56
ROMAN ZAKHAROV v. RUSSIA JUDGMENT
through dissemination of information which was damaging to honour,
dignity or reputation could be compensated irrespective of the tortfeasor’s
fault. The Government submitted a copy of a decision of 9 December 2013
by the Vichuga Town Court of the Ivanovo region, awarding compensation
in respect of non-pecuniary damage for unlawful interception of a suspect’s
telephone conversations after the recordings obtained as a result of that
interception had been declared inadmissible as evidence by the trial court.
The Government also submitted a judicial decision awarding compensation
for an unlawful search and seizure of documents and a judicial decision
awarding compensation to an acquitted defendant for unlawful prosecution.
224. Russian law also provided for criminal remedies for abuse of power
(Articles 285 and 286 of the Criminal Code), unauthorised collection or
dissemination of information about a person’s private and family life
(Article 137 of the Criminal Code) and breach of citizens’ right to privacy
of communications (Article 138 of the Criminal Code – see
paragraphs 19-22 above). The Government referred in that connection to the
Supreme Court’s judgment of 24 October 2002, convicting a certain E.S. of
an offence under Article 138 of the Criminal Code for inciting an official to
supply him with the names of the owners of several telephone numbers and
to provide him with call detail records in respect of those telephone
numbers. They also referred to the Supreme Court’s judgment of 15 March
2007, convicting a customs official of an offence under Article 138 of the
Criminal Code for intercepting the telephone communications of a certain P.
They submitted copies of two more conviction judgments under Article 138
of the Criminal Code: the first concerned the selling of espionage
equipment, namely pens and watches with built-in cameras, while the
second concerned the covert hacking of a communication provider’s
database in order to obtain the users’ call detail records.
225. Lastly, the Government argued that remedies were also available in
Russian law to challenge the alleged insufficiency of safeguards against
abuse in the sphere of interception of communications (see paragraph 156
above).
226. The Government submitted that the applicant had not used any of
the remedies available to him under Russian law and described above. In
particular, he had chosen to bring judicial proceedings against mobilenetwork operators, the Ministry of Communications being joined only as a
third party to the proceedings.
(b) The Court’s assessment
(i) General principles
227. The Court reiterates that any interference can only be justified
under Article 8 § 2 if it is in accordance with the law, pursues one or more
of the legitimate aims to which paragraph 2 of Article 8 refers and is