This is the ground that wins most often on its own terms. It does not ask the Commission to judge a foreign prosecution — it asks whether the requesting bureau has actually described what this person is supposed to have done, and whether the offence is serious enough for INTERPOL to be involved at all. Of the fourteen published decisions in which this was the main ground, six ended with the data deleted.
What a compliant description looks like
Across three separate decisions the Commission has set out the same test in almost the same words. The information supplied by the bureau must be concrete and specific, and it must identify:
- the role of the person concerned — what they, individually, are said to have done;
- the specific criminal actions, with the time and the means of committing them;
- where relevant, a personal gain or benefit, or the intention to commit the offence.
What fails that test is remarkably consistent. In a 2023 decision the bureau described a co-accused’s conduct precisely but not the applicant’s, and offered general statements that evidence existed without answering his submissions. In a 2025 decision the bureau asserted that the applicant had profited personally, produced nothing to support it, and never addressed his evidence that he had not been the company’s director. In both, the data were found non-compliant with Articles 12, 35 and 99(2) of the Rules on the Processing of Data.
The practical consequence for an application is that the strongest submission is often the narrowest: not «the case is fabricated», but «the file does not say what I did, when, or how — and it does not answer this specific point».
Seriousness: a Red Notice is not for petty crime
Article 83(1)(a)(i) of the RPD allows a Red Notice only where the offence is a serious ordinary-law crime. In a 2019 decision the applicant, then between 18 and 21, had allegedly stolen and resold a mobile phone and misused another person’s identity card. The Commission weighed the value involved and the absence of serious, concrete damage to any public or private interest, and held that the case concerned a petty crime that did not meet Articles 35 and 83. The data were deleted.
Seriousness is assessed on what the file actually shows, not on the label of the offence in the national code — which is why the argument works in commercial and property cases where the sums are modest.
When the bureau will not produce the documents
The pattern that decides borderline cases is not the applicant’s evidence but the bureau’s silence. In a 2019 case the Commission asked repeatedly for the decision revoking the applicant’s passport and for the arrest warrant behind the entry. Neither arrived. The Commission held that the lack of appropriate answers prevented it from concluding that the data were compliant, and resolved the case in the applicant’s favour without reaching his other arguments.
Purpose: notices other than Red
Every notice type has its own purpose, and the question is always whether that purpose is still served.
- Blue Notice — to locate a person. It survives while the location is genuinely unknown: in one case the applicants said their whereabouts were known to the authorities, the bureau said the opposite, and the fact that they had left the country shortly before the court order told against them.
- Green Notice — to warn of a person’s criminal record and likely recidivism, under Article 89 of the RPD. One was upheld after the bureau verified the convictions with the country concerned and updated the entry.
- Lawfulness of retention — even where purpose and proportionality are made out, Article 11 requires that the data be authorised by the law applicable to the supplying bureau. In a 2025 decision the bureau never confirmed that expressly, and the Commission required it to do so.
When the data concern a thing rather than a person
Two of these decisions are not about notices at all: one concerns a passport recorded in INTERPOL’s stolen and lost travel documents database, the other a vehicle in the stolen motor vehicles database. The test shifts accordingly. The Commission asks whether the object is still recorded as stolen in the reporting country and whether a recovery procedure is pending — not whether the person holding it did anything wrong. In the vehicle case the applicant’s own good faith, and even confirmation that the car had entered the second country before being reported stolen, did not displace the entry.
Arguments that did not work
- A civil judgment or settlement in your favour. It does not by itself quash criminal proceedings, especially where it says nothing about the underlying facts and comes from a different jurisdiction than the country that supplied the data.
- A refusal to transfer the proceedings to another country. Two sovereign states are not obliged to hand a case to one another, and the refusal is not in itself contrary to INTERPOL’s rules.
- Delay, where the bureau is in fact acting. Where the bureau had asked the countries in which the applicant was located to extradite or surrender him, it met Articles 84(2) and 87(b) of the RPD.
The decisions
The fourteen published decisions whose reasoning turns primarily on the quality of the data or the seriousness of the offence. Decisions where the main ground was political motivation or procedure are on the Article 3 page and the procedural grounds page; the full corpus is on the hub.
14 decisions
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Accuracy-Quality
After the requesting bureau checked the applicant's conviction data with the bureau of the country concerned and updated the Green Notice accordingly, the Commission found the notice met the criteria of Article 89 of the RPD, and revision did not lead to a different conclusion.
FOR THESE REASONS, THE COMMISSION Decides that the data challenged are compliant with INTERPOL’s rules applicable to the processing of personal data.
