Report: Surveillance a Threat to Fundamental Rights

By Mick Meaney
RINF Alternative News 

A new report from the Council of European Commission for Democracy has warned the widespread use of public surveillance is a threat to our “fundamental rights”. The Venice Commission also made recommendations on how personal freedoms could be protected.

Recommendations include authorities and business to state the zones being filmed and set up a national body to guarantee the lawfulness of such installations, in line with the requirements of the European Convention on Human Rights and the international texts governing the gathering and protection of data.

“The right of the owner or inhabitant to protect his or her private property does not mean that a person who enters somebody else’s territory, has no right to respect for his or her privacy. He or she must instead be informed, or reasonably be made aware on other grounds, of the surveillance or the possibility of incidental surveillance. In addition, as is the case with surveillance in public places by public authorities, the person concerned is entitled to know if data have been collected and how the data collected will be processed and what use may be made thereof. And finally, he or she must have a legal remedy to have the legality of the surveillance reviewed,” states the report.

A Home Office spokesman said: “A review was under way into the issue of CCTV and how it can be used most effectively and fairly. There is no doubt that CCTV plays a vital role in the fight against crime.”

Read the report in full here:
http://www.venice.coe.int/docs/2007/CDL-AD(2007)027-e.asp