BGH decision: Facebook must inform before deletion

If Facebook wants to delete a user’s post and block their account, the network must inform them of this and give them the opportunity to comment. That was decided by the Federal Court of Justice.

The Federal Court of Justice (BGH) has declared Facebook’s general terms and conditions for deleting posts and blocking users to be ineffective. The third civil senate of the BGH justified this with the lack of hearing rights of the users concerned.

From the company’s point of view, two Facebook users had made derogatory comments about Muslims and immigrants. Your posts have been removed for violating Facebook standards, and your user accounts have been temporarily blocked. The two then went to court. Since they were unsuccessful in their appeal to the Nuremberg Higher Regional Court, they appealed to the BGH.

This overturned the judgments of the OLG and changed them: Facebook must reactivate both posts. It is not allowed to block the plaintiff again because of this. The terms and conditions were ineffective because Facebook did not commit itself to informing those affected and they had no opportunity to comment before the account was blocked, it said. The regulations unreasonably disadvantaged users.