The Law on Retention of Telecommunication Data for the Investigation of Serious Criminal Offenses (183(I)/2007) obliges the mobile phone and internet service providers in Cyprus to store for a period of 6 months, location and other related data needed for the identification of all their subscriber/users universally and proactively. The purpose is to make this data available to the police, with the Court’s permission, in situations where a specific subscriber is suspected of having committed a serious crime. In the decision of the plenary session of the Supreme Court dated 27.10.2021 Re: Hatzioannous’ application for the issuance of a certiorary order etc. Civil Applications concerning the Telecommunication Data no. 97/18, 127/18, 140 / 19-143 / 19, 154/19, 169/19, 36/20 and 46/20, 27/10/2021, the Supreme Court examining the European Directive 2002/58 / EC and the principles established by the Court of Justice of the European Union in Joined Cases C-203/15 and C-698/15 TELE2 SVERIGE and WATSON AND OTHERS dated 21.12.2016, ruled that because Law 183 (I) 2007 provides for universal data retention by the service providers instead of limiting it to specific groups of people or location for a specific period of time necessary to investigate a suspected criminal behaviour, its provisions are contrary to EU Law.
