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In a ruling of 27 February 2007, the Bundesverfassungsgericht (Federal Constitutional Court - BVerfG) strengthened the freedom of the press and the protection of sources, as enshrined in Art. 5.1.2 of the Grundgesetz (Basic Law - GG). In their decision, the judges declared that both a search of the editorial offices of political magazine Cicero, and the confiscation of computer data in September 2005 were actions that were unconstitutional. These actions were taken following the publication of an article by a freelance journalist concerning the terrorist Abu Mussab al Sarkawi in April 2005. In...

The sale of the majority of the shares in German television company ProSiebenSat.1 Media AG to Lavena Holding 4 GmbH, an investment company controlled by equity funds KKR(Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co.) and Permira, has been approved by the Kommission zur Ermittlung der Konzentration im Medienbereich (Commission for the investigation of media concentrations - KEK) and the European Commission. Permira and KKR are private investment fund companies. In the media sector, they control the Dutch SBS television group, mainly active in Scandinavia, the Netherlands, Belgium and Central and Eastern Europe....

At its meeting on 25 January 2007, the Direktorenkonferenz der Landesmedienanstalten (Conference of Land media authority directors) decided on the key features of a nationwide trial of mobile broadcasting services using the DVB-H standard (see IRIS 2007-2: 10). The aim of the project is to develop a workable overall system for the digital terrestrial transmission of broadcasting services and telemedia. The full bandwidth of an analogue television channel (8 MHz) will be made available throughout the country for the trial of the DVB-H standard (Digital Video Broadcasting - Handheld). Capacity in...

After the Bundestag (lower house of the German Parliament) had adopted the Gesetz zur Vereinheitlichung von Vorschriften über bestimmte elektronische Informations- und Kommunikationsdienste (Act on the standardisation of provisions on certain electronic information and communication services - ElGVG), the cornerstone of which is the Telemediengesetz (Telemedia Act - TMG), on 18 January 2007, it was passed by the Bundesrat (upper house of the German Parliament) on 16 February 2007. The Telemedia Act no longer distinguishes between tele-services, which were previously covered by the Teledienstegesetz...

On 6 February 2007, the Verwaltungsgericht Hannover (Hanover Administrative Court - VG) rejected two appeals by broadcaster RTL against decisions of the Kommission für Jugendmedienschutz (Commission for the Protection of Youth in the Media - KJM) (case nos. 7 A 5469/06 and 7 A 5470/06). In decisions reached in July and October 2005, the Niedersächsische Landesmedienanstalt (Lower Saxony Land Media Authority - NLM) had ruled that various TV programmes broadcast by RTL in 2004 had been unlawful. These decisions had been based on rulings of the KJM, a body jointly set up by the German Landesmedienanstalten...