CyberLaw Blog

Archive for the ‘Germany’ Category

The Canadian Press: German government says it will delete website featuring child pornography

By The Associated Press – 06.04.2011

BERLIN — Germany’s governing coalition says it will delete websites that feature child pornography, dropping a plan to attempt to block such sites.

The plan to block child porn sites was drawn up in 2009 by Chancellor Angela Merkel’s first-term ‘grand coalition’ of right and left but never took effect.

Critics including the junior partners in the current government, the Free Democrats, argued that blocking the sites was ineffectual and raised concerns over Internet censorship.

Coalition leaders on Tuesday night agreed to change the government’s approach.

Justice Minister Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger told Bavarian radio Wednesday that ‘blocking on the Internet is something that rightly causes rejection and distrust.’

She says deleting child porn sites is the ‘correct and effective’ approach.”

(Via .)

German law on Internet blocking challenged in Constitutional Court | EDRI

23 February, 2011

On 22 February 2011 the German Working Group against Internet Blocking and Censorship (AK Zensur) submitted their complaint against the German law on Internet blocking to Germany’s Constitutional Court. The law is directed against online child abuse material and had come into force on 23 February 2010, setting a one-year deadline for the complaint.

AK Zensur and many others had fiercely opposed the law and announced that a complaint would be filed when the law was enacted by Parliament in June 2009. An online petition against the law collected 134 000 signatures in May and June, the highest number ever achieved at the German Parliament’s online petitions system. A curious situation emerged when the government changed after the elections in September 2009, taking the liberal party FDP into power in a coalition with the conservative CDU/CSU. The FDP had opposed the blocking law in their election campaign, and before the law came into force, it was agreed that it would not be fully implemented. In a legally dubious move, a ‘non-application directive’ by the Interior minister stipulated that initially, only take-down was to be attempted, and the governing parties agreed that a review would be held about a year later.

This created something of a legal absurdity as the consequences of the law are not fully felt at the moment when the deadline to complain is expiring. But AK Zensur and its lawyers are confident that even now, many aspects of the law are in clear violation of the German Constitution, and several experts had voiced similar concerns at a parliamentary hearing before the law was enacted. While political support for the ill-fated law has widely diminished, the governing parties have not found the will to abolish it in a new Parliamentary act. AK Zensur is hopeful that with its complaint, it will be able to do the politicians’ homework for them. A website collecting signatures to support the complaint in the political debate will be started soon.

German press release: German Free Speech Working Party issues constitutional complaint against censorship law (only in German, 23.02.2011)

http://ak-zensur.de/2011/02/verfassungsbeschwerde.html

German Free Speech Working Party issues constitutional complaint against censorship law (23.02.2011)

http://ak-zensur.de/2011/02/constitutional-complaint.html

EDRi-gram: Germany’s President signs an Internet bill against his own government (24.02.2010)

http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number8.4/german-president-adopts-interne…

(Contribution by Sebastian Lisken)

German Porn Producer Files 670 New BitTorrent Lawsuits: “There’s a secret war against alleged BitTorrent infringers going on that’s beginning to compare in scope with the USCG lawsuits. This pursuit, however, doesn’t focus on independent or artsy fartsy movies – these lawsuits are focused on adult movies allegedly shared via the BitTorrent protocol. Filed in US District Court in Dallas, 670 John Doe lawsuits were filed by Evan Stone on behalf of Mick Haig Productions, who own the copyright to the adult German film Der Gute Onkel.”

(Via Slyck.com File-Sharing News And Information.)

Pirate Bay resurfaces after German legal depth-charge: “

Chortling freetards flaunt buttocks at scurvy law-dogs

The Pirate Bay file tracking site is currently offline – apparently forced to close by a German court injunction filed last week.…

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(Via The Register – Public Sector.)

Google Street View whacked by German prosecutors, Czech data watchdog: “

Wi-Fi slurping spycars scrutinised in Europe

Google came under increased fire in Europe yesterday, after German prosecutors and the Czech data protection agency launched separate investigations into the company’s interception of private Wi-Fi data.…

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(Via The Register – Public Sector.)

Germany Asks Google to Surrender Private Data: “The demand by a German regulator increased pressure on the company over its collection of private data from unsecured home wireless networks.

(Via NYT > Technology.)

German court rejects police data snooping store: “

Leaves Euro spooks in limbo

Germany’s High Court has told police and secret services that they must stop storing email and telephone data and delete information already collected.…

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(Via The Register – Public Sector.)

DE – New Internet Legislation Embarrasses German Government: “(Der Spiegel)
A new bill to fight child pornography has been signed into law by Germany’s president. There’s only one problem: The government has decided it no longer wants it. They are now in the awkward position of relying on opposition help to repeal the legislation. It was supposed to be an initiative to stop child pornography on the Internet. But now the German government finds itself in a uniquely awkward situation after a bill which it no longer wanted was signed into law by the country’s president. German President Horst Köhler signed the law after deciding that there were ‘no significant concerns’ regarding the law’s compatibility with the German constitution. The Access Impediment Law, as it is known, is aimed at combating child pornography and allows access to offensive Web sites to be blocked.
However the German coalition government, which pairs Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives with the business-friendly Free Democratic Party, has decided it no longer wants the law, which was massively opposed by Internet users. Instead of blocking access to Web sites, it now wants to delete offensive Internet content instead.

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(Via QuickLinks Update.)

German court finds parent liable for child’s file-sharing: “

Someone’s going straight to bed

Parents can be legally responsible for the unlawful behaviour of their children using home internet connections, a German court has ruled. It said that a woman had a duty to monitor the use to which her internet connection was put.…

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(Via The Register – Public Sector.)

German court finds parent liable for child’s file-sharing: “Parents can be legally responsible for the unlawful behaviour of their children using home internet connections, a German court has ruled. It said that a woman had a duty to monitor the use to which her internet connection was put.”

(Via OUT-LAW News.)