Right to be Forgotten I · 1 BvR 16/13
German Federal Constitutional Court · 6 November 2019
A man had served his sentence for crimes committed decades earlier. A magazine had reported them accurately at the time. Once its archive was searchable online, typing his name brought those old reports back to the surface. A person meeting him for the first time could encounter that part of his life before learning anything else about him.
Why time changed the balance
The constitutional judges found that the civil court had given too little weight to the claimant’s interest in being able to move on. They set aside its decision and sent the case back. The publisher’s press freedom and the public value of an intact archive also mattered. The court examined the possibility of limiting discovery through a name search while keeping the report available as a historical source.
Describe how the material is being found
An old article, an inaccurate article and a prominent search result raise different questions. Save the precise URL, search terms, date and results as displayed. Identify any continuing public interest and the particular impact of being found by name. The ruling required a fresh balancing of those interests. It gave no general entitlement to remove truthful reporting after a fixed number of years.
Read the Federal Constitutional Court’s decision
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