Judgment of the Federal Constitutional Court on automated number plate recognition
| Automated license plate capture | ||||||
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| Negotiated November 20, 2007 | ||||||
| Delivered March 11, 2008 | ||||||
| File numbers: 1 BvR 2074/05 and 1 BvR 1254/07 | ||||||
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| facts | ||||||
| Constitutional complaints against police regulations in Hesse and Schleswig-Holstein, which authorize the automated recording of the license plates of motor vehicles. | ||||||
| tenor | ||||||
| 1. § 14 paragraph 5 of the Hessian law on public safety and order (HSOG) in the version of the announcement of 14 January 2005 (Law and Ordinance Gazette for the State of Hesse, Part I, page 14) is with Article 2 paragraph 1 incompatible and void in connection with Article 1 paragraph 1 of the Basic Law.
2. Section 184 (5) of the General Administrative Act for the State of Schleswig-Holstein (Landesverwaltungsgesetz - LVwG -) in the version of Article 1 number 6 letter b of the Act on the Adaptation of Hazard Prevention Law and Administrative Procedure Laws of 13 April 2007 (Law and Ordinance Gazette for Schleswig-Holstein, page 234) is incompatible with Article 2 paragraph 1 in conjunction with Article 1 paragraph 1 of the Basic Law and is void. |
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| Guiding principles | ||||||
| 1. An automated recording of vehicle registration numbers for the purpose of comparison with the wanted inventory takes effect, if the comparison is not carried out immediately and the registration number is not deleted immediately and without a trace without further evaluation, in the area of protection of the fundamental right to informational self-determination (Art. 2 Para. 1 in Connection with Article 1, Paragraph 1 of the Basic Law). 2. The constitutional requirements on the basis of authorization are based on the weight of the impairment, which is particularly influenced by the type of information recorded, the reason and circumstances of its collection, the group of people concerned and the type of use of the data. |
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| Applied Law | ||||||
| § 14 HSOG , § 184 LVwG SH , Art. 1 and 2 of the Basic Law |
The ruling of the Federal Constitutional Court on the automated recognition of license plates deals with the question of the extent to which the license plates of motor vehicles can be automatically recorded and evaluated in order to avert danger and fight crime.
facts
With their constitutional complaints, the two complainants complained about the violation of their basic right to informational self-determination by the provisions of the Hessian Law on Security and Order (HSOG) and the State Administration Act (LVwG) of the State of Schleswig-Holstein , which allowed the police authorities to automatically record car license plates .
The decision
In its decision, the court dealt extensively with the encroachment on the protected area . It advocated a broad interpretation of the scope of protection. The basic right to informational self-determination must be adapted to technical progress and also include information-related measures of modern data processing. The intervention is already given by the storage of the data, not only when they are used. The judges justified this with the fact that the data were collected for a very specific purpose. The court saw no obstacle in the fact that the recorded information was accessible to the public, since the basic right to informational self-determination at least protected against automated information collection and storage with the possibility of forwarding it to other government agencies. However, the court added that a violation of the fundamental right would not be considered if the data
- "[...] technically again without a trace, anonymously and without the possibility of establishing a personal reference, being sorted out."
If the information obtained is not stored for a longer period of time but is processed immediately for a search , the right to informational self-determination is not affected.
Then the judges turned to the question of the conditions under which justification could be considered. In doing so, they placed particular emphasis on the principle of proportionality and specificity . The problem is the way in which the data is collected - namely in a way that the citizen has no insight into. In addition, the court made it clear that the challenged regulations with regard to the intended use of the data obtained are too broad and explains this
- "Even if it should be possible to eliminate some of the deficits of definiteness through interpretation, the deficiencies, in particular the lack of definiteness of the intended use, cannot be completely cured by a restrictive constitutional interpretation."
When examining the proportionality of the measure, this leads the court to assume a violation of the prohibition of excess, since, among other things, it cannot be ruled out that the challenged provisions may be
- "[...] enable measures that take place without cause or [...] nationwide for the automated recording and analysis of vehicle registration numbers."
As a result, the Federal Constitutional Court followed the complainants' arguments and declared the relevant provisions to be incompatible with the Basic Law and therefore void .
literature
- Hornmann: Unconstitutionality of the authority to automatically compare vehicle license plates in the Hessian police law . In: New journal for administrative law . 2007, ISSN 0721-880X , p. 669.
- Roßnagel: Suspicious automated capture of license plates . In: German car law . 2008, ISSN 0012-1231 , p. 61.
