Information technology - Bavaria tests new police software with human data
Without a legal basis for regular use, the police in Bavaria have been testing new police software with data from real people for months. Since March, the State Office of Criminal Investigation has also been using real data, for example from the Bavarian police's wanted persons database, the Ministry of the Interior announced in Munich on Thursday. However, the results are "not used for police purposes", but only for "internal testing of the application". Bayerischer Rundfunk (BR) had initially reported this.
In order to be able to use the "cross-procedural research and analysis platform" (VeRA) regularly in investigations, the state government actually wants to initiate an amendment to the Bavarian Police Duties Act. However, no draft has yet been presented. According to the Ministry of the Interior, this is not necessary for the test operation, said a spokesperson. The Bavarian Data Protection Act is sufficient.
According to the BR report, Bavaria's data protection commissioner Thomas Petri was initially unaware of the test operation. He also doubted that there was a sufficient legal basis for this: It would be difficult, for example, if the police received evidence of criminal offenses through the tests. "If that is the case, then the police are subject to the so-called legality principle," Petri told BR. "That means they have to investigate these crimes. And then the test operation becomes a veritable legal problem, because the police don't actually have the legal basis to operate VeRA."
The Ministry of the Interior, on the other hand, said that Petri had already been "informed about the ongoing test phase with real data in a personal conversation" in March. A spokesperson for the Bavarian State Office of Criminal Investigation emphasized that the authority had also offered to provide Petri with data protection documentation on the test deployment. However, the data protection officer only requested this on November 24. However, the State Office of Criminal Investigation contradicted Petri's statement that the principle of legality was not affected by the structure of the tests.
When asked, Petri told the German Press Agency: "I don't want to completely rule out the possibility that the LKA President mentioned the test operation planned by the LKA in a personal conversation with me. However, I do not have any meaningful documentation on this." He only found out about the actual test operation with "real data" from the BR and has therefore now initiated an investigation.
According to the Ministry of the Interior, the State Criminal Police Office has its own test system and a concept for who can access it there. A few of the manufacturer's employees are working on the system on site, but they do not have remote access.
In the run-up to the procurement, data protectionists had expressed concerns that sensitive data could be diverted by the program from the controversial US manufacturer Palantir. The company had been financed by the CIA in the past and also counted the secret service among its customers. However, a review of the source code by the Fraunhofer Institute for Secure Information Technology prior to testing did not reveal any anomalies.
The software is intended to help the Bavarian investigators to read various police data pools simultaneously and establish links. Similar programs from the company are already in use in Hesse and North Rhine-Westphalia. The Federal Ministry of the Interior rejected the use of the software in federal authorities in the summer, as did other federal states - despite a purchase option negotiated by Bavaria specifically for this purpose.
The CDU/CSU therefore planned to make a new attempt with a motion in the Bundestag on Friday. The MPs are to vote on whether the Federal Ministry of the Interior should be asked to approve the procurement and use of the software by customs and the Federal Criminal Police Office, for example. The AfD parliamentary group has also submitted a motion to this effect, which will be put to the vote on Friday.
Bavaria's Digital Minister Fabian Mehring (Free Voters) cannot understand the uproar: "Typical German: once again, data protection is being used as a fig leaf to deny the future. Instead of using digital innovations for the benefit of all, people are indulging in bureaucracy and, in case of doubt, even prefer to give criminals free rein." Bavaria is no longer going along with this.
Bundestag on the CSU and AfD motions
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- The Ministry of the Interior in Germany announced that Bavaria's police have been conducting a test operation of new police software using real human data for several months, with the approval of the Bavarian Data Protection Act.
- During this test operation, the Bavarian State Office of Criminal Investigation has been using real data from sources such as the wanted persons database, with the results not being used for police purposes but rather for internal software testing.
- Bavaria's data protection commissioner Thomas Petri initially expressed concerns over a lack of a sufficient legal basis for the test operation, but the Ministry of the Interior later confirmed that he had been informed of the test phase in March.
- The Ministry of the Interior also revealed that the Bavarian State Office of Criminal Investigation offered Petri data protection documentation on the test deployment, which he only requested on November 24.
- The software being tested is a "cross-procedural research and analysis platform" (VeRA) developed by a US company, Palantir, which has raised concerns among data protectionists due to its controversial past.
- Despite these concerns, the testing of the software in Bavaria has not revealed any anomalies, and similar programs are already in use in other German states, such as Hesse and North Rhine-Westphalia.
Source: www.stern.de
