“Keep it secret. Keep it safe.”
In contrast to the European Production Order, under a Preservation Order the data initially remains with the service provider and is not yet transmitted to a law enforcement authority. The Preservation Order is less intrusive than the Production Order. Accordingly, the conditions for issuing it are less strict.
A Preservation Order may, in principle, be issued for all criminal offences, provided it is necessary and proportionate and could have been ordered under the same conditions in a similar domestic case. It may also be issued for the execution of a custodial sentence or a detention order of at least four months. Unlike a Production Order for traffic data or content data, it therefore does not require, in particular, a specific minimum penalty threshold or a specific list of offences.
The Preservation Order is transmitted by means of the European Preservation Order Certificate, or EPOC-PR for short. Among other things, it contains information on the issuing authority, the addressee, the user concerned, the requested category of data and, where applicable, the relevant time range.
Upon receipt of the EPOC-PR, responsibility shifts to the service provider. What matters now is that the provider identifies the specified data quickly and reliably. If there are no obstacles, the data must be preserved without undue delay. The confidentiality and integrity of the data must be ensured throughout the preservation period.
The preservation obligation generally applies for 60 days. Within this period, the issuing authority may extend the preservation period once by an additional 30 days. If, within the period (as extended, where applicable), the issuing authority confirms that a subsequent request for production has been issued, the data must continue to be preserved for as long as necessary to process that request.
For service providers, a Preservation Order is therefore not a one-off event, but a long-term process. The data must not only be preserved in the short term. Over weeks or months, it must also be assigned to the correct case, protected, and monitored with regard to deadlines and follow-up decisions. EviGate supports you from the receipt of the Preservation Order through deadline monitoring and escalation to audit-proof documentation.