Systematic government access to private-sector data in Germany

Abstract

German law has long been strongly committed to informational privacy, with protection to be found at the constitutional and statutory levels. † Legislation over the last two decades has expanded the ability of the government, including the police and intelligence agencies, to process, store, and share personal information. † The leading examples from this study of systematic data access in Germany concern; the leading examples from this study concern 'strategic searches' by intelligence agencies, data mining by the police, the structured statutory system for access to the contents of the 'Anti-Terror File', and the police's 'radio-cell inquiries' pursuant to the Code of Criminal Procedure, section 100g. † German unease with systematic data access is shown by current controversies with data retention, a new federal bill for 'residence reporting', the abandonment of the ELENA process, and the proposal for a 'Bundes-Cloud' that is intended to keep German personal data out of the datacen-tres of US corporations.