Accused in 'Il-Bona' murder case claims he was shot at

Roderick Micallef

Feb 25th 2010, 14:21

Communications providers do keep certain information primarily for billing purposes but there are other reasons and one of them can be police investigation.
In order for a comm. company to be able to send a bill, a billing system needs to record every single time the customer uses it's services, so every time you receive or make a call and every time you receive and send an sms or use internet or anything else logs are kept.
However this doesn't mean that the logs contain all the information, so for example when it comes to sms's, the log will have the sender number, the date, time, quantity and the receiving number but not what was actually written in the sms.
This also applies for voice calls, the actual conversation is not kept or recorded but the logs are etc.
All the systems must be made available and accessible to authorized law enforcement in due course of a criminal investigation and in some cases additional measures can be taken like phone tapping and phone conversation recordings. All of these measures have to be backed up with a court order. Data protection is strictly adhered to but the law is above that!

Mario Martinelli

Feb 23rd 2010, 21:55

Mobile service providers keep data of sent sms's and receiver's together with all calls dialed and received but not their content. (At least when court demanded this information, representatives of such companies said that they do not keep content) They keep data for 1 year only according to EU regulations. They provide this information only by court request.

C.Scerri

Feb 23rd 2010, 21:14

Recordings of telephone calls can only be made upon an order by an enquiring magistrate and the police need to show that the recording can be useful for its inestigation. Then it is the telephone companies that can do this with the equipment that they have installed.

All telephone companies keep records of numbers called, length of time as well as the "cells" used (in the case of mobile phone users). This is pretty obvious from the list of calls that one can download from the operators' website so as to check one's bill.

Duncan Sant

Feb 23rd 2010, 18:23

@M Galea, those calls are used for training purposes, and the message indicating that the call will be recorded is used for that scope.
All activity is monitored, including mobile/fixed calls and internet activity!

M. Galea

Feb 23rd 2010, 17:58

To my understanding a call is only recorded when this is advised. Example, when you call banks or customer care. However no operator should record calls (a nice way to say tap in) unless this is authorised by the police. However sms's although encrypted could be decrypted and shown.

Mario Pace

Feb 23rd 2010, 17:54

To learn about the introduction of this phone recording service one can follow this link: http://www.maltatoday.com.mt/2006/07/30/top_story.html

Joe Fenech

Feb 23rd 2010, 17:33

Sod data protection if its to reveal criminal activity/harassment!

Mario Pace

Feb 23rd 2010, 17:21

All the Telecom operators were by law ordered to record and preserve all calls a few years back. They were even made to pay themselves for the installation of the software infrastructure required. If I remember correctly this was acquired from an Israeli firm. These records can only be accessed by a court order for security reasons.

D. A . Agius

Feb 23rd 2010, 17:17

In theory they are obliged to keep a record that a call has been made andother details such as from which numbers to which numbers and length, not necessarily its actual content. I believe though that they can store some text data although it's speculation, not knowledge.

oliver mallia

Feb 23rd 2010, 17:08

and were is the data protection?

Albert Farrugia

Feb 23rd 2010, 16:57

As far as I know mobile telephony providers keep a record of numbers dialled, but not of the content of a conversation. If they do indeed keep the actual conversation, may God help us.

A. Borg

Feb 23rd 2010, 16:55

Christian Bajada ,
Easy,because it's not the first time that representative of mobile phone providers are cited to appear in court and provide transcripts of conversations carried out on certain calls made on certain times and dates. A report to the Police have to be lodged prior the representative takes the stand.

Christian Bajada

Feb 23rd 2010, 16:41

@Chrissey Zammit

Can you please tell us how do you know this?

Looking forward for your reply,
Chris

Chrissey Zammit

Feb 23rd 2010, 16:21

ALL mobile phone providers record ALL calls. Yes its the same as landline

Eric Gahn

Feb 23rd 2010, 16:07

"recordings from the mobile phone providers "

Do mobile services providers record all phone calls? Is it the same with landlines?