Police to gain new powers to extract data under Crime and Policing Bill
18/06/2025 | Open Rights Group
Digital rights campaigners, Open Rights Group (ORG), have condemned the last-minute inclusion of "extreme powers" in the Crime and Policing Bill. The new clauses (63-70) added by the government would permit police to extract data from any online accounts accessed via a seized device, solely with the approval of a senior police officer, bypassing judicial oversight.
ORG highlights that police already possess broad discretion to seize devices, for instance, during arrest or stop and search, if a crime is suspected, even without a warrant. Jim Killock, ORG Executive Director, criticised the government for "sneaking" in these "authoritarian policing powers," arguing that police should not self-regulate such intrusive actions. ORG argues that the entire device seizure regime needs an overhaul, demanding independent judicial oversight for such measures.
In a separate article, ORG claims the Data (Use and Access) Bill (DUA Bill) will impact around 4.4 million individuals who work in the gig economy because of changes to the subject access requests (SARs) and automated decision-making (ADM) that favour businesses.
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