Global Law Enforcement Convention Weakens Privacy & Human Rights

The Council of Europe Cybercrime Committee’s (T-CY) recent decision to approve new international rules for law enforcement access to user data without strong privacy protections is a blow for global human rights in the digital age. The final version of the draft Second Additional Protocol to the Council of Europe’s (CoE) widely adopted Budapest Cybercrime Convention, approved by the T-CY drafting committee on May 28th, places few limits on law enforcement data collection. As such, the Protocol can endanger technology users, journalists, activists, and vulnerable populations in countries with flimsy privacy protections and weaken everyone’s right to privacy and free expression across the globe. 

The Protocol now heads to members of CoE’s Parliamentary Committee (PACE) for their opinion. PACE’s Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights can recommend further amendments, and decide which ones will be adopted by the Standing Committee or the Plenary. Then, the Council of Ministers will vote on whether to integrate PACE’s recommendations into the final text. The CoE’s plan is to finalize the Protocol’s adoption by November. If adopted, the Protocol will be open for signatures to any country that has signed the Budapest Convention sometime before 2022.

The next step for countries is at the signature stage when they will ask to reserve the right not to abide by certain provisions n the Protocol, especially Article 7 on direct cooperation between law enforcement and companies holding user data. 

If countries sign the Protocol as it stands and in its entirety, it will reshape how state police access digital data from Internet companies

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