New regulation planned

Personal rights: Minister in turmoil

The justice department is going through turbulent times. This currently concerns the debate about the planned new regulation on the seizure of data carriers such as laptops or cell phones.

First, Minister Alma Zadic (Greens) agreed to the short review period of two weeks. Now, after a wave of outrage from the professional associations of judges and public prosecutors, she wants to draw up a proposal in the coming weeks and extend the deadline for the draft to six weeks.

This is an unnecessary delay, which in turn outrages the coalition partner ÖVP: after all, the bill was passed in the Justice Committee with the votes of the Greens.

What ends up in the criminal file?
Specifically, it is about the violation of fundamental rights during house searches. Experts have been complaining for years that personal rights are not sufficiently protected in Austria, which could lead to violations of the European Convention on Human Rights.

For example, when, according to experts, all cell phone or hard drive data is collected by an authority and included in the criminal file. This also includes purely private photos or personal documents, which may then end up as abstractly relevant content in parliamentary committees of inquiry. Even if they have no relevance under criminal law. This should now be rectified with the new law.

Irrespective of the new legislative initiative, this criminal relevance would actually already be regulated in the Code of Criminal Procedure: Only what is necessary for the criminal proceedings may be included in the file. There is also Supreme Court case law on this.

Nevertheless, it took the Constitutional Court to call for a revision of the law by January 1, 2025 at the latest due to the legal violations.