(Still) Challenging mass interception from the UK: HRW and others v UK
The applicants challenged the UK’s mass interception regime following PI’s campaign and support. As part of a friendly settlement reached by the parties in this case, the UK government admits that they violated the applicants’ rights to privacy and freedom of expression.
* Photo by Chris Slupski on Unsplash
Court: European Court of Human Rights
Applications nos 64230/16, 64368/16, 64741/16, 65463/16 and 65487/16
Status: Open
The applicants are a human rights NGO (Human Rights Watch-HRW), a journalist, a lawyer, a technologist, and an entrepreneur. HRW is headquartered in New York with major offices in the United Kingdom, and the individual applicants are all resident in the United Kingdom. They complained that UK’s bulk interception and intelligence sharing regime was in violation of their rights to privacy (Art 8) and freedom of expression (Art 10) under the European Convention on Human Rights.
On 16 May 2016, the Investigatory Powers Tribunal (IPT) found that they had standing to complain about the mass interception and intelligence sharing regime, and directed inquiries into whether their communications had been unlawfully intercepted, stored, accessed, or retained. However, the IPT made no determination in their favour. On 4 November 2016, they lodged their complaints before the European Court.
This complaint originated from a PI campaign encouraging individuals and organisations to request that the UK’s IPT, the judicial body responsible for overseeing UK intelligence agencies, conduct investigations into whether they had been subjected to unlawful surveillance by UK intelligence agencies. You can find more information on the origins of the case and PI’s involvement here.
On 31 March 2022, the European Court of Human Rights issued a decision, in relation to two applicants, HRW and Ball, confirming the UK government’s admission that the bulk interception regime was not compliant with Articles 8 (right to privacy) and 10 (freedom of expression) with regard to the treatment of confidential journalistic material. On 19 May 2022, similar decisions were issued in relation to Robinson and Weatherhead.