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Stop das press! No more surreptitious state surveillance

By Jeremy

The IPKat's amiable and scholarly friend Dr Guido Westkamp (pictured right, together with his highly-trained news hound) has just written to inform him as follows:

"Today the German Constitutional Court decided that the state may not engage in surreptitious surveillance of information technology systems. The case, a constitutional complaint against a law permitting such surveillance by intelligence services, was decided on the basis of a new human right in the confidentiality and integrity of information technology systems. The court emphasises that this right, which applies where other fundamental rights affecting privacy are inapplicable (such as the rights in confidentiality of telecommunication communications or the right to inviolability of ones home), is derived from the fundamental rights in personal dignity and personality rights under the constitution. The right can only be restricted where significant higher ranking fundamental values need be protected, such as the life and integrity of others (that is, as a means to prevent acts of terrorism provided there are sufficient reason to believe that surveillance will the state to prevent such acts, but only if the surveillance measure is permitted by a judge on a case by case basis).

The decision may have a dramatic impact in relation to the constitutionality of protected rights management information systems deemed to protect copyright. Where a supplier of copyright works manipulates data stored on a customers computer, or where personal data are being collected in order to allow the right holder to trace the use of works supplied online, it appears that if the customer can invoke the new right there is little left to argue for right holders that such means are necessary to protect copyright. It seems most unlikely that the protection of copyright can serve as a basis for higher ranking interests that would provide a legitimate purpose for justifying such intrusion. I incidentally wonder what would happen if the German Constitutional Court would find the DRM provisions under copyright unconstitutional and thereby void, given that it is derived both from the WCT and the Information Society Directive".

The link to the decision is here. The IPKat imagines that this decision may have repercussions for more than copyright management systems, since it may come into conflict with scenarios in which, on the face of it, IP Enforcement Directive 2004/48 would contemplate the disclosure of infringement-sensitive materials held by internet service providers and regular database holders. Merpel sniffs, surely it would be a good idea if matters of this sort -- given their fundamental nature -- were resolved by the Commission and by pan-European legislation before they arose, rather than by national courts after they arose ...

Full post as published by IPKat on February 27, 2008 (boomark / email).