{"id":2015,"date":"2022-05-17T09:54:16","date_gmt":"2022-05-17T07:54:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cms.elsc.support\/?p=2015"},"modified":"2024-03-21T17:29:22","modified_gmt":"2024-03-21T16:29:22","slug":"german-court-rules-in-favour-of-scholar-dr-anna-younes-in-digital-surveillance-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/nl\/german-court-rules-in-favour-of-scholar-dr-anna-younes-in-digital-surveillance-case\/","title":{"rendered":"German Court Rules in Favour of Scholar Dr. Anna Younes in Digital Surveillance Case"},"content":{"rendered":"

European Legal Support Center (ELSC), Amsterdam and Berlin, May 17, 2022<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

On 6 May 2022, the Berlin District Court upheld Dr. Younes\u2019 claims and ordered VDK \u2013 the German state-funded organisation that legally represents RIAS Berlin and MBR \u2013 to give Anna Younes access to data that the two civil society organisations had gathered on her and passed on to others. The information released so far reveals that RIAS and MBR have been collecting people\u2019s personal data based on their \u201cpositions on Israel and BDS.\u201d<\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In November 2019, RIAS and MBR created a secret dossier<\/a> which depicted Dr. Younes as an anti-Jewish racist, terrorist sympathiser and sexist. The dossier was then sent to Katina Schubert, the head of the political party Die Linke\/The Left<\/em> in Berlin. This resulted in Dr. Younes\u2019 exclusion<\/a> from a public event organised by the party. This conduct infringed upon Dr. Younes\u2019 right to privacy, freedom of expression, and academic freedom. RIAS\/MBR\u2019s actions amount to digital surveillance<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In March 2020, Dr. Younes, with the support of her lawyer and the ELSC, requested RIAS provide access to her personal data, based on data rights under EU Data Protection Law. RIAS\/MBR refused. Therefore, she brought her case to the Berlin Data Protection Authority (DPA), and then to court. Additionally, she had to file two lawsuits at the beginning of April 2022, due to the non-processing of her case by the DPA.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, it was only after a public media campaign was launched and more than 1,000 scholars, organisations, artists, journalists and activists supported<\/a> her, that the DPA finally acknowledged Dr. Younes\u2019 right to access her data. On 2 May 2022, RIAS\/MBR withdrew their original position that Dr. Younes had no right to access her data, released the secret dossier previously disseminated and finally acknowledged the merits of her claim. A few days later, the court also handed down its decision in favour of Dr. Younes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Most importantly, RIAS\/MBR admitted to collecting data on, \u201cDr. Younes\u2019 positions on Israel and the BDS movement.\u201d The latter is a classification that most likely derives from MBR\/RIAS\u2019 use of the contested \u201cIHRA Working Definition of Antisemitism\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr. Anna Younes and the ELSC welcome the decision of the District Court and the reconciliatory reaction of the DPA. The ELSC expects the DPA to acknowledge that RIAS and MBR illegally passed the secret dossier on to Katina Schubert, which led to a violation of Dr. Younes\u2019 privacy rights – amongst other things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Following this victory, Dr. Younes and her lawyer will request damages in court as RIAS\/MBR prevented her from accessing her information for approximately two years. It also remains to be clarified whether RIAS and MBR have been storing further data other than those revealed in the disseminated dossier. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is an important victory because organisations using the IHRA definition for the surveillance of Palestinian rights advocates will be required to provide access to the information they collect on individuals. We believe that this is not an isolated case and that there is a structural issue of profiling Palestinians and Palestinian rights advocates in Germany. This is what we intend to challenge further in court. This demeanour creates a chilling effect and limits democratic participation in public debate<\/em>.\u201d – Giovanni Fassina, Director of the ELSC.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read more<\/a> about the case and watch <\/strong>this video<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read and sign<\/a> the support letter<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Donate<\/a> to support the case<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Listen<\/a> to the podcast featuring Dr Younes, Inna Michaeli and Alice Garcia (Advocacy and Communications Manager at ELSC)<\/strong><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On 6 May 2022, the Berlin District Court upheld Dr. Younes\u2019 claims and ordered VDK \u2013 the German state-funded organisation that legally represents RIAS Berlin and MBR \u2013 to give Anna Younes access to data that the two civil society organisations had gathered on her and passed on to others. The information released so far reveals that RIAS and MBR have been collecting people\u2019s personal data based on their \u201cpositions on Israel and BDS.\u201d <\/p>","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":2019,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","_kadence_starter_templates_imported_post":false,"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,55],"tags":[101,51,48,104],"test-2":[],"country":[25],"blog_categories":[],"class_list":["post-2015","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-case-update","category-press-release","tag-academic-freedom","tag-bds","tag-freedom-of-expression","tag-smear-campaign","country-de"],"acf":[],"taxonomy_info":{"category":[{"value":3,"label":"Case Update"},{"value":55,"label":"Press Release"}],"post_tag":[{"value":101,"label":"Academic freedom"},{"value":51,"label":"BDS"},{"value":48,"label":"Free Speech"},{"value":104,"label":"smear campaign"}],"country":[{"value":25,"label":"Germany"}]},"featured_image_src_large":["https:\/\/elsc.support\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/05\/PR-visual-1024x440.png",1024,440,true],"author_info":{"display_name":"Bashar","author_link":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/nl\/author\/bashar\/"},"comment_info":0,"category_info":[{"term_id":3,"name":"Case Update","slug":"case-update","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":3,"taxonomy":"category","description":"Updates on legal cases ELSC is working on.","parent":0,"count":33,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":3,"category_count":33,"category_description":"Updates on legal cases ELSC is working on.","cat_name":"Case Update","category_nicename":"case-update","category_parent":0},{"term_id":55,"name":"Press Release","slug":"press-release","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":55,"taxonomy":"category","description":"Official updates shared with media or public.","parent":0,"count":77,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":55,"category_count":77,"category_description":"Official updates shared with media or public.","cat_name":"Press Release","category_nicename":"press-release","category_parent":0}],"tag_info":[{"term_id":101,"name":"Academic freedom","slug":"academic-freedom","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":101,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"Academic freedom under threat","parent":0,"count":30,"filter":"raw"},{"term_id":51,"name":"BDS","slug":"bds","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":51,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions campaign","parent":0,"count":41,"filter":"raw"},{"term_id":48,"name":"Free Speech","slug":"freedom-of-expression","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":48,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"Relates to censorship and academic freedom","parent":0,"count":89,"filter":"raw"},{"term_id":104,"name":"smear campaign","slug":"smear-campaign","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":104,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":4,"filter":"raw"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2015","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2015"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2015\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3280,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2015\/revisions\/3280"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2019"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2015"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2015"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2015"},{"taxonomy":"test-2","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/test-2?post=2015"},{"taxonomy":"country","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/country?post=2015"},{"taxonomy":"blog_categories","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/blog_categories?post=2015"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}