MOSCOW (Sputnik) — The proposed legislation, unveiled by the German government Wednesday, would oblige telecom and Internet companies, including social networking sites and online messaging apps, to store customer traffic and location data for up to ten weeks if requested by security agencies.
“The law would destroy the professional secrecy of lawyers, doctors and journalists,” Michael Konken said in a statement emailed to Sputnik. “It brings forward data mishap and data abuse and undermines the protection of the sources of journalists. It thus is harming press freedom at its core.”
“It is the mere fact of gathering these data that endangers the relation between media and informants and thus the press freedom is in danger,” Konken told Sputnik.
In March 2010, Germany's Federal Constitutional Court ruled that a similar law was unconstitutional because it violated secrecy of correspondence guarantees.
