Proposals from the ruling GERB party for changes to proposed amendments to the electronic eavesdropping act, unsurprisingly, do not deviate much from the line set out by the Interior Ministry and Interior Minister Tsvetan Tsvetanov.

The Electronic Communications Act (ECA), as the act is formally known, is expected to be tabled for a second reading in Parliament in February 2010.

Under the changes proposed by GERB, mobile telephone and internet operators are obliged to have a member of staff available at all times who will be responsible for the accuracy of private communication data provided to the Interior Ministry, Bulgarian-language daily Dnevnik said.

The deadline for providing requested communication data would remain two hours after receipt of the court approval. Service providers have objected that the two-hour deadline is too short and unrealistic, but GERB considered it realistic, Dnevnik said.

Fines for not complying with the two-hour deadline would not be as high as previously cited, Atastas Anastasov, chair of the Internal Security and Public Order Committee, was quoted by Dnevnik as saying.

According to Anastasov, the fine for a first non-compliance would be between 10 and 30 000 leva; a second violation would cost the service provider up to 100 000 leva.

Where possible, data would be sent to the Interior Ministry electronically, Anastasov said.

One option would be a so-called closed interface; that is, an interface to access the database with communication data that would be opened by the service provider for the police to access data for which a court order had been issued.

Other changes to the amendments that GERB proposed include a deadline after which communication data, which has been accessed by the Interior Ministry, should be destroyed, as had been demanded by privacy advocates and non-governmental organisations.

Accessed data that was not part of an investigation or court case, was to be destroyed within six months after access. A three-member committee was to supervise the destruction, Dnevnik said.

Like the Blue Coalition, GERB proposed a parliamentary committee would supervise the access, storage and destruction of private communication data. The committee would have the right to access sites of the Interior Ministry and service providers for inspections on the storage and destruction of data, and would inform the prosecutor in case violations were found.

The committee would also have the obligation to inform citizens if their communication data had been accessed in violation of legislation.

We do not support the idea that citizens would be informed of every case of access to communication data that has not led to court action, Dnevnik quoted Anastasov as saying.

According to Anastasov, this could lead to information leaks regarding investigations.

The scope of crimes under which telephone and internet communication data could be accessed was reduced from 30 to 15 crimes in addition to serious crimes, Anastasov said. Most of these crimes carried a sentence of three to five years in prison, he said.

The full list of crimes included in the GERB proposal include: causing death by negligence, threatening an officer, vote-buying, acquisition or distribution of pornographic material, soliciting prostitution and providing premises for prostitution, all computer crimes, infringements of copyright and related rights, preparation of money laundering, unauthorised border crossing, soliciting investigators, judges and prosecutors to violate their administrative or legal obligations, organising gambling and conducting banking, insurance and other financial transactions without authorisation.