New Law: Customer Service Call Recordings Belong to the Consumer

In the near future, Israelis will be able to demand recordings of conversations they had with customer service agents on the phone. The Justice Ministry said that it was planning to adopt the recommendations of a committee that has been working on ways to ensure the digital rights of Israelis.

The Ministry’s Technology and Law Authority has determined that access to conversations that people have with customer service personnel on the phone is one of those rights. A law has been in place for several years now that companies must record these conversations so they can be checked in the event that a customer complains about services or products that they claim were misrepresented. The new measure requires companies to share those recordings with customers.

The rule, which is set to go into effect in two months, is the first section of an overall project that will allow Israelis full access to all digital information companies have on them, a Justice Ministry official said. When those rules go into effect, Israelis will be able to access video and database information pertaining to them, the official said.