Privacy Litigation

We support you in the preparation, communication, and targeted cooperation with authorities in order to either completely avoid the imposition of sanctions or, at least, to mitigate them. Proceedings of this kind occur primarily when the authorities investigate possible data protection violations in companies in response to information from those affected or as a result of media reporting. This can also include short-term on-site visits and inspections, for which companies should be prepared. Our public law team specialises in administrative proceedings and, together with our data protection experts, can offer you a one-stop solution to handle these proceedings for your company successfully. We also represent our clients before all administrative courts and have experience from several hundred summary proceedings and lawsuits before German administrative courts.

In addition to administrative proceedings, the supervisory authorities have the option of conducting independent fine proceedings based on data protection violations. German supervisory authorities in particular have already imposed fines in the tens of millions.

We support you in a proactive strategy to manage the successful handling of fine proceedings. Thus, in addition to comprehensive cooperation to avoid or mitigate the imposition of a fine, there is also the possibility of a judicial review and associated possible procedural defence against fines. We have extensive experience in dealing with fine proceedings and can devise tailor-made defence strategies for you. Our lawyers with years of litigation experience can work with you to shape the course of action with regard to alleged data protection breaches.

In addition to administrative and fine proceedings before the authorities, we also advise companies on the increasing number of civil damages proceedings in the area of data protection. Any violation of the GDPR can be a gateway for lawsuits, including, for example, violations of disclosure or deletion obligations or the lack of a justification for processing data relevant to data protection.

So-called mass proceedings quickly form in connection with those issues. In recent years, a specialised litigation industry has developed in Germany. This industry collects a large number of similar cases and uses them in a coordinated manner. This creates a wave of lawsuits that can easily overload companies and law firms. To face this legal and operational challenge, we have Fieldfisher X, a team and technology that can scale our legal expertise to defend against mass litigation. In doing so, we know exactly how the plaintiffs' industry thinks and operates, and how to counter it to achieve a commercially successful outcome for our clients.