CENTRUM FÖR RÄTTVISA v. SWEDEN JUDGMENT
preceding paragraphs would apply, the Court notes this point as a
procedural shortcoming in the regulatory framework.
343. Finally, the Court does not have sufficient information as to the
manner in which the necessity to keep or destroy material containing
personal data is assessed in practice and as to whether unprocessed intercept
material is always stored for the maximum period of one year or the
necessity of continued storage is regularly reviewed, as it should be. This
makes it difficult to arrive at comprehensive conclusions covering all
aspects of the storage and deletion of intercept material. In the context of its
analysis on the ex post facto review in the Swedish bulk interception
system, the Court will return to the question what conclusions could be
drawn from the fact that it has insufficient information on the above point
and other aspects of the functioning of the Swedish system.
344. In sum, for the purposes of the present stage of the analysis, while
the Court noted in the preceding paragraph a procedural shortcoming that
needs to be addressed, it considers that, as a whole, the circumstances in
which the intercept material has to be destroyed are clear under Swedish
law.
(8) Supervision
345. Under Swedish law the task of overseeing foreign intelligence
activities in general and signals intelligence in particular is entrusted mainly
to the Foreign Intelligence Inspectorate. Further supervisory functions,
albeit with lesser powers, are exercised by the Data Protection Authority.
346. Noting that the Inspectorate’s board is presided over by permanent
judges or former judges and that its members, appointed for terms of at least
four years by the Government, are selected from candidates proposed by the
party groups in the Parliament, the Court is satisfied that the Inspectorate’s
role is that of an independent control mechanism.
347. The Inspectorate has wide-ranging powers covering the operation
of signal intelligence activities from beginning to end. In particular, it is
tasked with granting the FRA access to communications bearers after
verifying that the requested access corresponds to the permit issued by the
Foreign Intelligence Court (Chapter 6, section 19a of the Electronic
Communications Act). The Inspectorate reviews all other aspects of the
FRA’s activities, including the interception, analysis, use and destruction of
material. Importantly, it can scrutinise the selectors used (section 10 of the
Signals Intelligence Act) and enjoys access to all relevant documents of the
FRA (see paragraphs 50-53 above).
348. It appears therefore that the Inspectorate has the powers and tools
necessary to assess not only compliance with the formal requirements of
Swedish law but also to examine aspects of the proportionality of the
interference with individual rights that may be occasioned by signals
intelligence activities. It is noteworthy in this regard that its inspections
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