The matter at hand
Coty Germany, the exclusive EU licensee for DAVIDOFF HOT WATER, purchased a counterfeit bottle of this perfume on an internet auction platform. In order to get hold of the name and address of the holder of the bank account into which it had paid the amount for the purchased goods, Coty Germany contacted the bank, Stadtsparkasse. Stadtsparkasse refused to provide this information, invoking German banking secrecy legislation.
Article 8 of the Enforcement Directive sets out the right of information that Member States shall ensure in the context of proceedings concerning an infringement of an intellectual property right. Paragraph (3)(e) of that article however stipulates that this right of information “shall apply without prejudice to other statutory provisions which govern the protection of confidentiality of information sources or the processing of personal data”. The referring court requested the ECJ to clarify whether this exception must be interpreted as precluding a national provision which allows a banking institution to refuse to provide information concerning the name and address of an account holder.
The judgment of the ECJ
The ECJ first establishes that “the present request for a preliminary ruling […] raises the question of the need to reconcile the requirements of the protection of different fundamental rights, namely the right to an effective remedy and the right to intellectual property, on the one hand, and the right to protection of personal data, on the other” (paragraph 33). In this regard, reference is made to the ECJ’s case law where it was found that “EU law requires that […] the Member States take care to rely on an interpretation of [national law] which allows a fair balance to be struck between the various fundamental rights protected by the EU legal order” (paragraph 34) and that “any limitation on the exercise of the rights and freedoms recognised must respect the essence of those rights and freedoms“(paragraph 35).
The ECJ then considers that “it appears that the provision of national law at issue in the main proceedings, taken in isolation, allows […] an unlimited refusal, since its wording does not contain any condition or qualification” (paragraph 37). As “such a provision of national law […] is liable to frustrate the right to information recognised in Article 8(1) of the Enforcement Directive”, it infringes “the fundamental right to an effective remedy and the fundamental right to intellectual property” (paragraph 38). For these reasons, such national legislation “does not […] comply with the requirement to ensure a fair balance between, on the one hand, the various fundamental rights, and, on the other, Article 8 of the Enforcement Directive”.