Court case 11 Sa 808/23 – Court Ruling (Germany, 2024)

The data subject, a job seeker with over ten years of experience in debt and accounts management, applied twice for a position at a housing company (the controller) on 3 August 2022 and 3 December 2022. The controller did not respond to either application. On 18 May 2023, the data subject requested access to his personal data under Article 15 GDPR. After receiving no response, he sent reminders on 3 June 2023 and 18 June 2023, with deadlines of 17 June 2023 and 28 June 2023. The controller still did not respond. The data subject then filed a lawsuit at the Labour Court Düsseldorf ("Arbeitsgericht Düsseldorf - AG Düsseldorf") seeking a copy of his data, information on all the recipients to whom his personal data was disclosed to, and €5,000 in non-material damages. The first instance court ruled partially in favour of the data subject, granting the access request but denying the claim for non-material damages. The court held that a violation of Article 15(1) GDPR always means a loss of control and cannot be considered as the damage itself. Therefore, the court found that the data subject did not demonstrate any non-material damage entitling him to compensation. The data subject then appealed this decision at the Regional Labour Court Düsseldorf ("Landesarbeitsgericht Düsseldorf - LAG Düsseldorf"), adjusting his claim to €2,500 in non-material damages. First, the court held that the controller violated Article 15 GDPR in conjunction with Article 12(3) GDPR by not providing information on the data subject's personal data, its processing purposes, and the recipients of the personal data to the data subject after repeated requests. Second, the court determined whether the violation under Article 15 GDPR gave rise to a claim for compensation for material and non-material damage under Article 82(1) GDPR. The court held that Article 82(1) GDPR should not be interpreted too narrow. The court took into account that some case law take the view that violations under Artic