Why, even the Spiegel article says right at the beginning that it's just playing with words for the sake of elections:
"But for this change of course to be more than just an election ploy, the government should however advocate a change in the EU Directive in Brussels. Which prescribes a six-month storage of traffic data - and the Union confirms in other parts of its election manifesto that it holds onto the fundamental goal to implement the Directive. "Minimum retention period" is spoken in the Union for two years already - and means nothing but data retention."
"But for this change of course to be more than just an election ploy, the government should however advocate a change in the EU Directive in Brussels. Which prescribes a six-month storage of traffic data - and the Union confirms in other parts of its election manifesto that it holds onto the fundamental goal to implement the Directive. "Minimum retention period" is spoken in the Union for two years already - and means nothing but data retention."