Download decision (PDF) Source: INTERPOL, Commission for the Control of INTERPOL’s Files
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Lawfulness-Validity of proceedings · Misuse of INTERPOL channels · Status of the person
A Blue Notice keeps a valid purpose where the bureau is seeking the location of suspects in an ongoing investigation: the applicants did not establish that their whereabouts were already known, and they had left the country shortly before the court order was issued.
FOR THESE REASONS, THE COMMISSION Decides that the data challenged are compliant with INTERPOL’s rules applicable to the processing of personal data
Download decision (PDF) Source: INTERPOL, Commission for the Control of INTERPOL’s Files
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Lawfulness-Validity of proceedings · Purpose
A country's refusal to transfer criminal proceedings to another state is not in itself contrary to INTERPOL's rules or to international standards — the two are separate sovereign states, and the refusal alone does not make the data non-compliant.
FOR THESE REASONS, THE COMMISSION Decides that the data challenged are compliant with INTERPOL’s rules applicable to the processing of personal data.
Download decision (PDF) Source: INTERPOL, Commission for the Control of INTERPOL’s Files
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Purpose
Where the bureau did not produce, despite repeated requests, the decision revoking the applicant's passport or the arrest warrant behind the entry, that absence of appropriate answers prevented the Commission from concluding that the data met INTERPOL's criteria, and it disposed of the matter in the applicant's favour.
FOR THESE REASONS, THE COMMISSION Decides that the data concerning the Applicant ’s passport […], issued by […] authorities, are not compliant with INTERPOL’s rules applicable to the processing of personal data, and that
Download decision (PDF) Source: INTERPOL, Commission for the Control of INTERPOL’s Files
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Accuracy-Quality · International interest-Seriousness
Red Notices are reserved for serious ordinary-law crime: the theft and resale of a mobile phone by a young adult, with no serious concrete damage to any public or private interest shown, was a petty crime that failed the requirements of Articles 35 and 83 of the RPD.
FOR THESE REASONS, THE COMMISSION Decides that the data concerning the Applicant are not compliant with INTERPOL’s rules applicable to the processing of personal data, and that they shall be deleted from INTERPOL’s files
Download decision (PDF) Source: INTERPOL, Commission for the Control of INTERPOL’s Files
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International interest-Seriousness · Lack of action for extradition
A favourable civil ruling or settlement does not by itself quash criminal proceedings, particularly where it says nothing about the underlying facts and was entered in a different jurisdiction from the country that supplied the data.
Decides that the data challenged are compliant with INTERPOL’s rules applicable to the processing of personal data ---------------- Vitalie Pîrlog Chairman of the Commission Secretariat to the Commission for the Control
Download decision (PDF) Source: INTERPOL, Commission for the Control of INTERPOL’s Files
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Description of criminal activities · Extradition
The description supplied by the bureau must be concrete and specific: it has to identify the person's role, the specific criminal actions, the time and the means, and where relevant a personal gain or the intention to commit the offence. General assertions that evidence exists do not satisfy Articles 12, 35 and 99(2) of the RPD.
FOR THESE REASONS, THE COMMISSION Decides that the data concerning the Applicant are not c ompliant with INTERPOL’s rules applicable to the processing of personal data, and that they shall be deleted from INTERPOL’s file
Download decision (PDF) Source: INTERPOL, Commission for the Control of INTERPOL’s Files
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Description of criminal activities · Extradition · Ne bis in idem
Where the bureau had actually asked the countries in which the applicant was located to extradite or surrender him, it met its obligations under Articles 84(2) and 87(b) of the RPD, and the applicant's arguments did not suffice to show the data had lost their purpose.
FOR THESE REASONS, THE COMMISSION Decides that the data challenged are compliant with INTERPOL’s rules applicable to the processing of personal data, subject to the following update of the Applicant’s file: - the extradi
Download decision (PDF) Source: INTERPOL, Commission for the Control of INTERPOL’s Files
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Description of criminal activities · Transfer of proceedings
The bureau described a co-accused's acts precisely but not the applicant's, made general statements about the existence of evidence and did not address his submissions; on that record the Commission found the data non-compliant.
FOR THESE REASONS, THE COMMISSION Decides that the data concerning the Applicant are not compliant with INTERPOL’s rules applicable to the processing of personal data, and that they shall be deleted from INTERPOL’s files
Download decision (PDF) Source: INTERPOL, Commission for the Control of INTERPOL’s Files
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Description of criminal activities · Due process · Extradition · Refugee Policy
A national court's finding that extradition would expose the person to conditions violating fundamental rights reinforces a claim under Article 2 of INTERPOL's Constitution; refugee status and the absence of any manifest participation in the offence were treated as aggravating factors, and the bureau's material did not remove the doubt.
