Court case Az. VI ZR 426/24 – Court Ruling (Germany, 2025)

The data subject is a member of the parliament for the party Die Linke. The controller is a state party described as "right-wing extremist small party". The data subject announced a demonstration against governmental actions at the town’s square and a few days later the controller published a post on Telegram and printed flyers announcing a demonstration at the same place and time and for the same cause as the other demonstration. In their announcement they called for a united demonstration and listed the data subject’s name amongst the names of far-right party leaders. The data subject filed a case before the Regional Court (District Court of Leipzig - LG Leipzig) arguing that his good reputation and credibility as politician had been significantly impaired by the fact that the announcement has wrongly given the impression that he was cooperating with a "right-wing party". He requested an injunctive relief and claimed immaterial damages for the violation of his personality rights and privacy rights, under Article 82 GDPR. The Regional Court awarded him €10,000 in immaterial damages and ordered the controller to delete the post. Following the controller’s appeal before the Court of Appeal (Higher Regional Court of Dresden - OLG Dresden), the court overturned the Regional Court's judgment and dismissed the action. It held that the violation of the right to personality did not reach the degree of relevance required for the granting of a monetary compensation and a claim from Article 82 GDPR was also out of the question because this article is not relevant in the area of political debate. The data subject appealed this judgement before the Federal Court of Justice (BGF) pursuing his claim for monetary compensation. The Federal Court of Justice held that the data subject was not entitled monetary compensation against the controller from any legal point of view. First, it held that the controller did not violate the data subject’s right to personality, under na