Security: Uk Phonetap Laws Breach Privacy

Government phone-tapping practices have violated the right to privacy, the European court of human rights ruled yesterday. It described the legal discretion granted to the government for intercepting communications as "virtually unfettered". Procedures covering the use and storage of intercepted material should be set out in a form which is open to public scrutiny and knowledge, it said.

The judgment is the culmination of a nine-year legal battle by civil rights groups in London and Dublin who claim their communications have been subject to indiscriminate surveillance.

The ruling will have widespread implications for Britain's current law on phone tapping and interception of communications, warned the groups involved - Liberty, the Irish Council for Civil Liberties and British-Irish Rights Watch.

Although the comments of the European court were directed at the 1985 Interception of Communications Act, they said the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (Ripa) 2000, which superseded the 1985 act, was almost identical.

The case was initiated following allegations that telephone calls between Britain and Ireland were intercepted by a Ministry of defense installation at Capenhurst, Cheshire. The Irish government raised the allegations with British ministers, who said they could neither confirm nor deny the allegations.

Alex Gask, Liberty's legal officer, said: "The court of human rights has rightly found that greater accessibility and accountability is required to ensure respect for the privacy of thousands of innocent people." The Home Office said it would "carefully consider the judgment".