(c/o Twister) Press release European Digital Rights, XS4ALL Internet 28 July 2005
International petition against data retention European Digital Rights, together with the Dutch ISP XS4ALL Internet, have launched an international petition today against the European data retention plans. Internet users from all European countries are urged to sign the protest. The petition is aimed at the European Commission and the members of the European Parliament. The data retention proposal orders telephone companies and internet providers to retain the phone and e-mail records of their customers. The proposal to retain traffic data will reveal who has been calling and e-mailing whom, what websites people have visited and even where they were with their mobile phones. Telecommunications data retention is a policy that significantly expands the powers of surveillance as it is not only targetting suspected criminals or terrorists but all telecommunication users. European Digital Rights (EDRI) and XS4ALL argue that retention of telecommunication traffic data is an invasive tool that interferes with the private life of all 450 million people in the European Union. Secondly, the petition points out that data retention is illegal under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, because it is disproportionate. Thirdly, the petition explains that security gained from retention may be illusory, as traffic data may easily point to another user. Finally, the means through which this policy is being pursued are illegitimate as some member states who have failed to pass this policy through their own national Parliaments are now trying to push it through the EU instead in the name of harmonisation and international cooperation. In the next two months, EDRI and XS4ALL hope to collect an impressive amount of signatures from all over Europe, to convince Commission and Parliament that data retention is no solution against terrorism and crime. Supporters are invited to help distribute information about this petition, by placing the banner on their sites or homepages and spread the news through mailinglists. The petition is launched this thursday in the opening speech of the open-air hacker event What the Hack in the Netherlands www.whatthehack.org European Digital Rights is an association of 17 privacy and civil rights organisations from 11 different countries in Europe. XS4ALL Internet is the first consumer ISP of the Netherlands and started in 1993. EDRI and XS4ALL Internet petition against data retention: http://www.dataretentionisnosolution.com/ You are a subscribed member of the infowarrior list. Visit www.infowarrior.org for list information or to unsubscribe. This message may be redistributed freely in its entirety. Any and all copyrights appearing in list messages are maintained by their respective owners.
