When the National Assembly meets on April 26 a total of six new bills including an amendment to the Interception of Communications Act will be read for the first time.
The Amendment being tabled by Minister of Public Telecommunications Catherine Hughes seeks to provide more exceptions to the offence of communication interception.
Under Section 3 of the 2008 Act a persons who intentionally intercepts a communication in the course of its transmission by means of a telecommunications system commits an offence and is liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding five million dollars and to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three years.
The Section provides as exceptions situations where the interception occurs “in obedience to a warrant issued by a Judge” or “on the authority of a designated officer in the case of a national emergency or in responding to a case where approval for a warrant is
impracticable having regard for the urgency of the case.”
The amendment being tabled seeks to add five more exceptions compatible to exceptions found in “similar legislation across the region”
The new exceptions include if the person has reasonable grounds for believing that the persons to whom or by whom the communication is transmitted consents to the interception or if the communication is not a private telecommunication.
Also included is if the communication is intercepted as an ordinary incident in the course of employment in the provision of telecommunication services, the communication is a stored communication and is acquired in accordance with other law or the interception is of a communication transmitted by a private telecommunications network and is done either by a person who has a right to control the operation or use the network or a person with the express or implied consent of the person to whom or by whom the communication is transmitted.
