CENTRUM FÖR RÄTTVISA v. SWEDEN JUDGMENT
were spent on creating routines and educating its personnel in order to
minimise the risk of unwarranted interferences with personal integrity.
Moreover, no evidence had been found which indicated that the FRA was
handling personal data for purposes not authorised by the legislation in
force. However, the Authority noted, inter alia, that there was a need to
improve the methods for separating domestic and cross-border
communications. Even if the FRA had implemented mechanisms in that
area, there was no guarantee that domestic communications were never
intercepted, and, although the occasions had been very few, such
communications had in fact been intercepted. The Authority further noted
that the procedure for notification to individuals (paragraphs 58-60 above)
had never been used by the FRA, due to secrecy considerations.
76. A second report was issued by the Authority on 24 October 2016.
Again, the Authority found no evidence that personal data had been
collected for other purposes than those stipulated for the signals intelligence
activities. It also noted that the FRA continuously reviewed whether data
intercepted was still needed for those purposes. A similar review was made
concerning the communications bearers from which the FRA obtained
intelligence. Moreover, there was nothing to indicate that the provisions on
destruction of personal data had been disregarded (see paragraphs 37-39
above). However, the FRA was criticised for not adequately monitoring
logs used to detect unwarranted use of personal data, a shortcoming that had
been pointed out already in 2010.
L. The report of the Signals Intelligence Committee
77. On 12 February 2009 the Government also decided to appoint a
committee predominantly composed of members of parliament, the Signals
Intelligence Committee (Signalspaningskommittén), with the task of
monitoring the signals intelligence conducted by the FRA in order to
examine the implications for personal integrity. The report was presented on
11 February 2011 (Uppföljning av signalspaningslagen; SOU 2011:13). The
Committee’s examination focused primarily on signals intelligence
conducted over the airways, as such activities on cable-based traffic had not
yet commenced on a larger scale.
78. The Committee concluded that concerns of personal integrity were
taken seriously by the FRA and formed an integral part of the development
of its procedures. It noted, however, that there were practical difficulties in
separating domestic cable-based communications from those crossing the
Swedish border. Any domestic communications that were not separated at
the automated stage were instead separated manually at the processing or
analysing stage. The Committee further observed that the selectors used for
communications data were less specific than those used for interception of
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