Commissioner on Interception of Communications & Surveillance Justice Woo Kwok-hing says he is satisfied with the overall compliance with the requirements of the Interception of Communications & Surveillance Ordinance by law enforcement agencies.

In his first annual report submitted to the Chief Executive, Justice Woo said he has not detected any intentional or deliberate breach of the ordinance or the code of practice by law enforcement agencies.

All irregularities reported to or detected by the commissioner were due to careless mistakes or were not intentional, he said.

The commissioner observed that law enforcement agencies had vigilantly taken the initiative to discontinue operations whenever their continuation was no longer warranted, that they refrained from making an application for emergency authorisation, and that they strictly adhered to requirements.

Code of practice revised

Welcoming the commissioner's comments, the Security Bureau said although some of the tightened procedures require adjustments to law enforcement operations, they have injected additional discipline into the system and provided better privacy protection.

In light of the commissioner's suggestions and recommendations and the agencies' operation experience, the bureau has revised the code of practice.

Key amendments are:

* updating the procedures and practices in respect of applications for prescribed authoristions and applications for confirmations of emergency authorisations or authorisations issued upon oral applications, and providing for additional reporting requirements;

* improving the forms attached to the code to better reflect the requirements of the ordinance and to avoid ambiguity;

* providing for more detailed application and reporting requirements in respect of the inclusion and cancellation of additional facilities under a subject-based authorisation for interception operations;

* providing for further clarifications on the categorisation of the type of authorisation;

* providing additional guidance as to when the mechanism under section 57 (discontinuance followed by revocation) and that under section 58 (report on arrest if no discontinuance) should be invoked; and,

* elaboration on the procedures to report cases of non-compliance to the commissioner.

Review in 2009

The Government will monitor the operation of the regime in respect of interception of communications and surveillance, and fully co-operate with the commissioner and panel judges.

It will conduct a comprehensive review of the ordinance in 2009 after the commissioner's second full-year report is available.

For more details of the report click here.