Data retention: German coalition drama continues despite quick freeze agreement

Despite the agreement negotiated between Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) and Federal Minister of Justice Marco Buschmann (FDP) on a quick-freeze approach to freezing connection and location data for criminal prosecution in suspected cases, Federal Minister of the Interior Nancy Faeser (SPD) does not want to back down. It is also calling for IP addresses to be retained at the very least. A spokesperson for the Federal Ministry of the Interior (BMI) explained on Wednesday that this is a necessary prerequisite for this new, fundamentally sensible procedure "to work at all and for data to be available at all". Only in this way could investigations lead to "the perpetrators being identified". Otherwise, Quick Freeze would make no sense at all: "Where there is nothing, you can't freeze anything."

Faeser thus echoes the criticism of Günter Krings, legal policy spokesperson for the CDU/CSU parliamentary group in the Bundestag. The latter had criticized Buschmann's draft bill for Quick Freeze, which was presented in autumn 2022 and was already somewhat grey, for lacking "the necessary core element, i.e. IP address retention regardless of the occasion". With his initiative, the Minister of Justice is ignoring "both the leeway opened up by the European Court of Justice and the needs of investigators". The police union (GdP) also complained that the new agreement, which had been approved from the very top of government headquarters, was not sufficient.

The parliamentary secretary of the SPD parliamentary group, Katja Mast, together with other leading Social Democrats, announced that the federal government's agreement would be revised in the parliamentary process. Jörn Pohl, office manager of the Greens' parliamentary deputy Konstantin von Notz, who had vehemently welcomed the agreement on Wednesday morning, finds this absurd: "The Chancellor once ensured that there was a good compromise and that the law enforcement authorities were given a relevant instrument with Quick Freeze after years of legal certainty - and immediately the BMI and parts of the SPD parliamentary group attacked the compromise and once again demanded the logging of user traces without cause.

Internet industry: remove data retention from the law

"General data retention has repeatedly failed in the courts," emphasized Buschmann. "The fact that we are now implementing Quick Freeze" is good news for freedom and security in Germany. The freezing of telecommunications data improves the legal situation and will help in the fight against crime. The Liberal wants to continue the dialog with Faeser, who was initially ignored. He received support from the German Bar Association (DAV), for example, according to which the mass surveillance that goes hand in hand with unprovoked IP storage has no place in a liberal constitutional state: "The less invasive quick freeze procedure is clearly the better way forward here. The prerequisites for data collection are an official order, judicial control and a time limit for the measure. Proportionality must never be lost sight of in the fight against crime."

MEP Patrick Breyer (Pirate Party), who has long campaigned against data retention, saw the coalition's decision as a "success for the civil rights movement, which has been fighting for decades on the streets and in court against the idea of comprehensive total recording of our contacts, movements and internet connections". However, Buschmann's draft lacks the requirement "that the persons and connections concerned must be precisely identified in the freeze order". This would mean that public prosecutors and local courts could still "have the communications data of all citizens stored on a nationwide basis". The eco Association of the Internet Industry called for the paragraphs on data retention, which have repeatedly been classified as unlawful by the highest courts, to be removed from the Telecommunications Act and not left as a torso. It was time for the government to "seriously protect civil rights in the digital space".

(mho)