Reclaim your data from the European police authorities!
Aufruf auch in deutsch
Throughout Europe, the data of millions of people is stored in
information systems operated and checked by the police and and
intelligence services as a matter of course. The various national
systems are supplemented by centralized databases such as the Schengen
Information System (SIS) and databases
operated by Europol. In addition, the Treaty of Prüm and the “Swedish
Initiative” has led to increasing automation and facilitate rapid data
exchange between national systems.
We are no longer talking only about persons convicted for criminal
offences. Immigrants are regularly entered in these databases – for
having committed the “crime” trying to enter in a European country
without obtaining prior permission, for wishing to make use of their
right of asylum, or even for simply being a guest for a longer period
in a European Union member state. But it is not just immigrants either.
EU citizens are finding themselves entered in data retention systems
for something as simple as, for example, being caught up in an ID check
at a political demonstration or as a result of being ordered by the
police to vacate a premises.
Facing a total “flood of information”, the interior ministers of
several European countries are calling for the police authorities to be
given even more powers and the technical capabilities necessary to make
use and explore this “data tsunami”. “Data mining” software should
simplify data analysis and provide “decision support”. Data on persons,
objects and their relations is processed to be able to identify “risks”
and “predict” crime and unrest even before it happens. Naturally, the
relevant software is developed by the security industry, its source
code and therefore its functionality kept secret.
The creation of a cross-border information network, which should
“extend as far as the USA”, together with the development of technical
platforms for real-time cooperation between the police authorities is
one of the top priorities for European interior ministers. With the
“Stockholm Programme”, due to be passed by the European Council in
December 2009, these plans will officially become the rule for EU
domestic policy over the next five years. Critics are warning of a
“database society”.
As it becomes increasingly easy to exchange police data within the
Single European Market, those who are actually affected generally have
neither knowledge of nor control on the collection, processing and
circulation of the data. Data protection does not figure highly in
European police cooperation; a set of common standards is kept to a
minimum. Issues of proportionality or prescribed data storage periods
are generally ignored. Basically, what goes is what the respective
national law lets you get away with. Even where a European watchdog
exists, the interior ministers and police authorities have the last
word. The people concerned might even find themselves having to enforce
their claim to international legal protection far away from their place
of residence.
Thus the danger is the normalization of uncontrolled storage and
cross-referencing of data collected in one country to be continued by
another country. Higher data protection standards of one country can be
easily bypassed by clever officials going through countries with lower
standards. And there is a very real risk of both a huge accumulation of
maximum amounts of data in centralised “data warehouses”, whose sole
purpose it is to enable computer-aided search for information, and the
comparison of databases becoming the daily norm.
All this not only increases the potential for data abuse. More
importantly, through cross-border police cooperation, the origin and
reliability of data will become even less transparent than it already
is today in the national context. A false “hit" made by a researching
official during police investigation in the European information
network can have grave consequences: from covert surveillance to the
tracking of one’s movements, temporary detainment to being refused the
right to enter or leave a country, deportation, house searches,
interrogations, and so on. It is then up to the affected persons to
prove their innocence. To rid oneself of the suspicion and mistrust
that undermines personal and civil liberties, in serious cases one is
forced to take expensive and exhausting legal action. And we know: even
having contact with people suspected by the police or a “tiny remaining
suspicion” justifies data storage.
Therefore, in response to these ominous developments, we call on all
those who share our concerns to join the campaign against the
“Stockholm Programme”. This means not just informing yourself and
others, but also taking specific action and exercising your rights.
The switchboards for the cross-border exchange of information are
central police authorities of the respective EU member state. Amongst
other things, these serve as a national point of contact for the
European Police Office (Europol) and its corresponding computer
systems, for the Schengen Information system and for the exchange of
information conducted within the scope of individual bilateral and
multilateral agreements. However, the central police authorities are
also obliged to provide information on data that might be stored there.
So to anyone who would like to know what the police (think they)
know about you, or simply to register your dissent, we recommend
exercising your right to access your own data by sending a request for
information to the relevant police authority in your country. The
digest received in response will help to give us an idea of the full
extent of police access to citizen data, as well as serving as a
starting point for getting your data out of the computer systems, by
legal or political means.
Instructions on how to contact your local SIRENE office can be found on http://euro-data.noblogs.org. For requests in Germany, we have prepared a document generator at http://www.datenschmutz.de/cgi-bin/moin.cgi/AuskunftErsuchen.
For more information on the future plans of the European ministers of interior and justice, see http://stockholm.noblogs.org.
September 2009
- The initiators of the campaign by email: euro-police@so36.net.
European signatories (always updated on http://euro-data.noblogs.org)
UK
- Newham Monitoring Project
- Action on Rights for Children
- Statewatch
- Campaign Against Criminalising Communities
- Privacy International
Portugal
- Associação Contra a Exclusão pelo Desenvolvimento
- Belgique
- Vredesactie
Österreich
- Institut für Rechts- & Kriminalsoziologie, Department Recht und Gesellschaft
- Solidaritätsgruppe – Rechtsberatung für sozial Schwächere
France
- LDH – Ligue des droits de l’homme
- IRIS – Imaginons un réseau Internet solidaire
Niederlande
- A SEED Europe
- VD AMOK
Italia
- ALCEI – Electronic Frontier Italy
Schweiz
- Grundrechte.ch
- Solidarité sans frontières
Schweden
- Nätverket mot Rasism
- Ingen Människa är Illegal Stockholm
Finland
- Electronic Frontier Finland
Germany
- InformatikerInnen für Frieden und gesellschaftliche Verantwortung
- Neue Richtervereinigung
- Netzwerk Neue Medien
- Internationale Liga für Menschenrechte
- netzpolitik.org
- Arbeitskreis Vorratsdatenspeicherung
- Europäische Juristinnen und Juristen für Demokratie und Menschenrechte
- Seminar für angewandte Unsicherheit
- Gipfelsoli
- Bundesarbeitskreis kritischer Juragruppen
- Humanistische Union
- Forum Recht
- Komitee für Grundrechte und Demokratie
- Republikanischer Anwältinnen- und Anwälteverein
- Datenschmutz
- Institut für Bürgerrechte & öffentliche Sicherheit
