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In July 2025, the Berlin Regional Court (Landgericht Berlin) issued a landmark decision declaring that data obtained from the hacked messaging platform EncroChat is inadmissible as evidence in criminal proceedings in Germany. This ruling marks a turning point in the ongoing debate over the legal admissibility of digital evidence and the delicate balance between privacy rights and public security.
EncroChat was a secure communications service widely used by criminal networks. In 2020, French authorities successfully infiltrated the platform and intercepted millions of encrypted messages. These were shared with law enforcement agencies across Europe, including Germany, where they formed the basis for numerous prosecutions, especially in cases involving drug trafficking and organized crime.
However, the Berlin court questioned the legality of this practice. The judgment emphasized that the EncroChat data had been collected without judicial oversight in Germany and without individual warrants. The court found this violated the constitutional rights of the accused, particularly the right to informational self-determination and the guarantee of a fair trial. It concluded that mass surveillance and indiscriminate data collection breach core principles of due process under German law.
This decision could significantly impact ongoing and past cases where EncroChat evidence was central. It also raises broader questions about the use of foreign-sourced digital evidence in domestic prosecutions and challenges the principle of mutual recognition within the EU’s criminal justice cooperation framework.
Courts in other German federal states, such as North Rhine–Westphalia and Bavaria, had previously ruled that EncroChat evidence was admissible. The Berlin ruling now disrupts that consensus and may trigger a review by the Federal Court of Justice (BGH) or even the Federal Constitutional Court (BVerfG).
As digital tools and international cooperation increasingly shape criminal investigations, the admissibility of digital evidence in Germany becomes ever more pressing. EncroChat has come to symbolize the legal struggle between effective law enforcement and the fundamental right to privacy—a tension likely to define legal discourse in the years ahead.
