Image rights and photo rights – horak Attorneys at Law, Germany

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Image rights and photo rights - horak Attorneys at Law, Germany

The right to one’s own image protects the depicted person as part of personality rights. Taking a photograph and publishing it require separate assessment. The photographer may also hold copyright in an original photographic work or a related right in a photograph. Protection terms and requirements differ; section 68 UrhG excludes related-right protection for reproductions of public-domain visual works. Lawful creation of an image does not automatically authorise its use in advertising.

The applicable rights depend on the image, its subject and the intended use. Please contact us for advice on the particular situation.

Where is regulated the Image and Photo Right?

Relevant rules include sections 22 and 23 KUG, general personality rights and, where applicable, the GDPR and supplementary data-protection law. Section 201a StGB concerns certain unlawful image recordings; section 202a instead concerns unlawful access to data.

What does it protect?

The right to one’s own image protects the depicted person. Section 22 KUG generally requires consent for distribution or public display. Payment for being depicted may create a presumption of consent; it does not mean that anyone who objects automatically receives remuneration. The scope of consent must be assessed. For ten years after death, consent is generally required from the surviving spouse or registered partner and children, or, if none exist, the parents. Section 23 exceptions and applicable data-protection law remain relevant. Taking an image may itself infringe personality, privacy or criminal-law protections.

Consent not required.

Section 23 KUG permits specified uses without consent, including images relating to contemporary history, persons appearing merely as incidental features of a location, images of assemblies or comparable events, and certain non-commissioned images serving a higher artistic interest. These exceptions are subject to the legitimate interests of the depicted person or, after death, their relatives. They are not blanket permission to publish every image of a public figure or event participant.

Further topics regarding image and photo rights: