Highest Court of Germany Rules Parents Allowed Access to Deceased Daughter’s Account

The parents of a 15-year-old girl that was killed by an underground train in 2012 have earned a landmark victory in Germany’s highest court, the Federal Court of Justice (BGH). The parents asked social media giant Facebook for access to their daughter’s account and messages to determine if her death was an accident or a suicide, but was denied citing that the German constitution, or Basic Law, entitles a person to data privacy even after their death.

The court agreed with the lower-level court ruling that that Facebook data is legally equivalent to private correspondence covered by Germany’s inheritance law and that it was part of the parents’ inheritance.

Facebook only allows relatives of a deceased user to either convert their page into a “memorial” site or entirely delete the page.

The legal questions surrounding a person’s “digital legacy” have previously arisen in the United States, where Apple refused a law enforcement request to unlock an iPhone of a mass shooter in San Bernardino, California.

See Facebook: Court Rules Parents Have Rights to Dead Daughter’s Account, DW.com, July 12, 2018.

Special thanks to Victor Salas (Evening Reference Librarian, Louis L. Biro Law Library, John Marshall Law School) for bringing this article to my attention.