EU Court of Justice · 8 April 2014

Digital Rights Ireland

In plain English

The Court struck down the EU Data Retention Directive, which required telecoms providers to keep everyone's traffic and location data so authorities could use them against serious crime. The interference with privacy and data protection went beyond what was strictly necessary.

  • Digital Rights Ireland Ltd v Minister for Communications, Marine and Natural Resources and Others and Kärntner Landesregierung and Others
  • Case C-293/12 and C-594/12
  • ECLI:EU:C:2014:238

What the court ruled

Directive 2006/24/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 15 March 2006 on the retention of data generated or processed in connection with the provision of publicly available electronic communications services or of public communications networks and amending Directive 2002/58/EC is invalid.

Judgment of 8 April 2014, Digital Rights Ireland, C-293/12 and C-594/12, EU:C:2014:238, operative partEUR-Lex

Related

The official text is quoted word for word from the English version of the source named under it; only the version published in the court’s own records is authoritative. The plain-English line is Fino’s own summary, not legal advice.