What the ruling means for Dwyer and other cases

Professor of Law Shane Kilcommins explains the High Court ruling data retention, the implications it might have on Graham Dwyer's case and ongoing investigations.

The court ruling did two things: To begin with it held that the demands of a modern-day democratic society to guarantee the fundamental right to privacy prescribed by EU and European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) law for access to retained telephony data have not been met by the Data Retention Act of 2011, which requires all service providers to retain the telephony data for two years. It was in breach because access to such data was deemed to be overly general and indiscriminate. The 2011 act did not provide for sufficient safeguards to ensure effective protection of the data retained against the risk of abuse and against any unlawful access and use of that data.