The Ryneš Case and Liability for Invasion of Privacy in the 21st Century

Abstract

New technologies combined with the internet have fundamentally altered our ability to have control over the diffusion of information and its impact on human behaviour. This paper explains this change as well as the transformation of the concept of privacy itself. The main part of the paper analyses the case law relating to local activities such as CCTV cameras in private buildings which serve to protect the property of the camera system operators. The author defends the regulation of privacy against the intrusions of providers of telecommunications and data services and corporations such as Google and Facebook. This should be exercised by the law of the EU because autonomous domestic regulation would endanger the free movement of services across the EU. Moreover, it would be difficult for separate national regulation to be successful in fighting global corporations like Google. On the other hand, there is not much sense in the European regulation of activities that are local by their very nature, such as the use of CCTV cameras in private buildings to protect the camera system operators’ property.