EU’s highest court declares UK surveillance powers illegal

Britain’s surveillance laws have been deemed illegal by the European Court of Justice in a case that throws into question the fate of the UK’s new Investigatory Powers Act. The ECJ ruled the legislation was illegal because it allowed “general and indiscriminate” retention of electronic communications. The judgment said member states could perform “targeted retention of that data solely for the purpose of fighting serious crime” but not the mass and indiscriminate data collection of everyone in Britain allowed by new UK spying regime. This type of legislation “cannot be considered to be justified within a democratic society, as required by the directive, read in the light of the Charter,” the ECJ said, referring to the charter of European human rights.