Law enforcement access to personal data originally collected by private parties: Missing data subjects' safeguards in directive 2016/680?

Access by law enforcement authorities to personal data initially collected by private parties for commercial or operational purposes is very common, as shown by the transparency reports of new technology companies on law enforcement requests. From a data protection perspective, the scenario of law enforcement access is not necessarily well taken into account. The adoption of the new data protection framework offers the opportunity to assess whether the new ‘police’ Directive, which regulates the processing of personal data for law enforcement purposes, offers sufficient safeguards to individuals. To make this assessment, provisions contained in Directive 2016/680 are tested against the standards established by the ECJ in Digital Rights Ireland and Tele2 Sverige on the retention of data and their further access and use by police authorities. The analysis reveals that Directive 2016/680 does not contain the safeguards identified in the case law. The paper further assesses the role and efficiency of the principle of purpose limitation as a safeguard against repurposing in a law enforcement context. Last, solutions to overcome the shortcomings of Directive 2016/680 are examined in conclusion.     

European national news

This article tracks developments at the national level in key European countries in the area of IT and communications and provides a concise alerting service of important national developments. It is co-ordinated by Herbert Smith Freehills LLP and contributed to by firms across Europe. This column provides a concise alerting service of important national developments in key European countries. Part of its purpose is to complement the Journal's feature articles and briefing notes by keeping readers abreast of what is currently happening “on the ground” at a national level in implementing EU level legislation and international conventions and treaties. Where an item of European National News is of particular significance, CLSR may also cover it in more detail in the current or a subsequent edition.     

“Regulation,I presume?” said the robot – Towards an iterative regulatory process for robot governance

This article envisions an iterative regulatory process for robot governance. In the article, we argue that what lacks in robot governance is actually a backstep mechanism that can coordinate and align robot and regulatory developers. In order to solve that problem, we present a theoretical model that represents a step forward in the coordination and alignment of robot and regulatory development. Our work builds on previous literature, and explores modes of alignment and iteration towards greater closeness in the nexus between research and development (R&D) and regulatory appraisal and channeling of robotics’ development. To illustrate practical challenges and solutions, we explore different examples of (related) types of communication processes between robot developers and regulatory bodies. These examples help illuminate the lack of formalization of the policymaking process, and the loss of time and resources that the waste of knowledge generated for future robot governance instruments implies. We argue that initiatives that fail to formalize the communication process between different actors and that propose the mere creation of coordinating agencies risk being seriously ineffective. We propose an iterative regulatory process for robot governance, which combines the use of an ex ante robot impact assessment for legal/ethical appraisal, and evaluation settings as data generators, and an ex post legislative evaluation instrument that eases the revision, modification and update of the normative instrument. In all, the model breathes the concept of creating dynamic evidence-based policies that can serve as temporary benchmark for future and/or new uses or robot developments. Our contribution seeks to provide a thoughtful proposal that avoids the current mismatch between existing governmental approaches and what is needed for effective ethical/legal oversight, in the hope that this will inform the policy debate and set the scene for further research.     

Asia Pacific news

This column provides a country-by-country analysis of the latest legal developments, cases and issues relevant to the IT, media and telecommunications’ industries in key jurisdictions across the Asia Pacific region. The articles appearing in this column are intended to serve as ‘alerts’ and are not submitted as detailed analyses of cases or legal developments.     

Opinion 1/15 of the Grand Chamber dated 26 July 2017 about the agreement on Passenger Name Record data between the EU and Canada

On 26 July 2017, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Justice rendered its seminal Opinion 1/15 about the agreement on Passenger Name Record data between the EU and Canada. The Grand Chamber considered that the decision of the Council about the conclusion, on behalf of the Union, of the agreement between the EU and Canada about the transfer and processing of PNR data must be based jointly on Article 16(2) about the protection of personal data and Article 87(2)(a) about police co-operation among member states in criminal matters, but not on Article 82(1)(d) about judicial co-operation in criminal matters in the EU of the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU. The Grand Chamber also considered that the agreement is incompatible with Article 7 on the right to respect for private life, Article 8 on the right to the protection of personal data, Article 21 on non-discrimination and Article 52(1) on the principle of proportionality of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU since it does not preclude the transfer, use and retention of sensitive data. In addition to the requirement to exclude such data, the Grand Chamber listed seven requirements that the agreement must include, specify, limit or guarantee to be compatible with the Charter.The opinion of the Grand Chamber has far-reaching implications for the agreement on PNR data between the EU and Canada. It has also far-reaching implications for international agreements on PNR data between the EU and other third states. Last, it has far-reaching implications for Directive 681 of 27 April 2016 on PNR data.     

