Privacy and data protection legal rulings in Europe

Legal developments in Switzerland and Germany have recently clarified the boundaries of privacy and data protection rights.

In Switzerland, the Federal Supreme Court established that the accuracy of press releases must be evaluated based on information available at the time of publication. The court also noted that anonymization requirements for criminal proceedings are not absolute for individuals of public interest during extraordinary events. In Germany, the Bavarian State Office for Data Protection Supervision ruled that the right to erasure under the GDPR does not apply to commercial register systems, which prioritize transparency and evidentiary functions.

Further rulings in Germany have reinforced protections for spoken words. The Federal Court of Justice determined that secret audio recordings of police officers are criminally liable, as professional contexts do not strip verbal statements of their non-public character. Additionally, the District Court of Bochum ruled that unauthorized recording and distribution of audio from a private livestream violates the general right of personality, classifying such limited-participant streams as private settings rather than public forums.