Is Ireland ready for email compliance with the E.U.?
Conor Ryan of the Irish Examiner reports that the answer is: yes. He states that the Irish government “is to implement controversial European rules for retaining electronic data, including all email and internet traffic, but said it will not rush legislation through this month.” Legislation would entitle the government to “see the basic details of when emails were sent, by whom and to whom, stored by internet service providers between six months and two years.” The article states that the E.U. Directive “was adopted by an overwhelming majority in the European parliament three years ago.”
Am I missing something here? I find this deeply concerning. What has happened to a persons right to privacy? Why does the Irish government need to keep track of when and where your emails are sent? Email archiving and e mail retention have several important reasons to be integrated in society, but needless government control is not one of them. For instance, HIPAA (the U.S. health insurance portability and accountability act) binds health care professionals to specific email compliance regulations in dealing with patient privacy. Laws set forth by HIPAA security and HIPAA privacy ensure that the privileged relationship between doctor and patient is retained by protecting the exchange of electronic health care data and email communications. Another example can be found in the amendments of the FRCP (U.S. Federal rules of civil procedure) in December of 2006. The inclusion of electronic discovery proceedings in civil litigation has enabled organizations to justify corporate disputes and prevent illegal scandals from taking place. But how does email management play a role in European Union governance?
TJ McIntyre, Chairman of Digital Rights Ireland, has been vocal on this issue and also appeared in an article in the Irish Examiner. He warns of some potentially serious risks to be associated with E.U. email compliance. I think what he had to say is important and I am going to close with an excerpt from his blog.
“Laws requiring monitoring of the entire population are astonishing in a democracy. Yet so far there has been very little public debate. One reason might be that his surveillance happens invisibly in the background. But compared to traditional surveillance it is potentially far more intrusive, and carries much greater risks of abuse. In the United Kingdom we have seen the loss of data on many millions of individuals. Here officials in the Department of Social Welfare have been found to be engaged in the systematic leaking and selling of personal information from government databases. There is no reason to think that this information will be treated any differently.”
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