Bundesgerichtshof; 2019-09-24; Facebook; BGH VI ZB 39/18
Decision by national courts in the field of European Union law — ECLI:DE:BGH:2019:240919BVIZB39.18.0
Date: 2019-09-24
Subject matter: Judicial cooperation in civil matters
Origin: Germany

82019DE0924(51)_ENG_SUMJURE
JURE summary
JURE summary
A private person living in Germany (hereinafter ‘the plaintiff’) filed an action against the operator of the internet site www.facebook.com and the Facebook-Messenger service domiciled within the EU but outside of Germany (hereinafter ‘the defendant’) demanding to be provided information about the stored inventory data.
Several text and voice messages with abusive and offensive content were sent to friends and family members of the plaintiff through Messenger under the user names S.K., Z.K. and S.J. registered on Facebook.
The Landgericht Frankfurt am Main dismissed the application.
The appeal of the defendant lodged with the Oberlandesgericht Frankfurt am Main (hereinafter ‘the Court of Appeal’) was dismissed too. The plaintiff was not entitled to be provided with any information as Article 14(3) of the TMG (1) in connection with Article § 1(3) of the NetzDG (2) were not applicable in this case. The Messenger service of the defendant did not represent a social network and was only a service for individual communication, and therefore not subject to the NetzDG. In addition, it was also not clear whether any entitlement to receive information from the defendant could be derived from Article 242 BGB (3).
The revision filed by the plaintiff with the Bundesgerichtshof (hereinafter ‘the Supreme Court’) was successful.
The Court of Appeal was correct to establish the international jurisdiction of the German courts due to the fact that the defendant entered an appearance in proceedings under Article 26(1)(1) of the Brussels I Regulation (recast) (4).
Approval proceedings under Article 14(3-5) of the TMG represent a civil matter within the meaning of Article 1(1) of the Brussels I Regulation (recast).
The provision of TMG regarding the protection of personal data also applied to Messenger. Article 14(3-5) of the TMG represented a law under Article 6(4) of the Regulation (EU) 2016/679 (5) serving to the assertion of civil claims. In a democratic society, such information was necessary, as without this information about the data of a person violating the fundamental rights protected by law, the prosecution of the wrongdoer and enforcement of the respective claims would have been impossible.
Contrary to the opinion of the Court of Appeal, the law was not limited only to social networks under NetzDG but applied to all service providers within the meaning of Article 2(1) of the TMG.
The Supreme Court annulled the decision of the Court of Appeal and referred the case back for a new hearing and decision to the Court of Appeal.
(1) Telemediengesetz (Telemedia Act).
(2) Gesetz zur Verbesserung der Rechtsdurchsetzung in sozialen Netzwerken (Network Enforcement Act).
(3) Bürgerliches Gesetzbuch (Civil code).
(4) Regulation (EU) No 1215/2012 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 12 December 2012 on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters.
(5) Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (General Data Protection Regulation).