BERLIN: German telecom companies will be obliged to keep telephone and internet data for up to 10 weeks to help fight crime under a new law passed by parliament on Friday after a long political wrangle over possible infringements of individuals’ rights. Under the data retention law, companies will be required to keep data on the timing and duration of telephone calls, as well as online traffic through IP addresses. Location data from mobile phones may only be stored for four weeks. Telecom and internet companies will be forbidden from storing the content of communications, while e-mail traffic is excluded from the new law. Data retention centres will also be located in Germany, Justice Minister Heiko Maas told parliament. Privacy is a particularly sensitive issue in Germany because of the surveillance by the Gestapo in the Nazi era and by communist East Germany’s Stasi secret police. Disclosures by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden about widespread espionage in Germany by the US caused outrage in Germany.