Google and Facebook can rely on German administrative courts: On Tuesday, the administrative court in Cologne dismissed two urgent applications from Google Ireland Ltd.

and the Facebook parent company Meta Platforms Ireland Ltd.

against the Network Enforcement Act partially granted.

Central provisions of the amended law are “inapplicable due to violations of Union law provisions” (Ref.: 6 L 1277/21 and 6 L 1354/21).

Michael Hanfeld

responsible editor for feuilleton online and "media".

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What is meant is the condition implemented in the Network Enforcement Act in 2020 with the “Act Against Right-Wing Extremism and Hate Crime” that Google, Facebook and other platforms must transmit the data of suspected criminals to the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA).

The Federal Government wanted to make the criminal prosecution of criminals more effective and accelerate it.

The "Central Reporting Office for Criminal Content on the Internet" with around 200 employees was set up specifically for this purpose at the Federal Criminal Police Office.

Google and Facebook do not have to pass on any data to you for the time being.

In Ireland, the corporations are in a safe haven

The Cologne Administrative Court found that Section 3a of the Network Enforcement Act violated the so-called country of origin principle.

This can be found in the EU's E-Commerce Directive, which was passed twenty-two years ago.

It states that providers of electronic services must comply with the legal requirements of the EU country in which they are based.

In the case of Google and Facebook, that is Ireland.

There are no regulations as formulated in the Network Enforcement Act.

The corporations do not have to report criminal content in Ireland, hardly care about data protection and only pay minimal taxes.

The EU's new digital law, the "Digital Services Act", which is still being voted on, is intended to put an end to this situation.

The judgment of the Cologne administrative judges comes just in time for Google and Facebook.

According to the Administrative Court of Cologne, the federal government cannot invoke a particular urgency or an exception to the consultation and information procedure required for such laws in the EU to date.

Google was also successful in a second point.

Paragraph 4a of the Network Enforcement Act designates the authority that is responsible for the legal supervision of the network groups.

According to the administrative judges, this must be set up "remotely from the state", and this is clearly not the case with the Federal Office of Justice commissioned by the Federal Government.

Facebook had no success with its complaint against the so-called counter-presentation procedure.

This states that platforms must review their deletion decisions at the request of affected users.

The procedure is legal

The parties to the dispute can lodge an appeal against the decision, for which the Münster Higher Administrative Court would then have jurisdiction.

Until this possible negotiation, Google and Facebook and other platforms are exempt from the obligation to report criminal content.

They have to delete criminal content, but do not report the suspected perpetrators to the BKA.