Telia Lietuva accused of deleting decade-long cemetery archive

The November 2nd Society, an organization dedicated to digitizing Lithuanian rural cemeteries, has accused Telia Lietuva of deleting a decade’s worth of data from its servers. The society claims that a single delayed payment for website hosting resulted in the loss of the ‘Atminimo knyga’ (Memory Book) database, which contained records from nearly 120 cemetery datasets collected between 2010 and 2020.

The organization stated that the data, intended to preserve the history of rural residents and their families, may be unrecoverable. While the society sought assistance from Telia Lietuva to restore the site from primary records, the company reportedly rejected the request. A formal claim submitted by lawyer Rūta Menčikovskytė was also dismissed by the company.

Legal recourse remains difficult for the society, as the State Consumer Rights Protection Authority does not handle disputes involving legal entities, and the Communications Regulatory Authority’s jurisdiction does not cover standard hosting contract disputes. The society noted it lacks the sufficient funds to pursue the matter in court.