By Moon Gwang-lip
Staff Reporter

Telecom operators will be required to keep phone service records for up to a year from late August in case they are needed for criminal investigation, the Ministry of Justice said on Tuesday.

The measure sparked swift protest from civic groups claiming the new requirement violates privacy rights, as every citizen is seen by the government as a potential criminal.

The ministry announced a plan to revise the enforcement ordinance of the communication privacy protection law in order to require telecom companies to keep records of long-distance calls and international calls for 12 months.

The revision will also require local call records be kept for six months.

Once the revised regulation is enforced, telecom operators, such as fixed-line telephone operator KT and three mobile operators SK Telecom, KTF and LG Telecom, will have to keep the phone records.

Those records required will be the time of the telephone conversation, the telephone number dialed and the location of the handset. The records are to be handed over to law-enforcement agencies to facilitate criminal investigations.

The period for local calls was set at six months in consideration of their greater frequency, a ministry official said.

``The measure reflected law enforcement agencies’ need for such information in their investigations,’’ the official said.

So far, telecom operators have stored the records at their discretion for up to six months, as the current law has no clause for a compulsory storage period.

``I heard from prosecutors and police that many investigations failed due to the lack of such records. So the measure is on the right track toward their goal of conducting a more thorough investigation. We believe the measure will strengthen national security as well,’’ he said.

The government plans to enforce the new regulation around Aug. 27 after getting approval for the revision in line with the new communication privacy protection law.

The measure, however, sparked controversy on the issue of privacy and civil groups such as the Korean Progressive Network (KPN) said they are skeptical of the new regulation.

``They say the measure is for investigation’s sake and that’s nonsense,’’ said Kim Jeong-woo, KPN activist in charge of policy supervision.

``It just means the government views its people as potential criminals. The measure is believed to give law enforcement agencies the authority to breach people’s privacy under the name of investigation,’’ Kim said.

The ministry denied any possibility of legal misappropriation.

``We will require prosecutors and police to seek court approval to obtain such records to prevent law enforcement authorities from violating a person’s privacy,’’ said the ministry official.

joseph@koreatimes.co.kr