Cops to Congress: We need logs of Americans' text messages | Politics and Law - CNET News

Cops to Congress: We need logs of Americans' text messages | Politics and Law - CNET News: "State and local law enforcement want wireless providers to store detailed information about your SMS messages for at least two years -- in case they're needed for future criminal investigations."

"In one 2009 case in Michigan, wireless provider SkyTel turned over the contents of 626,638 SMS messages, a figure described by a federal judge as "staggering." "

"Some providers, like Verizon, retain the contents of SMS messages for a brief period of time, while others like T-Mobile do not store them at all."

"as of 2010, AT&T, T-Mobile, and Sprint did not store the contents of text messages. Verizon did for up to five days, a change from its earlier no-logs-at-all position, and Virgin Mobile kept them for 90 days. The carriers generally kept metadata such as the phone numbers associated with the text for 90 days to 18 months; AT&T was an outlier, keeping it for as long as seven years, according to the chart."