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ANOM

European Court of Human Rights

ECtHR

European Court of Human Rights, Raal & Reudolph v. Estonia 14711/25, 14712/25

ANOM Evidence Reaches Strasbourg: Estonian Supreme Court Conviction Challenged Under Articles 6 and 8 ECHR

The European Court of Human Rights (Third Section) communicated on 12 February 2026 the applications in Raal v. Estonia (no. 14711/25) and Reudolph v. Estonia (no. 14712/25), both pending, concerning ANOM-derived data used as sole or decisive evidence in Estonian drug and money-laundering proceedings. The Estonian Supreme Court convicted both applicants on 16 January 2025, overruling the Tallinn Court of Appeal's exclusion; it applied a presumption of lawfulness (seaduslikkuse eeldus) under Art. 65 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, reasoning that US assurances of lawful collection were sufficient and that analogous procedural safeguards exist in Estonian law. The applicants allege violations of Art. 8 ECHR — mass surveillance without individualised suspicion, with unverifiable authorisations — and of Art. 6 § 1 ECHR, submitting they had no effective access to the surveillance authorisations and no meaningful opportunity to contest admissibility. The Court's questions invoke Big Brother Watch v. UK [GC] and Yüksel Yalçınkaya v. Türkiye [GC], placing Raal alongside Silgir v. Germany (EncroChat) as a key pillar in Strasbourg's growing framework for encrypted evidence admissibility across Europe.




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