Germany: Constitutional Court rules against trawling of databases

On 22 May, the German Constitutional Court declared that the trawling of several private and public databases by the police to identify potential terrorists following the September 2001 terrorist attacks in the US was unconstitutional. The Court held such action was only permissible where there was a concrete threat to the lives or liberties of persons, or to the existence of the Federal Republic or of a federal state.

Court Press Release (German) Judgment (German)