Research Briefing
Crime (Overseas Production Orders) Bill
The Crime (Overseas Production Orders) Bill [HL] would create a framework to enable law enforcement agencies and prosecutors to apply to a UK court for an ‘overseas production order’ requiring a person (in practice, generally a communications service provider or ‘CSP’) in a foreign jurisdiction to produce or grant access to electronic data for the purposes of investigating and prosecuting serious crime. An application would only be granted if the judge was satisfied that the data was likely to be of substantial value to the criminal proceedings or investigations for which it was sought, and that it would be in the public interest.