A review set up to investigate PSNI snooping operations has received around 50 responses.
The McCullough Review was established last year after it emerged that police has been spying on journalists.
The review, headed by London based barrister Angus McCullough KC, is focused on journalists, lawyers and non-governmental organisations, while the Policing Board and Police Ombudsman also fall under its terms of reference.
In a report to the policing board last year the PSNI admitted making 823 applications for communications data for journalists and lawyers over a 13-year period from 2011-2024.
It later emerged that more than 4,000 phone communications between 12 journalists were monitored by police over a three-month period.
In a progress report published on Tuesday Mr McCullough confirmed that his review has received “about 50 responses from a wide variety of individuals and on behalf of two organisations”.
Mr McCullough said around 80 percent of responses, around 40 in total, have been from journalists and lawyers.
A “small number of responses”, around five, “relate largely or entirely to matters outside” his terms of reference, the barrister said.
Mr McCullough said that chief constable Jon Boutcher, who ordered the review, “has been proactive in ensuring that we have full and unrestricted access to PSNI personnel and materials”.
He also said that his work is also “considering the possibility of surveillance that is not, or not properly, recorded on PSNI systems”.
Mr McCullough’s report comes just days after it emerged that the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee at Westminster will investigate the extent of PSNI spying when it launches an inquiry into press freedom next month.
Details of the probe emerged weeks after the Investigatory Powers Tribunal (IPT) found the PSNI and Metropolitan Police approved a snooping operation against investigative journalists Barry McCaffrey and Trevor Birney.
The London-based tribunal looks at complaints from people who believe they have been the victim of unlawful covert interference.
The IPT examined allegations that the journalists were subjected to unlawful surveillance by the PSNI over their 2017 film about the 1994 Loughinisland atrocity.
Six Catholic men were shot dead in the UVF attack, which was later found to involve collusion.
