The Network Enforcement Act has been a thorn in the side of platform companies since it came into force in autumn 2017.

Now Youtube or the European headquarters of the parent company Google in Ireland (Google Ireland Limited) has filed a declaratory action against the law before the Cologne Administrative Court and has declared urgency (Az. 6 L 1277/21 and 6 K 3769/21).

Michael Hanfeld

responsible editor for features online and "media".

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Youtube opposes the obligation to automatically pass on user data to the Federal Criminal Police Office in potentially criminal cases. "For us, the protection of our users' data is a central concern," writes Sabine Frank, Head of Government Affairs and Public Policy for German-speaking countries and Central and Eastern Europe from YouTube, on the group's corporate blog. "We have therefore decided to have the relevant obligations of the legislative package examined by the Cologne Administrative Court as part of a declaratory action."

The lawsuit is directed against an amendment that the Federal Government and Bundestag only added to the Network Enforcement Act last April and which will only come into force on February 1 of the coming year. After the "Law to Combat Right-Wing Extremism and Hate Crime", a new paragraph 3a is added to the Network Enforcement Act. According to this, platform groups are obliged to report certain criminal content to the Federal Criminal Police Office so that it can initiate criminal prosecution. These include threats of murder and rape, sedition, child pornography and serious hate crimes. Such content should not only be deleted as quickly as possible - in the case of serious facts within twenty-four hours,as provided by the Network Enforcement Act from the start. Law enforcement should become more effective.

Victims' associations criticized the lack of clear reporting forms for such offenses. Josephine Ballon from the organization HateAid, which advises victims of hate crime, pointed out in the course of the legal advice that the digital corporations clearly illustrated how users can report content that they believe violates the “community rules” of the respective network. Reporting content that users have the impression of violating the Network Enforcement Act has turned out to be more difficult (anyone who has tried it will be able to confirm that). "Reporting channels for criminal content must be easy to find and easy to use," said Federal Justice Minister Christine Lambrecht (SPD) in April of the law extension."Anyone who wants to defend themselves against hate postings in court can now request the necessary data, such as the name of the agitator, from the platforms much more easily."

Notification and prosecution

The amendment to the Network Enforcement Act therefore stipulates that reporting procedures must be presented to users clearly and simply - and in certain cases not only need to be deleted, but the BKA is automatically informed of the content and deletion and the IP address of the person who publishes the content in question Has. The BKA decides on criminal prosecution, requests further data on potential criminals and forwards them to the responsible investigative authorities of the federal states - or, if the assessment is different, not either. Those affected will be informed of this process by the BKA or the platforms. The Federal Criminal Police Office can already act in this way, but now YouTube and others should inform the BKA in all cases in question in advance.