Terrorist attacks often require immediate responses to emergency incidents, preservation of data and urgent data requests for international cooperation. Lawfully obtaining electronic evidence, or e-evidence, from the Internet and communication service providers is critical to successful prosecutions. More specifically, e-evidence can be used to indicate the location of terrorists and organized crime suspects, with whom they were communicating, and what crimes they planned and committed.
United Nations Security Council resolutions 2322 (2016) and 2396 (2017) recognized the importance of considering the re-evaluation of methods and best practices, in particular those related to e-evidence, and the challenges faced by Member States in obtaining admissible e-evidence. They also stressed the importance of Member States’ capacity to cooperate with the private sector in accordance with applicable law.