NBI can get Vhong's text records
MANILA - The National Bureau of Investigation can get the phone transaction records of actor/comedian Vhong Navarro but not the actual content of his text conversations with Deniece Cornejo, an official of a local telco said Tuesday. Speaking to ABS-CBN's Umagang Kay Ganda, Atty. Froilan Castelo, general legal counsel and SVP of Globe Telecom, said information on calls and messages can only be retrieved with the consent of both parties. This means that both the sender and the receiver of the calls and text messages must agree to the request to retrieve the records. "Without that consent, you can only get the messages through a court order or any agency that has the authority to issue a subpoena including the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) or the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group," he said in a Punto por Punto interview. He said that if Navarro is a postpaid subscriber, he can ask for his transaction records from Globe. He said the records can be seen in his billing statement. However, he also pointed out that Globe does not keep a record of text messages but only the transaction logs. He said the transaction records will show that a text or call was made or received at a certain hour and minute. Castelo said about 1.2 billion text messages are sent through Globe's network every day. "We are not in the business of keeping text messages. This will keep costs of calls and text messages low. Imagine the capacity and data equipment we need in order to keep all those records. What we have are transactions records," he said. Navarro has accused Lee and 6 others of beating him up at Cornejo's Forbeswood Heights condominium unit last January 22 before turning him over to the police. Cornejo, however, accused Navarro of trying to rape her before he was stopped by Lee and company. Navarro earlier said he had been exchanging text messages with Cornejo from January 17 until January 22, the date of the mauling. An NBI report earlier said Cornejo had performed oral sex on Navarro during the latter's visit to Cornejo on January 17, a claim that Cornejo denied. Navarro said he received several text messages from Cornejo after their first date, inviting him to go back to her condo. The actor said that after he was beaten up by Lee's group, the businessman took his cell phone when they were at the Southern Police District Office (SPDO) in Taguig and deleted the text messages between him and Cornejo. The NBI has expressed interest in Navarro's text conversations with Cornejo since it would shed more light on the case. iPhone and Android phones Meanwhile, Manila Bulletin Tech Editor Art Samaniego said there is also a possibility that Navarro can retrieve his deleted text messages if he is using an iPhone. He said the iPhone Spotlight function can search for deleted text messages. However, he said the messages will be deleted if the iPhone is synced with iTunes backup or iCloud. In Navarro's case, Samaniego said the actor could simply type in Cornejo's phone number in the Spotlight function and it will retrieve all text messages. Samaniego said there are third party software that can also do the same function for Android phones.