British tribunal: 17 years of mass surveillance by secret services illegal

A British tribunal ruled on Monday about the legality of surveillance practices by national security services. The conclusion is that the bulk collection of data between 1998 and 2015 infringed the right to privacy.

In doing so, the security services violated Article 8 of the ECHR, according to the tribunal in its opinion. The so-called Investigatory Powers Tribunal is the only tribunal allowed to hear complaints against the security services MI5, MI6 and GCHQ, writes The Guardian. The tribunal states that until 2015, collecting ‘bulk personal data sets’, including medical records, tax data, and commercial and financial activities, was illegal. The services intercepted telephone and internet data, but without detecting its contents.

The tribunal finds that there was insufficient supervision of the collection of the data and that the overarching regime infringed the right to privacy. In 2015, it was announced that the data collection was taking place in this way, after which rules were introduced to provide a legal basis for data collection, the BBC writes. This concerned rules on the collection, management and destruction of data.

The NGO Privacy International filed the data collection case in June 2015. The organization says the statement is “very meaningful”, but also mentions some criticisms. For example, according to Privacy International, the new rules on the collection of data are also in conflict with applicable rules. A new law is currently being drafted in the United Kingdom that would provide the secret services with additional powers.