telephone information in a “common and indiscriminate” method, however may use particular info to deal with some very severe crime.

The court docket dominated on a case introduced by the Supreme Court docket in Eire the place a person sentenced in 2015 to life imprisonment for homicide appealed, saying the court docket of first occasion had wrongly admitted site visitors and placement information of phone calls as proof.

The Luxembourg-based Court docket of Justice of the EU (ECJ) on Tuesday stated it was as much as a nationwide court docket there to resolve whether or not the proof was allowed.

However it additionally stated the bloc’s members can't have legal guidelines in place that might permit crime prevention via the “common and indiscriminate” retention of such information.

Some circumstances, resembling notably severe crime considered a risk to nationwide safety, may justify information retention however solely in a narrower scope or for a restricted time.

The ruling follows one other from the ECJ final 12 months that discovered such information could possibly be used to “fight severe crime or forestall severe threats to public safety”.