C. W. de Kiewiet,Historian of Africa: African Studies and the American Post-War Research University

The Marikana massacre ruptured the South African sociopolitical horizon in August 2012. This analysis aims to expose or make visible the scopic regimes at work when interpreting the event. By referencing Judith Butler’s “frame theory” (2009) and Nicholas Mirzoeff’s “the right to look” (2011), the event is unpacked, among other things, as the volatile intersection of differing world views and technics of vision. Three scopic frames are used to interrogate the event: the first aims to unmask “oversights” during the event, whereas the remaining two deal more with inversions of sight which bear on “foresight” and “insight”. In terms of oversight, the first frame refers to the overseeing or invigilation of the event via instruments of visuality or vision machines (e.g. satellites, unmanned aerial vehicles, and helicopters), promising complete transparency. The second oversight comes in the representations of the events as media spectacle, becoming part of a new mediated visibility. The final oversight refers to the miners as subalterns becoming visible in a system that renders them invisible from the start. The second cluster of the visual complex, namely the appeal to foresight, surfaces through the calling on a Sangoma (traditional healer) for muti (traditional medicine) to render the miners invincible/invisible to the enemy. The third and final cluster refers to artists Ayanda Mabulu’s Yakhal’inkomo—Black man’s cry (2013) and Mary Wafer’s Mine exhibition (2012), aiming to provide some insight into the unrepresentability of the event.     

The Impact of AIDS on the Botswana Civil Service: A Case Study of the Police and Prison Services

That HIV/AIDS has had an enormous impact on southern Africa in general, and in Botswana in particular, is not in doubt. Numerous studies have documented certain aspects of the problem—high HIV prevalence rates, increasing numbers of orphans and vulnerable children, declining average life expectancy, and a high number of deaths among adults during their most productive years. Scholars have engaged in speculation about the possible impacts that this disease might have on social relationships, economic growth and development, and governance in both the near and the long terms. But these studies are only forecasts of possible futures, not data driven analyses. This study closely examines data available from two agencies in the Botswana civil service, the police and prisons services in an effort to assess, albeit indirectly, any impact that the HIV/AIDS crisis may have had on the workforce. Although the AIDS epidemic in the country as a whole was reflected in the experience of these services, neither agency suffered the devastating effects some feared.     

HPLC-MS／MS同时检测全血中佐匹克隆、唑吡坦和扎来普隆

目的建立全血中佐匹克隆、唑吡坦和扎来普隆的液相色谱一四级杆飞行时间串联质谱联用同时检测方法。方法采用液液萃取进行提取,提取物以ZorbaxEclipsePlusC18（2．1×50mm,1．8fire）色谱柱分离,以10mmol／L甲酸铵（含0．1％甲酸）一乙腈为流动相梯度洗脱,流速为0．2mL／min,四级杆一飞行时间串联质谱检测。结果全血中佐匹克隆和扎来普隆的线性范围为10ng／mL-500ng／mL,检出限为3ng／mL唑吡坦的线性范围为3ng／mL-300ng／mL,检出限为lng／mL。结论本方法准确、快速、灵敏,可用于全血中佐匹克隆、唑吡坦和扎来普隆的同时定性、定量检测。     

GC/MS方法检验制毒原生植物中的毒性成份

应用超声波提取法和GC/MS法研究制毒原生植物麻黄草中伪麻黄碱、麻黄碱和罂粟中可待因、吗啡、蒂巴因、罂粟碱、那可汀的定性分析方法,此方法科学、准确,能满足制毒案件中麻黄草、罂粟的检验要求。     

Buried voices: Mexican migrants’ views on the question of illegality

How do immigrant Mexican workers perceive the policies and social discourses that regulate their insertion into American society as noncitizens and illegals? Using ethnographic fieldwork and in-depth interviews, evidence is presented that unauthorized Mexican migrants do not consider themselves lawbreakers but rather moral actors responding to difficult socioeconomic conditions. Informed by a keen understanding of the social forces oppressing them, these migrants articulate a discourse of social justice that works as a powerful counterpoint to the hegemonic ideas of citizenship, belonging, and illegality. A careful analysis of migrant social reflexivity offers a much-needed corrective to the prevailing top-down perspective typically offered among contemporary scholars. By looking at the ways in which migrants make sense of immigration policies and articulate their right to have rights, this examination departs from the widespread tendency among scholars and policy makers of analyzing the migrant’s social and civic status as a matter of assimilation and immigration control.