This week, I chose to write my blog on Why Is It Impossible to Find Free Wi-Fi in Germany?by Grace Dobush. I chose this article because I have studied abroad in Germany, and also found it interesting that public Wi-Fi is not available like it is in the United States. This was especially difficult when traveling because I paid for an international travel cell phone plan before arriving, and tried to minimize my internet use by connecting to different Wi-Fi connections.
The article states that there is a law called Störerhaftung that prevents people from letting others use their personal Wi-Fi connections. It makes the owner of the network liable for any suspicious or illegal activity performed on the internet connection, regardless of who owns the device. This makes it nearly impossible for public business owners to avoid consequences caused by the activities of their patrons.
I believe that this law should be redacted. Germany is a very modern and innovative country. There is a lot of technology that comes from this country. They are also a country with a different work ethic than the United States. They mix it up and move around. People in Germany tend to meet up for business lunches, use public transportation more, or walk to destinations. I think that people should have a more accessible way to work from home since their work and lifestyle habits differ than the United States.
According to the article Liability for Interference: Better Protection for WLAN Operators (translated) by Verbraucherzentrale, there is now more protection for owners of public networks. Private individuals are now no longer liable for illegal activities that others do on their network. The article also states that people should still protect their home Wi-Fi networks with a password because they should want to eliminate the illegal activity that is performed on their home network. Details are still being worked out regarding who is responsible for activity on a network and owners will have to show proof that it was not them that performed the illegal activity.
Some are still against making Wi-Fi networks available to the public. For instance, according to the article Liability for Interference: When do you have to be liable for infringements by third parties? (translated) by Urheberrecht, people are wary of making their networks available to the public because of liability for interference. This means that the owner could still be partly responsible for illegal activity performed on their network because of their ownership of the network, and their gatekeeping abilities to make it available to the user. This also applies to file sharing. People can share files with one another over the Wi-Fi network, and the owner of the network could get leaked access to these files that weren’t intended for them.
An article titled The BGH’s liability for interference: when am I liable at all? highlights several cases where the owner of a Wi-Fi network was in trouble for the activity that was performed on their network. For instance, a network owner is responsible for illegal activities done by a child, spouse, or roommate. Another case determined that the laws are too vague and inconsistent case-to-case.
After looking at the evidence I found to support both sides, I personally believe that the owner should not be liable for activity that is performed on a device with an IP device not owned or assigned to the network owner. I think that individuals living in the same household (such as spouse or roommate) should be responsible for their own devices, not a shared network. If they are responsible for activities performed on a device that they do not own, it can cause many disputes that could be easily avoided if the law allowed for it to be tracked to the device, not the network. I also think that this has recently resurged and will continue to develop and change.
References
The BGH’s liability for interference: When am I liable at all? (2016, August 09). Retrieved April 22, 2021, from https://www.kanzlei-heidicker.de/rechtsgebiete/filesharing/97-stoererhaftung-bgh-hafte-ich-ueberhaupt
Dobush, G. (2016, May 28). Why is it impossible to find free wi-fi in Germany? Retrieved April 22, 2021, from https://qz.com/694618/why-is-it-impossible-to-find-free-wi-fi-in-germany/
Liability for interference: Better protection for WLAN operators. (2021, January 28). Retrieved April 22, 2021, from https://www.verbraucherzentrale.de/wissen/digitale-welt/mobilfunk-und-festnetz/stoererhaftung-besserer-schutz-fuer-wlanbetreiber-19261
Liability for interference: When do you have to be liable for infringements by third parties? (2021, February 16). Retrieved April 22, 2021, from https://www.urheberrecht.de/stoererhaftung/
Mikayla Flynn 