Report of the Interception of Communications Commissioner - March 2015
Figure 1 Total Number of Interception Warrants Issued 2012-14
3500
3372
3000
2500
2760
2795
2013
2014
2000
1500
1000
500
0
2012
6.42 The total number of extant warrants on 31st December 2014 was 1605, a 3.8%
decrease on 2013. Of the 1605 warrants, 20 were issued under section 8(4).
6.43 Some of the 1605 warrants were first authorised before 2014 but the vast majority
of interception warrants do not run for longer than 6 months. Last year I commented
that it was unsatisfactory that a number of the interception agencies have to apply to
renew their warrants excessively early. This results in significantly shortened periods of
authorisation. Serious crime warrants can only be authorised for a three month period
and this means that an applicant may have to submit renewal paperwork only a few
weeks after the initial interception was initially authorised. Understandably in some cases
there has not been sufficient time to gain a detailed intelligence picture and as a result
it can be hard to articulate the benefit and justify continuance. In addition renewing
early causes the intervening authorisation period to be lost and therefore serious crime
warrants of this kind are virtually never in force for the full three month period. A further
consequence of early renewal is that warrants are often subject to unnecessary renewals.
The majority of serious crime interception warrants do not last more than 6 months and
therefore a renewal would not be necessary if the period was amended to 6 months.
There remains a strong practical case for increasing the validity period for serious crime
warrants to six months, or at least in amending the legislation to enable the renewal to
take effect from the expiry of the original authorisation as this latter approach would not
shorten the original authorisation period.
6.44 This year we provide a breakdown of the 2795 interception warrants issued by
statutory necessity purpose to better inform the public as to how these intrusive powers
are being used. Figure 2 details this further breakdown.
6.45
The combination category in Figure 2 represents those few warrants that were
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