Abstract
The article deals with the legal problems brought about by the developments of the digital age. In the EU, there is a comprehensive legal framework, comprising many directives and regulations, and also the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights is important as the highest legal act, covering many important rights for the digital age (e.g. data protection, right to privacy, judicial rights). The Court of Justice of the EU has an important influence on the development of the field, therefore the most important judgments in this field will be presented. These are C-131/12, Google Spain, on the issue of the “right to be forgotten”, and C-362/14, Schrems, on the transfer of data of Facebook users to the US, and the assessment of the appropriateness of the legal basis at EU level that allows this transfer. Moreover, the case dealing with the issue of the right to request the deletion of comments on Facebook will be sketched (C-18/18, Glawischnig-Piesczek). Based on the analysis of the case law of the Court of Justice of the EU, the impact on the digital age is visible, especially through the emphasized data protection and the right to privacy. In the future, there will also be important questions regarding the role of judges (judge as a human being), as the role of adjudication of cases is already being taken over by various algorithms or robots.
Human rights are not a privilege conferred by government.
They are every human being’s entitlement by virtue of his humanity.
– Mother Teresa
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- 1.
Opinion 1/17 of the CJEU, ECLI:EU:C:2019:341, para 110.
- 2.
See, e.g., Geiger C, ‘“Constitutionalising” Intellectual Property Law? The Influence of Fundamental Rights on Intellectual Property in the European Union’ (2006) International Review of Intellectual Property and Competition Law 371; Helfer L and Austin G, Human Rights and Intellectual Property: Mapping the Global Interface 2011, CUP, Cambridge; Grosheide W (ed) 2009, Intellectual Property Rights and Human Rights: A Paradox, Edward Elgar, Cheltenham.
- 3.
See, e.g. Trstenjak V and Weingerl P, The Influence of Human Rights and Basic Rights in Private Law, Springer, 2016, Cham.
- 4.
For the case law of the ECtHR, see, e.g., the report ‘Internet: case-law of the European Court of Human Rights’ available at https://www.echr.coe.int/Documents/Research_report_internet_ENG.pdf.
- 5.
- 6.
See Case C-489/07, Messner, ECLI:EU:C:2009:502; Joined Cases C-585/08 and C-144/09, Pammer and Hotel Alpenhof, ECLI:EU:C:2010:740.
- 7.
See, e.g., C-324/09, L’Oréal and Others v eBay, ECLI:EU:C:2011:474.
- 8.
See, e.g., C-521/11, Amazon.comInternational Sales and Others, ECLI:EU:C:2013:515; C-58/14, Amazon EU, ECLI:EU:C:2015:385.
- 9.
See, e.g., C-131/12, Google Spain and Google, ECLI:EU:C:2014:317 (Google Spain).
- 10.
See, e.g., C-362/14, Schrems, ECLI:EU:C:2015:650. Currently, there are two pending cases based on the preliminary reference procedure before the CJEU: C-311/18, Facebook Ireland and Schrems, and C-645/19, Facebook Ireland and Others.
- 11.
See also, e.g., C-275/06, Promusicae v Telefónica de España, ECLI:EU:C:2008:54; C-70/10, Scarlet Extended v SABAM, ELCI:EU:C:2011:771; C-510/10, DR, TV2 Danmark AS v NCB—Nordisk Copyright Bureau, ECLI:EU:C:2012:244; C-160/15, GS Media BV v Sanoma Media Netherlands BV, ECLI:EU:C:2016:644; C-149/17, Bastei Lubbe GmbH & Co KG v Strotzer, ECLI:EU:C:2018:841
- 12.
C-320/16, Uber France, ECLI:EU:C:2018:221.
- 13.
There are currently two pending cases before the CJEU: C-723/19, Airbnb Ireland and Airbnb Payments UK and C-390/18, AIRBNB Ireland.
- 14.
Google Spain. See, e.g., Fazlioglu M, ‘Forget Me Not: The Clash of the Right to be Forgotten and Freedom of Expression on the Internet’ (2013) 3 (3) IDPL 149; Padova Y, ‘Is the right to be forgotten a universal, regional, or ‘glocal’ right?’ (2019) 9(1) International Data Privacy Law 15–29.
- 15.
Directive 95/46/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 24 October 1995 on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data OJ L 281, 23.11.1995.
- 16.
Google Spain, para. 100.
- 17.
Summarised decision of the CJEU in this case.
- 18.
Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (General Data Protection Regulation) (Text with EEA relevance) OJ L 119, 4.5.2016.
- 19.
See Gömann M, ‘The new territorial scope of EU data protection law: Deconstructing a revolutionary achievement’ (2017) 54(2) Common Market Law Review 567–590.
- 20.
C-507/17, Google v CNIL, ECLI:EU:C:2019:772.
- 21.
Summarised decision of the CJEU in this case, paras. 70, 72.
- 22.
C-314/12, UPC Telekabel Wien, ECLI:EU:C:2014:192, para. 62, and C-484/14, McFadden, ECLI:EU:C:2016:689, para. 96.
- 23.
Summarised decision of the CJEU in this case, para. 71.
- 24.
C-362/14, Schrems, ECLI:EU:C:2015:650.
- 25.
Commission Decision of 26 July 2000 pursuant to Directive 95/46/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council on the adequacy of the protection provided by the safe harbour privacy principles and related frequently asked questions issued by the US Department of Commerce (notified under document number C(2000) 2441) (Text with EEA relevance.) OJ L 215, 25.8.2000, p. 7–47.
- 26.
See European Commission, 2015, Fact Sheet “Q&A: Guidance on transatlantic data transfers following the Schrems ruling”, available at http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_MEMO-15-6014_en.htm.
- 27.
Commission Implementing Decision (EU) 2016/1250 of 12 July 2016 pursuant to Directive 95/46/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council on the adequacy of the protection provided by the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield (notified under document C(2016) 4176) (Text with EEA relevance) OJ L 207/1, 1.8.2016.
- 28.
C-18/18, Glawischnig-Piesczek, ECLI:EU:C:2019:821.
- 29.
Directive 2000/31/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 8 June 2000 on certain legal aspects of information society services, in particular electronic commerce, in the internal market, OJ 2000 L 178, p. 1.
- 30.
See Jabłonowska A, ‘Monitoring duties of online platform operators before the Court—case C-18/18 Glawischnig-Piesczek’, available at http://recent-ecl.blogspot.com/2019/10/monitoring-duties-of-platform-operators.html. See also Peers S, ‘Facebook’s liability for defamatory posts: the CJEU interprets the e-commerce Directive’, available at http://eulawanalysis.blogspot.com/2019/10/facebooks-liability-for-defamatory.html.
- 31.
See, e.g. Keane Woods A, ‘The CJEU Facebook Ruling: How Bad Is It, Really?’, available at https://www.lawfareblog.com/cjeu-facebook-ruling-how-bad-it-really.
- 32.
See judgment in the case of C-264/14, Skatteverket, ECLI:EU:C:2015:718.
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Trstenjak, V. (2021). Human Rights in the Digital Era: From Digital Practice to Digital Law and Case Law. In: Miller, K., Wendt, K. (eds) The Fourth Industrial Revolution and Its Impact on Ethics. Sustainable Finance. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-57020-0_18
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