FOR THESE REASONS, THE COMMISSION Decides that the data concerning the Applicant are not compliant with INTERPOL’s rules applicable to the processing of personal data, and that they shall be deleted from INTERPOL’s files
Download decision (PDF) Source: INTERPOL, Commission for the Control of INTERPOL’s Files
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Purpose of a Green Notice
The diffusion was deleted by the General Secretariat at the requesting bureau's own request once its national authorities confirmed that the charges had lapsed under the statute of limitations; the applicant's remaining complaints about the Green Notice did not succeed.
FOR THESE REASONS, THE COMMISSION Decides that the data challenged are compliant with INTERPOL’s rules applicable to the processing of personal data.
Download decision (PDF) Source: INTERPOL, Commission for the Control of INTERPOL’s Files
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Accuracy-Quality · Purpose
Where the bureau confirms that a vehicle is still recorded as stolen, the data remain accurate, relevant and of interest for police cooperation under Article 35 of the RPD — even though the applicant's own wrongdoing was not shown and the vehicle had entered the second country before it was reported stolen.
FOR THESE REASONS, THE COMMISSION Decides that the data challenged are compliant with INTERPOL’s rules applicable to the processing of personal data.
Download decision (PDF) Source: INTERPOL, Commission for the Control of INTERPOL’s Files
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Description of criminal activities · Due process · Lawfulness or Validity of the proceedings
Assertions that the applicant personally profited, unsupported by any material and without addressing his evidence that he was not the company's director, did not demonstrate involvement, criminal intent or personal benefit, and the data were held non-compliant.
FOR THESE REASONS, THE COMMISSION Decides that the data concerning the Applicant are not compliant with INTERPOL’s rules applicable to the processing of personal data, and that they shall be deleted from INTERPOL’s files
Download decision (PDF) Source: INTERPOL, Commission for the Control of INTERPOL’s Files
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Accuracy-Quality · Purpose
The Green Notice had a purpose and was proportionate under Articles 89, 10(1) and 12 of the RPD, but because the bureau never explicitly confirmed that retention of the data is authorised by its own national law as Article 11 requires, the Commission required that confirmation.
FOR THESE REASONS, THE COMMISSION Decides that the challenged data are compliant with INTERPOL’s rules applicable to the processing of personal data, subject to: a) the confirmation from the NCB of [Country 1] that the r
Download decision (PDF) Source: INTERPOL, Commission for the Control of INTERPOL’s Files
No decisions match these filters.
What this means for an application
Read the description of the offence in your own file first, sentence by sentence, and mark everything it does not say: which act is attributed to you personally, on what date, by what means, and what you are said to have gained. Those gaps are the application. Then put them to the Commission as specific questions the bureau has to answer — the published record shows that a bureau which cannot or will not answer loses.
Our lawyers build and argue these applications, including the request to block access to the data while the review runs: see how a challenge is put together.
Data quality and seriousness: common questions
Is «the case against me is fabricated» enough for the CCF?
No. The Commission does not retry the national case. What it does examine is whether the requesting bureau has described your own conduct concretely — your role, the specific acts, the time and means, and any personal gain. General assertions that evidence exists have repeatedly been held insufficient.
Can a Red Notice be removed because the alleged offence is minor?
Yes, that is a recognised ground. A Red Notice may be published only for a serious ordinary-law crime. In one published decision the theft and resale of a mobile phone, with no serious concrete damage shown, was found to be a petty crime and the data were deleted.
Does winning a civil case help remove the notice?
Not on its own. The Commission has held that a favourable civil ruling or settlement does not quash criminal proceedings, particularly where it says nothing about the underlying facts and was obtained in a different jurisdiction from the country that supplied the data.
My passport or car is flagged in an INTERPOL database — is that the same procedure?
The procedure is the same, the test is not. For a document in the stolen travel documents database or a vehicle in the stolen vehicles database, the Commission asks whether the object is still recorded as stolen and whether recovery is pending, not whether you did anything wrong.
What happens if the requesting country does not send the documents?
It usually decides the case. Where a bureau failed to produce the arrest warrant and the decision behind the entry despite repeated requests, the Commission held that it could not conclude the data were compliant and resolved the matter in the applicant’s favour.