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Basic informations

About the Agency

The Operational and Technical Agency Skopje (hereinafter referred to as OTA) has been legally established by means of the Law on OTA (“Official Gazette of the Republic of Macedonia” No. 71, dated 19.4.2018), and started operating on 1.11.2018. Its establishment is intended to prevent any abuse of the surveillance measure of the electronic communications of the citizens on the part of the bodies authorized to monitor communications or the operators. Its scope of protection covers only the electronic forms of communication among the citizens.

 

Role

OTA is an independent and autonomous state body that provides the technical link between the operators and the communications surveillance authorities in cases where communications surveillance has been authorized by way of a court order for the needs of criminal investigation or for the protection of the interests of security and defense of the State. OTA does not have the technical capacity to access the contents of the intercepted communications, while the technical connection between the operators and the authorized bodies is provided exclusively and solely on the basis of a surveillance order issued by the court.

 

Planning

In its strategic planning, OTA is guided by the Constitution of the Republic of Macedonia and the European Convention for the Protection of Fundamental Human Rights and Freedoms, as well as the generally accepted NATO standards and rules. In its day-to-day operations, OTA is guided by and adheres to the legal provisions of the Law on Criminal Proceedings, the  Law on Communications Surveillance, the Law on OTA, the Law on Personal Data Protection, the Law on Classified Data and the Law on Electronic Communications. The functioning of OTA and all of the aspects of its organizational, personnel, technical and other setup are legally regulated by the Rulebook on Internal Organization, the Rulebook on the Systematization of OTA Posts and by other by-laws, which are classified. As a result, the latter must not be published on the OTA’s website. OTA complies with other bylaws as well, which are not classified, and these will be published on the OTA website from the date of their adoption

 

Management

OTA is managed by a Director, who is appointed and dismissed by the Assembly of the Republic of Macedonia. On the proposal of the Committee on Matters of Election and Appointment of the Assembly of the Republic of Macedonia, and following a previously published public vacancy announcement, on 7/9/2018, Zoran Angelovski was elected as Director of OTA by the Assembly of the Republic of Macedonia by a two-thirds majority of votes of the total number of Members of Parliament and by a majority vote of the total number of MPs belonging to the non-majority communities in the Republic of Macedonia. His term of office is five years, with no right to be re-elected.

 

Supervision and control

The work of OTA is subject to the supervision and control of the Assembly of the Republic of Macedonia, the Directorate for Security of Classified Information, the Directorate for Personal Data Protection, the Ombudsman of the Republic of Macedonia, the Council for Civil Control, the courts and the Public Prosecutor's Office of the Republic of Macedonia. Namely, the Director of OTA is obliged to submit annual reports to the Parliament of the Republic of Macedonia on the work of OTA for the previous calendar year by the end of February of the each year at the latest, and, if necessary, submit additional reports upon the request of the Assembly of the Republic of Macedonia. The reports must contain data on:

  • the number of communications activated for the needs of the authorities;
  • the number of communications activated for each authorized body separately. This number does not include the number of communications activated for security and defense purposes;
  • the state of affairs and the findings during the expert supervisions conducted by OTA over the work of the operators;
  • the number of disciplinary procedures carried out against OTA workers;
  • OTA’s financial operations.

 

Reports

The aforementioned reports must be published at a visible place on the website of the Assembly of the Republic of Macedonia, and the same are also accessible on the OTA’s web site.

 

Headquarters and contact

The head office of the Operational and Technical Agency is located at the following address: ul. "Orce Nikolov" br.48, Skopje, Republic of North Macedoniа

Contact person: Agron Ademi, Martina Zhuzhellovska

Е-mail: [email protected]