ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Félix Tréguer

Félix Tréguer is a junior researcher at the CERI-Sciences Po, where he looks at post-Snowden controversies for the UTIC project, funded by the French National Research Agency. He is also a founding member and former legal analyst of the Paris-based digital rights advocacy group La Quadrature du Net and is involved in Les Exégètes Amateurs, a team of volunteers working on strategic litigation against Internet censorship and surveillance (Foto: Sylvia Fredriksson (CC-BY-NC-SA)).

POSTS BY Félix Tréguer

26 October 2016

Félix Tréguer

French Constitutional Council Strikes Down “Blank Check” Provision in the 2015 Intelligence Act

Can intelligence agencies and their practice of secret state surveillance be reconciled with the rule of law? Is the unprecedented global debate on surveillance opened by the Snowden disclosures in 2013 bringing intelligence work closer to democratic standards? Last week, the French Constitutional Council indirectly dealt with these pressing questions by striking down a blank-check provision in the 2015 Intelligence Act, excluding “measures taken by public authorities to ensure, for the sole purpose of defending national interests, the surveillance and the control of Hertzian transmissions" from safeguards like the authorisation of the Prime Minister and the ex-ante opinion of an oversight commission. Continue reading >>