Denmark Releases 32 Prisoners Convicted Because Of Flawed Mobile Phone Tracking Data
from the but-how-many-more-to-come? dept
A few weeks ago, Techdirt wrote about Denmark reviewing 10,000 court verdicts because of errors in mobile phone tracking data that was offered as evidence in those cases. At that time, it wasn’t clear how many of the group were affected by the unreliable data. However, the Guardian reports that 32 people have already been freed. Given the large number of cases involved, it seems unlikely that many have been reviewed in such a short space of time. If that’s the case, it is possible that quite a few more verdicts will be overturned, and more people released. Companies providing mobile phone services in Denmark are naturally keen to distance themselves from this mess. Jakob Willer, speaking on behalf of the country’s telecoms industry association, said it was not their job to provide evidence:
“We should remember: data is created to help deliver telecom services, not to control citizens or for surveillance,” Willer said. He conceded it could be valuable to police, but insisted its primary purpose was to facilitate communication between users.
That’s an important point. If the authorities wish to use this kind of data they need to take into account that it was never designed to track people, and therefore has limitations as evidence. Fortunately, Denmark’s embarrassing discovery that an unknown number of over 10,000 verdicts may be based on unreliable evidence has been something of a wake-up call for the country’s lawyers. Karoline Normann, the head of the Danish law society’s criminal law committee, told Agence-France Presse:
“This situation has changed our mindset about cellphone data. We are probably going to question it as we normally question a witness or other types of evidence, where we consider circumstances like who produced the evidence, and why and how.”
It’s troubling that it didn’t occur to the legal profession to do that before. Just because information comes from high-tech sources doesn’t mean it is infallible or that it can’t be challenged.
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Filed Under: csli, denmark, evidence, location info, location tracking, privacy
Comments on “Denmark Releases 32 Prisoners Convicted Because Of Flawed Mobile Phone Tracking Data”
So WHY wasn't it challenged at the time? Not ONE in 10,000?
Surely it’d be a major point obvious to any defendant.
The figure kind of makes the defendants look FLAWED TOO!
You just VERY slightly re-write what I’d already read.
You’ve added nothing! In fact, reduce!
Is this the utmost level of your "journalism"?
Don’t you have ANY curiosity about details?
Re: So WHY wasn't it challenged at the time? Not ONE in 10,000?
Have you had a mental health exam lately?
Re:
I’m curious about the detail of how you can both support copyright and decry corporate censorship without your brain turning into pudding.
Re: So WHY wasn't it challenged at the time? Not ONE in 10,000?
If you don’t like reading the articles here, why do you keep coming back?
Re: Re:
Because he can’t hatefuck an actual woman.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
Thus "Blue Balls."
At least it wasn't the US.
Here if something like that came about, you would still have to go through years of appeals while locked up, and might still remain convicted because even if all the evidence was wrong, the jury might still have been right.
Re: At least it wasn't the US.
So far as I know, actual innocence isn’t a reason to overturn a conviction, yet convictions get overturned. This is one of the places where our legal system absolutely baffles me.
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In America? Pretty much: “The Supreme Court has repeatedly declined to hold that the federal Constitution allows for so-called freestanding claims of innocence, that is, the right to be let out of prison simply because you didn’t do it, without any other “technical” violation to back up your argument. In the United States, the inmate who raises a compelling case of innocence after a constitutionally proper trial may well be doomed.” (Source)
Re: Re: At least it wasn't the US.
"So far as I know, actual innocence isn’t a reason to overturn a conviction"
Although it should be.
"yet convictions get overturned"
As a result of much effort and many hours in court.
Justice should not be directly proportional to your net worth, and yet it is.
Re: Re: At least it wasn't the US.
Troy Davis what?
Get real
I think the big issue is, Denmark isn’t willing to be the first country to admit their mobile phone tracking data is 100% accurate. I mean, no government would use questionable data.
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You forgot a sarcasm marker there.
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I know. I don’t use the Sarcmark™. I don’t want to get sued for a Trademark violation. 🙂
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Hence why I use a tilde before punctuation (e.g., sarcasm~.).
Some context
While I agree, I feel two things need to be noted here:
An entirely different matter is that this logging of location data (or at least the directive forming the basis for IT) has been ruled in violation of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights by the ECJ, but the Danish government, three years on, refuses to change the relevant legislation. A lawsuit has been filed to force their hans, but it’s purposefully being stalled by the government awaiting a new logging case at the ECJ.
Re: Some context
Apologies for the misspellings. That’s the curse of having autocorrect enabled in a different language.
Re: Some context
"extremely shaky basis for a conviction."
Never stopped them in the past.
"…wake-up call for the country’s lawyers…"
Wake up call? More like lunch time call.
They are going to make big eurobucks from this.
This is an unusual case! Have a look here https://bestparentalcontrolapps.com/track-kids-phone/ if you need a tracking app