ROMAN ZAKHAROV v. RUSSIA JUDGMENT
45
unreported), where the Commission had found that the tapping of the
applicant’s telephone for almost two years had not violated the Convention.
(iv) Procedures to be followed for storing, accessing, examining, using,
communicating and destroying the intercepted data
188. The applicant further submitted that the OSAA did not specify the
procedures to be followed for examining, storing, accessing or using the
intercept data or the precautions to be taken when communicating the data
to other parties. It provided that the data had to be destroyed within six
months, unless those data were needed in the interest of the service or of
justice. There was however no definition of what the “interest of the service
or of justice” meant. Russian law also gave complete freedom to the trial
judge as to whether to store or to destroy data used in evidence after the end
of the trial.
189. The Government submitted that the OSAA required that records of
intercepted communications had to be stored under conditions excluding
any risk of their being listened to or copied by unauthorised persons. The
judicial decision authorising interception of communications, the materials
that served as a basis for that decision and the data collected as a result of
interception constituted a State secret and were to be held in the exclusive
possession of the State agency performing interceptions. If it was necessary
to transmit them to an investigator, a prosecutor or a court, they could be
declassified by the heads of the agencies conducting operational-search
activities. Interception authorisations were declassified by the courts which
had issued them. The procedure for transmitting the data collected in the
course of operational-search activities to the competent investigating
authorities or a court was set out in the Ministry of the Interior’s Order of
27 September 2013 (see paragraph 58 above).
190. The data collected in the course of operational-search activities
were to be stored for one year and then destroyed, unless they were needed
in the interests of the authority or of justice. Recordings were to be stored
for six months and then destroyed. Russian law was therefore foreseeable
and contained sufficient safeguards.
(v) Authorisation of secret surveillance measures
(α) The applicant
191. The applicant submitted that, although domestic law required prior
judicial authorisation for interceptions, the authorisation procedure did not
provide for sufficient safeguards against abuse. Firstly, in urgent cases
communications could be intercepted without judicial authorisation for up
to forty-eight hours. Secondly, in contrast to the CCrP, the OSAA did not
provide for any requirements concerning the content of the interception
authorisation. In particular, it did not require that the interception subject be