EU to pressure tech companies on handing over evidence to authorities

Telcos and platform providers to be given 10 days to hand over data or face fines

Member countries of the EU voted on Friday to strengthen the hand of law enforcement authorities gathering evidence held on technology platforms within the European Union.

The European Commission (EC) originally drafted the legislation in April, in the wake of a number of terrorist attacks. The proposals requiring companies holding data to respond to police requests within ten days - or six hours in case of emergency (compared to up to 120 days for the existing European Investigation Order) - with fines up to two per cent of global turnover non-compliance.

Member states would also be able to require service providers in another EU state to preserve specific data on request.

The e-evidence proposal covers telecoms services providers, online marketplaces and internet infrastructure services providers and applies to subscriber data and other data on access, transactional and content.

"More than half of all criminal investigations today include a cross-border request to access electronic evidence such as texts, e-mails or messaging apps," says the EU.

Spain, Ireland, France and Belgium backed the draft while Germany, the Netherlands, Finland, Hungary, Latvia, the Czech Republic and Greece abstained.

The Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA), a lobbying group whose members include Amazon, e-Bay, Facebook, BT, Cloudflare and Google, criticised the measures, saying they lack "sufficient procedural and substantive safeguards to prevent conflicts of law and ensure full respect for users' fundamental rights."

The CCIA statement continues: "The text does not provide for adequate checks and balances for ‘enforcing authorities' to review compliance of a production order with fundamental rights in cross-border cases. It also waters down procedural safeguards in cases where production orders conflict with the legislation of another Member State or a third country."

The e-evidence proposal still needs to pass the European Parliament, after which lawmakers, EU governments and the EC will negotiate on the details before it becomes legislation.