Europe To Make Sure That Investigators Work Harder, Not Smarter

Legal Issues

from the more-must-be-better dept

Arguments over data retention have gone on for years — and it’s already been explained why forcing ISPs to keep all that data generally makes it more difficult to find the important stuff, rather than making it easier to catch criminals — as supporters contend. However, politicians seem to like easy explanations, and “more” seems like it must be “better.” So, the European Parliament has now said that data retention is a must, requiring records to be kept for two years. Each country still needs to approve the rules on their own, though. And, of course, the politicians don’t explain how ISPs will pay for all of this data retention. They also don’t seem to consider the fact that the more data is retained, the more likely it is to be misused by those with access or twisted by other industries to be used for other, non-terrorism-preventing activities.