The Federal constitutional court occurs when car registration adjustment on the brake, and thus where surveillance technology and police attack powers.
comment by Wolfgang Janisch, Karlsruhe Wolfgang Janisch
On the question of what profession he wanted to take, Wolfgang Janisch during his law studies, a standard answer: criminal defense attorney. Really seriously that was meant, and today he is glad it came to nothing, although he keeps the Job for one of the most important in the rule of law. So instead journalism: After various stations in regional Newspapers (Mainzer Rhein-Zeitung, Südwest Presse), and the FAZ, as well as a legal Promotion, with a one-year study stay in the USA, he went, in 1997, as a justice, a political correspondent for the German press Agency to Karlsruhe. Jura from the other side, as an observer of the Federal constitutional court and the Federal court of justice. Since 2010, reports and comments for the SZ. In the meantime, he also writes about the European courts; the location – Karlsruhe, Germany – has remained the same.
The constitutional court objected to the powers of some of the countries in the case of the automated license plate control. At first glance, this follows a well-known scheme: Karlsruhe has trimmed safety laws to the extent of the basic law, and, time after Time, the legislators have been testing the boundaries again – and often exceeded. So is it now with the car numbers-Scan in Bavaria, Baden-Württemberg and Hesse. And so it will be sometime in the new police laws, which are now being tightened in many States.
The constitutional value of the decisions is much greater. The court granted an order to all Try for a cancellation, to install using a constantly refined technology is a sprawling infrastructure of the Monitoring. Yes, it is still allowed, indicator with automated procedures and databases to match, but only for specified purposes.
anyone Who wants to activate the electronic eye at the roadside, a concrete occasion, the prevention of a danger. This can also be the usual phenomena of a local Derby in the Bundesliga. And probably also controls of Diesel-driving bans. The hurdle is not too high, because the car number is not a intimate Information. It is important, however: automated rasterizing of all motorists at random places at any time is not permitted.
The constitutional court corrected its own error, from the year 2008, when it had classified the mark the control as not even a fundamental right relevant, if not deleted hit immediately. Now it occurs on the brake, and where monitoring technology, but also the police powers to grab. Because it is not only car numbers; by the face detection of up to the RFID-Chips are the ways to search with the electronic Grid, the needle in the haystack exponentiation.
Certainly, this won’t hurt, if a picture is chased briefly by the memory, and then immediately is deleted. But if the people are everywhere and filmed at any time, scanned and rasterized, then a feeling of being watched, the freedom and individuality do not thrive. It was high time that the Federal constitutional court intervenes.