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Although concerns have been expressed by the scientific services of the German Parliament's lower chamber on the implementation of the EU directive on data retention, the Ministry of Justice continues with its work on a draft bill in this matter.

Doubts have been expressed by the scientists on the compatibility of the EU directive with the fundamental privacy rights recognized by the EU and especially in relation to the German Constitution, which guarantees the citizens the right to privacy.

The choice of procedure - the data retention directive was initially submitted as a framework decision, but withdrawn since it would not get unanimity of votes - has been questioned as usually such a procedure is chosen with the purpose of harmonizing legal and administrative provisions to ease up the operation of a single market.

The doubts expressed by the scientists were also related to the implementation of the directive into the German legislation in "a constitutional manner" mainly in connection with the 6 months period of data retention decided by the European Commission as the minimum period that would help in combating terrorism. One of the reasons for concern was that the EU directive gives freedom to the Member States to pile up large amounts of data over long periods of time even in cases of milder crimes.

However, the Federal Ministry of Justice affirmed that the bill could meet both the requirements of the EU and German legislation, without contradicting the German Federal Constitution. Klaus-Uwe Benneter, a member of the Bundestag, stated the act could be drafted so as to comply with the provisions of Germany's constitution, reminding that it was up the each state to create a balance between "data protection and the protection against terrorism".

New doubts about the legality of telecommunications data retention(17.08.06)
http://www.heise.de/english/newsticker/news/76958

Federal Ministry of Justice to stick with its plans for telecommunications data retention (24.08.06)
http://www.heise.de/english/newsticker/news/77215

EDRI-gram: German Parliament rejects motion against data retention (21.06.06)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number4.12/germandataretention

EDRI-gram: Data Retention faces growing opposition in Germany (24.05.06)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number4.10/dataretentionde