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No urgent response from the Minister of Justice

Data storage Privacy

Three weeks ago, the European Court of Justice annulled the Data Retention Directive. The industry is still waiting to hear what happens next.

Since the implementation of the legislation in Sweden, telecom operators have incurred significant costs to introduce data retention of subscribers' traffic data, perhaps up to SEK 1 billion. In addition, many operators are stuck in contracts with consultants, among other things, which continue to generate costs. Costs that ultimately affect the operators' customers, i.e. consumers.

In connection with the annulment of the directive by the European Court of Justice, we sent a letter to the Minister of Justice, Beatrice Ask, asking the government to immediately clarify what now applies to telecom operators' data storage, so as not to impose additional unnecessary costs on operators that ultimately affect consumers. In the letter, we asked for a meeting with the Minister of Justice to have the opportunity to develop the consequences of the decision for the operators.

Three weeks have now passed without the Minister of Justice taking an interest in how the European Court of Justice's decision affects the Swedish telecom industry and consumers. Several large operators have followed the annulment and stopped storing traffic data because they care about their customers' privacy. However, many argue that the law on data retention requirements still applies. So the situation is still very unclear.

Yesterday, the government decided that an investigator should analyze the situation and come up with a proposal for new Swedish legislation on the issue. I hope and look forward to the investigator at least having an interest in meeting the industry and allowing the operators who have knowledge of the issue to be heard in this investigation. Even an optimist like me is beginning to realize that this will not happen quickly. If we are lucky, we will see the analysis of the situation in June, but the report will not be finalized until October.