50 Euro pain money per spammail?

The fact that spam mails are usually not a good idea for companies should have been talked about by now. The fact that spam mails can be admonished in principle should be clear to most people – let us say those who are comprehensible to the German judiciary. The fact that spam is not limited to email(see this post) and that you are also liable for the actions of a service provider(see this post) can be read here on the blog. No court has yet had to decide whether spammail, which usually triggers a data breach caused by the storage of the e-mail data, can result in pain money. So far. Because the district court Diez now had to deal with the question.

However, the court concludes that it is 50,00 Euro for a spam mail (through an unsolicited newsletter) however appropriate.

Incidentally, the newsletter was one of the most notorious emails from last year, more precisely from 25.05.2018 – when the GDPR became valid. On that day, some lawyer in Germany, possibly drunk from the celebration of the huge revenues due to the creation of data protection declarations, must have advised a large number of companies that because of the GDPR one allegedly new consents for newsletter. A legal view that probably made 99 of the IT lawyers swell on the floor with laughter. However, the applicant took the view that the newsletter sent was inadmissible and, referring to Article 82(1) of the GDPR, claimed at least EUR 500.00 in pain compensation.

The court saw this, fortunately, but differently

 

On the one hand, a serious violation of the right of personality is no longer necessary. On the other hand, it is still not necessary to grant compensation for a minor offence without serious impairment or for any individual inconvenience; on the contrary, the person concerned must have suffered a noticeable disadvantage and it must be concerned with an objectively comprehensible impairment of personal matters with a certain weight […].

However, the district court of Diez considered the already sentenced 50.00 euros to be a given. For the plaintiff, however, the case was nevertheless a loss-making transaction, since he must also bear the costs for the district court of Koblenz, which was initially seised.

Author: Marian Härtel

Marian Härtel ist Rechtsanwalt und Fachanwalt für IT-Recht mit einer über 25-jährigen Erfahrung als Unternehmer und Berater in den Bereichen Games, E-Sport, Blockchain, SaaS und Künstliche Intelligenz. Seine Beratungsschwerpunkte umfassen neben dem IT-Recht insbesondere das Urheberrecht, Medienrecht sowie Wettbewerbsrecht. Er betreut schwerpunktmäßig Start-ups, Agenturen und Influencer, die er in strategischen Fragen, komplexen Vertragsangelegenheiten sowie bei Investitionsprojekten begleitet. Dabei zeichnet sich seine Beratung durch einen interdisziplinären Ansatz aus, der juristische Expertise und langjährige unternehmerische Erfahrung miteinander verbindet. Ziel seiner Tätigkeit ist stets, Mandanten praxisorientierte Lösungen anzubieten und rechtlich fundierte Unterstützung bei der Umsetzung innovativer Geschäftsmodelle zu gewährleisten.