SpaceNet AG on the plans to return to data retention

Familiar problem - new packaging

"In the form planned by the coalition, data retention remains a blanket encroachment on citizens' rights," says Sebastian von Bomhard, CEO and founder of SpaceNet AG. "The type of data to be stored and the retention period have even been extended. The nature of this instrument further undermines the valuable principle of the presumption of innocence and makes trust in German digital policy impossible."

SpaceNet already took legal action against the data retention legislation at the time in 2016 - with success. The Federal Administrative Court confirmed the inadmissibility of blanket data collection and thus set a legal milestone for data protection and also for corporate legal clarity.

The storage obligation that has now been announced raises fears that the former concept is simply to be enforced after two failed attempts - with a new label, of course.

Technically flawed, practically ineffective

Data retention, as it is to be introduced, not only encroaches on fundamental rights. It is also technically unsuitable for convicting serious criminals on the Internet, as claimed. Professional criminals know how to conceal their tracks on the Internet, unlike unsuspecting innocent citizens.

Furthermore, providers would have to save, secure and store an average of several million data records every day - an effort that costs enormous resources and also has an impact on the_{carbon footprint} that should not be underestimated.

"In order to solve serious criminal offences, we need targeted instruments that are protected by the rule of law - not blanket general suspicion," emphasises von Bomhard. "The quick freeze procedure, which was even envisaged in the coalition agreement of the previous coalition government, could have opened up precisely this path - a compromise in which traffic data is frozen on urgent suspicion but may only be analysed following a court order. This approach strikes a balance between the interests of the investigation and the protection of fundamental rights - the planned obligation to retain data does not."

Signalling effect for society and the economy

SpaceNet sees the revitalisation of data retention as a political signal with a worrying effect.

"Against the backdrop of far-reaching technological upheavals caused by artificial intelligence and a growing digital dependency on international tech companies, it is the wrong step to further strain public trust and tighten the framework conditions for domestic providers. But far more serious is the fact that the introduction of such a platform would create an instrument that, in the wrong hands, would pose a massive threat to citizens. Those who are currently concerned about our democracy probably do not realise the implications of their plans. Data protection and democratic principles must be at the centre of contemporary digital policy and must not be degraded to a side effect," says von Bomhard and appeals to the German government. "We need neither symbolic politics nor technically and legally fragile compromises, but legal certainty in an increasingly digitalised world."