[CB21] Non-Private Chat: Police investigation legislation in the flat world by Vic Huang and Joy Ho

When law enforcement and national security are concerned, the balance issue between public orders and privacy is coming to the table. The police investigation skills have been approved and more technical elements are added due to the revolution of communication ways. Nowadays messenger apps have become a popular communicating way between people. Criminal investigation starts to target the communication content in messenger apps. However, the legality of such technology investigation method is challenged by public. First , we would discuss about the technical part of messengers apps and Police Monitoring possibility. There are some messengers which is popular in different regions. In these apps, not only personal information are stored in the data collector side - service provider, but also our private chat messages with our family and friends. The messenger app companies say they use point-to-point encryption (end-to-end encryption, E2EE) to technically protect user privacy, but actually each what is E2EE? What is the difference between messenger apps E2EE? And how’s it possible that there are some monitor(spying) apps clarify that they could reach to the data under E2EE scope? It makes the Police monitoring possible because many spying apps are existed. In this part we will also discuss about the technical part of privacy protection and spying. The discussion would then point out “what and how the police could really get in real world” from the technical perspective. Secondly, we would start from Technology Investigation Act draft in Taiwan. On September 8, 2020, the Taiwan Ministry of Justice announced the draft Technology Investigation Act, which introduced different high-tech investigation approaches, including the “source telecommunications surveillance.” We will introduce the draft Technology Investigation Act and the source telecommunications surveillance ruled. Then we hope to learn from the German Criminal procedure law, Japanese Communication Surveillance Act(通信傍受法) , the Stored Communication Act in the U.S., and the Telecommunications and Other Legislation Amendment Bill in Australia.Here we will share some case studies related to above legislations. The issues related to the access of individual communication content would be raised: (1) If public interest is the reason to get individual communication, what is the line between privacy protection and public interest?What is the legal basis to get individual communication? (2) Could Government request or compel technology companies to provide my communication content? (3) How about the encrypted one? Through the discussion of 3 issues above, this presentation hope to find the balance between privacy protection and police investigation. The last but not the least, we would share a case study about the police in Taiwan use the personal information collected for COVID-19 measurements to investigate the case.Read less