IT service provider DATEV experienced a significant data breach in connection with its LODAS payroll accounting system. On January 8, a technical malfunction in the data center meant that trial payroll calculations could not be sent back to the respective clients as planned. The following day, DATEV implemented a temporary solution to ensure the return of the outstanding documents. However, this technical workaround caused a serious allocation error: instead of sending the documents to the rightful clients, the sensitive documents were displayed to other clients. The misdirected documents w…

In its ruling of 28 November 2025 (2x W 74/25), the Schleswig-Holstein Higher Regional Court further clarified the limits of the registry court's powers of review when submitting lists of shareholders in accordance with Sec. 40 subsec. 1 of the German Limited Liability Companies Act (GmbHG). The proceedings were initiated by the submission of a list of shareholders signed by the managing director by a notary to the commercial register of the Flensburg Local Court. The background to the list was the redemption of shares held by a shareholder. The competent registry court made the inclusion of t…

Background With the aim of increasing comparability, transparency, and coherence in financial reporting, the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) published a new standard, IFRS 18 “Presentation and Disclosure in Financial Statements”, on 9 April 2024. IFRS 18 is intended to replace IAS 1 “Presentation of Financial Statements” and introduces a new structure for the presentation of the statement of profit or loss, which constitutes one of the key changes introduced by the new standard. Although IFRS 18 has not yet been adopted into European law, EFRAG already issued an endorsement …

In its ruling of October 14, 2025, ref. VI ZR 431/24, the Federal Court of Justice made a landmark decision on the admissibility under data protection law of the transfer of so-called positive data by telecommunications companies to SCHUFA. Positive data in this sense refers to master data and contract information without negative payment experiences. Background to the proceedings A consumer association wanted to prohibit the transmission of all positive data. The defendant, a telecommunications company, transferred its customers' master data and information on the conclusion and termina…

In its ruling (42 O 14139/24 of November 11, 2025), the Munich I Regional Court decided that the use of song lyrics by the AI language model ChatGPT infringes on the exploitation rights of the authors if the developer of the application does not have a license. The lawsuit was brought by the Society for Gesellschaft für musikalische Aufführungs- und mechanische Vervielfältigungsrechte (GEMA) against ChatGPT operator OpenAI. As a collecting society, GEMA manages the rights of members and rights holders (including music publishers, songwriters, and composers). In the lawsuit before the Mun…