Abstract: Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights strongly protects private and family life, but it protects in the same way home and correspondence. Protecting the correspondence is a classic freedom which is one aspect of the protection of one`s privacy. It may concern written correspondence and also correspondence by means of telecommunications. Written correspondence is protected on the basis of Article 8. Correspondence by means of telecommunications has caused serious difficulties in interpretation related on how wiretaps were performed. The possibility of such wiretaps is recognized by the European Court when the interference is necessary in a democratic society for the protection of national security, the defense of public order and the prevention of (criminal) offenses. If the intercepts are legitimate to defend the democratic States against the threat of terrorism or delinquency, it is nevertheless true that safeguards are needed to prevent any drift towards arbitrariness. National law must provide accurately the terms of those interceptions: particularly it shall define which offenses allow state interference. It is mandatory for the national law to allow to the person concerned to exercise effective control to limit the interference to what is necessary in a democratic society.

Keywords: communications, justification of State interference, legitimate aim