03/02/2020 CURIA - Documents corresponding obligations, referred to in Articles 6 and 9 of that directive (see, to that effect, judgment of 29 January 2008, Promusicae, C‑275/06, EU:C:2008:54, paragraph 50). Nonetheless, in so far as Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58 enables Member States to restrict the scope of the obligation of principle to ensure the confidentiality of communications and related traffic data, that provision must, in accordance with the Court’s settled case-law, be interpreted strictly (see, by analogy, judgment of 22 November 2012, Probst, C‑119/12, EU:C:2012:748, paragraph 23). That provision cannot, therefore, permit the exception to that obligation of principle and, in particular, to the prohibition on storage of data, laid down in Article 5 of Directive 2002/58, to become the rule, if the latter provision is not to be rendered largely meaningless. It must, in that regard, be observed that the first sentence of Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58 provides that the objectives pursued by the legislative measures that it covers, which derogate from the principle of confidentiality of communications and related traffic data, must be ‘to safeguard national security — that is, State security — defence, public security, and the prevention, investigation, detection and prosecution of criminal offences or of unauthorised use of the electronic communication system’, or one of the other objectives specified in Article 13(1) of Directive 95/46, to which the first sentence of Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58 refers (see, to that effect, judgment of 29 January 2008, Promusicae, C‑275/06, EU:C:2008:54, paragraph 53). That list of objectives is exhaustive, as is apparent from the second sentence of Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58, which states that the legislative measures must be justified on ‘the grounds laid down’ in the first sentence of Article 15(1) of that directive. Accordingly, the Member States cannot adopt such measures for purposes other than those listed in that latter provision. Further, the third sentence of Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58 provides that ‘[a]ll the measures referred to [in Article 15(1)] shall be in accordance with the general principles of [European Union] law, including those referred to in Article 6(1) and (2) [EU]’, which include the general principles and fundamental rights now guaranteed by the Charter. Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58 must, therefore, be interpreted in the light of the fundamental rights guaranteed by the Charter (see, by analogy, in relation to Directive 95/46, judgments of 20 May 2003, Österreichischer Rundfunk and Others, C‑465/00, C‑138/01 and C‑139/01, EU:C:2003:294, paragraph 68; of 13 May 2014, Google Spain and Google, C‑131/12, EU:C:2014:317, paragraph 68, and of 6 October 2015, Schrems, C‑362/14, EU:C:2015:650, paragraph 38). In that regard, it must be emphasised that the obligation imposed on providers of electronic communications services, by national legislation such as that at issue in the main proceedings, to retain traffic data in order, when necessary, to make that data available to the competent national authorities, raises questions relating to compatibility not only with Articles 7 and 8 of the Charter, which are expressly referred to in the questions referred for a preliminary ruling, but also with the freedom of expression guaranteed in Article 11 of the Charter (see, by analogy, in relation to Directive 2006/24, the Digital Rights judgment, paragraphs 25 and 70). Accordingly, the importance both of the right to privacy, guaranteed in Article 7 of the Charter, and of the right to protection of personal data, guaranteed in Article 8 of the Charter, as derived from the Court’s case-law (see, to that effect, judgment of 6 October 2015, Schrems, C‑362/14, EU:C:2015:650, paragraph 39 and the case-law cited), must be taken into consideration in interpreting Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58. The same is true of the right to freedom of expression in the light of the particular importance accorded to that freedom in any democratic society. That fundamental right, guaranteed in Article 11 of the Charter, constitutes one of the essential foundations of a pluralist, democratic society, and is one of the values on which, under Article 2 TEU, the Union is founded (see, to that effect, judgments of 12 June 2003, Schmidberger, C‑112/00, EU:C:2003:333, paragraph 79, and of 6 September 2011, Patriciello, C‑163/10, EU:C:2011:543, paragraph 31). In that regard, it must be recalled that, under Article 52(1) of the Charter, any limitation on the exercise of the rights and freedoms recognised by the Charter must be provided for by law and must respect the essence of those rights and freedoms. With due regard to the principle of proportionality, limitations may be imposed on the exercise of those rights and freedoms only if they are necessary and if they genuinely meet objectives of general interest recognised by the European Union or the need to protect the rights and freedoms of others (judgment of 15 February 2016, N., C‑601/15 PPU, EU:C:2016:84, paragraph 50). With respect to that last issue, the first sentence of Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58 provides that Member States may adopt a measure that derogates from the principle of confidentiality of communications and related traffic data where it is a ‘necessary, appropriate and proportionate measure within a democratic society’, in view of the objectives laid down in that provision. As regards recital 11 of that directive, it states that a measure of that kind must be ‘strictly’ proportionate to the intended purpose. In relation to, in particular, the retention of data, the requirement laid down in the second sentence of Article 15(1) of that directive is that data should be retained ‘for a limited period’ and be ‘justified’ by reference to one of the objectives stated in the first sentence of Article 15(1) of that directive. Due regard to the principle of proportionality also derives from the Court’s settled case-law to the effect that the protection of the fundamental right to respect for private life at EU level requires that derogations from and limitations on the protection of personal data should apply only in so far as is strictly necessary (judgments of 16 December 2008, Satakunnan Markkinapörssi and Satamedia, C‑73/07, EU:C:2008:727, paragraph 56; of 9 November 2010, Volker und Markus Schecke and Eifert, C‑92/09 and C‑93/09, EU:C:2010:662, paragraph 77; the Digital Rights judgment, paragraph 52, and of 6 October 2015, Schrems, C‑362/14, EU:C:2015:650, paragraph 92). As regards whether national legislation, such as that at issue in Case C‑203/15, satisfies those conditions, it must be observed that that legislation provides for a general and indiscriminate retention of all traffic and location data of all subscribers and registered users relating to all means of electronic communication, and that it imposes on providers of electronic communications services an obligation to retain that data systematically and continuously, with no exceptions. As stated in the order for reference, the categories of data covered by that legislation correspond, in essence, to the data whose retention was required by Directive 2006/24. curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document.jsf?text=&docid=186492&pageIndex=0&doclang=EN&mode=lst&dir=&occ=first&part=1&cid=1088733 12/16