Surveillance by intelligence services – Volume II: field perspectives and legal update
ECHR (right to an effective remedy).15 Nonetheless, cases
on general surveillance of communications still need
to be adjudicated.16 Since publication of the 2015 FRA
report, the ECtHR handed down a seminal judgment in
Roman Zakharov v. Russia.17 In this judgment, the court’s
Grand Chamber summarised and clarified past case law,
while finding that the Russian legal framework was not
compatible with human rights standards.
Figure 1:
EU Member States’ legal frameworks on surveillance reformed since October 2015
Laws and reforms have been introduced
No significant legal amendments
Source:
15
16
17
20
As stated in the 2015 FRA report, the ECtHR’s human
rights standards – which should be considered
minimum standards – have served as a benchmark for
Member States’ legislative reforms. Figure 1 presents
an overview of reforms of legal frameworks on
surveillance that have taken place in the EU-28 since
the 2015 FRA report. In light of heightened security
pressures, an overwhelming majority of EU Member
States have reformed or are in the process of reforming
their legal frameworks.
FRA, 2017
For a discussion of the ECtHR case law, see Council
of Europe (2016), pp. 55-93. See also von Bernstorff,
J. and Asche, J., Dietrich, J.-H. and Eiffler, S. (eds) (2017),
p. 79 and following.
See the pending cases: ECtHR, Centrum För Rättvisa
v. Sweden, No. 35252/08; ECtHR, Big Brother Watch
and Others v. the United Kingdom, No. 58170/13;
ECtHR, Bureau of Investigative Journalism and Alice Ross
v. the United Kingdom, No. 62322/14; ECtHR, 10 Human
Rights Organisations and Others v. the United Kingdom,
No. 24960/15; ECtHR, Association confraternelle de la presse
judiciaire v. France, No. 49526/15.
ECtHR, Roman Zakharov v. Russia [GC], No. 47143/06,
4 December 2015.