On Thursday 8 June, the European Commission presented the member states with several reflection ideas to reinforce the access of the investigative services of the member states to electronic evidence, for instance data held in the ‘cloud’, required in the framework of cross-border investigations. Commissioner Věra Jourová told a joint session of the justice and home affairs ministers how she intended to persuade major web operators to develop their cooperation in this area.
The Commission laid out several options before the ministers, forming the basis of a future legislative proposal to be presented by the institution early next year.
It presented a raft of practical measures as well as suggested legislative measures. At this stage, the practical aspects went down well with the ministers, the Maltese ambassador, Marlene Bonnici, explained after the working session. Additionally, most member states are in favour of legislation, another source commented, adding that only the United Kingdom and the Czech Republic had expressed any reservations on tools of this kind.
As regards the practical measures to be set in place in the immediate future, these include the new European investigation order, which aims to facilitate the harvesting of evidence in other member states. The idea is to develop an electronic form to speed up requests between the competent services.
Cooperation with the United States, which also receives requests to collect electronic evidence, will also be stepped up, for instance with exchanges between professionals on both sides.
One of the legislative options set before the ministers consists of allowing the law enforcement authorities in one member state to ask an IT services provider based in another member state to send them electronic evidence, without first having to apply to the authorities of that member state. Another option would require businesses to hand over data if the law enforcement authorities of other member states so request.
The Commission will propose a range of tools, a source explained in May. Operators should furthermore be given greater legal certainty, so that they know what they can and cannot do.
Discussion on online hate speech
Commissioner Jourova also said that she had been given a “strong mandate” by the justice and home affairs ministers to continue the work underway in the framework of the code of conduct set in place in May 2016 by four web giants (Facebook, Google, Twitter and Microsoft). It commits these companies to rapidly taking down radical online content. The Commission wishes to extend the scope of application of this code of conduct to other companies and, possibly, also to extend the scope of action to other types of hate speech, for instance speech targeting the LGTBI community or Islamophobic speech, the same source suggested in May. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)