The government has allocated £6m to help UK telecoms
providers comply with data retention legislation coming into effect
on 1 October.
The subsidy, to be made available through the
Home Office, is aimed at quashing fears that telecoms companies
will have to incur additional costs to retain mobile and fixed line
phone call data for a year under legislation passed by parliament
in July.
The UK legislation is being introduced to enact last year's
European data retention directive, which requires member states to
retain traffic and location data on telephone conversations to
assist law enforcement officers in tackling crime.
Despite speculation that many companies will have to invest in
additional software or hardware to comply with the data retention
regulations, most UK telecoms companies appear to be well prepared,
according to the Home Office and industry representatives.
"The UK telecoms industry has operated a voluntary code of data
retention for some years now, which means the new legislation is
not going to make that great a difference in terms of what we
retain," said Jack Wraith, co-chairman of the Association of Chief
Police Officers data communications group.
Wraith said most telecoms companies already had the necessary
infrastructure in place to retain call data, and it would be
"business as usual" after 1 October. He said telecoms providers
should not spend any money on data retention without consulting the
Home Office.
The only difference now was that all companies would retain the
same data for the same period of time, rather than setting their
own standards as they had in the past, Wraith said.
The new data retention legislation does not apply to records of
internet communications.