Serbia: Internet privacy debate heats up

Internet service providers in Serbia have announced that they will challenge, through the Supreme Court, the National Telecommunications Agency’s (Ratel) decision to oblige internet providers to allow unrestricted access to the Police and the Security and Intelligence Agency (BIA) to their clients` e-mail databases.

Ratel, on the other hand, claims that the decision that regulates the technical requirements service providers have to meet under the auspices of prevention of terrorism and organized crime was legal and adds that it found it strange that certain parties would want to introduce chaos and not allow regulation of internet and systemic issues in the area of crime and terror prevention.

Jovan Radunovic, Chairman of Ratel’s Board of Directors, told Danas daily newspaper that the document regulates the technical requirements for connecting, in accordance with the Law on Telecommunications which specifically states that all activities or use of equipment intended to threaten or violated privacy and confidentiality of messages is prohibited and any action by the competent authorities in that area shall require a valid court order.

He says that the decision doesn`t apply to all, but only to the four big super-providers that maintain international connections, adding that Ratel is willing to change the requirements should the Supreme Court decide they were unconstitutional or if there are problems in their practical application.

Radunovic is adamant that the set of rules was adopted after prolonged discussion with all operators and that Ratel met the constitutional obligations that all rules and regulations are to be adopted only after a proper public debate.

The critics of Ratel`s decision invoke Serbian Constitution and the guaranteed privacy of correspondence, noting that allowing security services to keep the proposed equipment for gathering and rerouting of electronic mail will allow them to circumvent the operators and involve in arbitrary control of the internet traffic.

Slobodan Markovic from the Centre for Internet Development, told Danas that submitting data on all users to security services is not related, whatsoever, to the issue of authorized monitoring.

“There is no feud between operators and security services and I believe that this matter should go to public debate. Similar regulations were already adopted for fixed, mobile telephony and KDS back in April. We now consider the possibility to start an Administrative Procedure with the Supreme Court if Ratel refuses to revoke its decision”, says Markovic.

Miloš Živkovic from the Belgrade School of Law says that the decision is not outright unconstitutional, but that the strong language used by the regulation allows the competent authorities to engage in constant control without public knowledge, which could then lead to violations of Constitution.

“The regulation opens the way for technology abuses and allows the authorities to maintain constant monitoring without anybody being aware of it. Ratel should adopt regulation to allow for monitoring, but should not go beyond that”, says Živkovic. (Source: Danas daily)

ANEM (Association of Independent Electronic Media) believes that the Technical Requirements adopted by Ratel allow for serious and unrestricted intrusions into elementary human rights, especially the rights to freedom of expression and privacy, i.e. confidentiality of means of communication.

ANEM doesn`t dispute the need to regulate the matter of legally sanctioned authorized electronic surveillance of certain communications, but disputes the fact that the necessary cooperation and dialogue with telecommunications operators was missing from the adoption procedure, as well as the fact that said Technical Requirements allow for restrictions of freedom of expression and violations of privacy.

“We demand from Ratel to revoke the said Technical Requirements and to start a process of public consultations with operators, as well as to define the conditions of legally sanctioned electronic surveillance of communications in a manner that would secure protection of fundamental human rights of users of telecommunications services”, says ANEM in a public statement.

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Serbia: Questions raised over internet privacy rights

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