Amendments to the German Infection Protection Act interfere with privacy
On 23 March 2020 the Federal Cabinet adopted the Amendments to the Infection Protection Act, as proposed by the Federal Ministry of Health (BMG) which include measures that aim to slow down the infection rate of COVID-19 (‘Coronavirus’) and have an impact on the right to privacy.
The Federal Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information (‘BfDI’), Ulrich Kelber, criticised some of the Amendments as potentially excessive and not proven to be effective. In particular, the BfDI highlights that the Amendments contain extensive record obligations for the transport sector, and also lack the obligation to delete personal data recorded during the health crisis afterwards.
