puter concerned to form a computer network, it leaves spatial privacy provided by delimitation of the dwelling unaffected. The location of the system is in many cases of
no interest for the investigation measure, and frequently will not be recognisable even
for the authority. This applies in particular to mobile information technology systems
such as laptops, Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) or mobile telephones.
Article 13.1 of the Basic Law also does not provide protection against the collection,
facilitated by infiltration of the system, of data found in the working memory or on the
storage media of an information technology system located in a dwelling (see on the
parallel relationship of home searches and seizure BVerfGE 113, 29 (45)).
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cc) The manifestations of the general right of personality, in particular the guarantees of the protection of privacy, and of the right to informational self-determination,
previously recognised in the case-law of the Federal Constitutional Court, also do not
comply sufficiently with the special need for protection of the user of information technology systems.
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(1) In its manifestation as protection of privacy, the general right of personality of the
individual guarantees a spatially and thematically specified area which is to remain, in
principle, free of undesired inspection (see BVerfGE 27, 344 (350 et seq.); 44, 353
(372-373); 90, 255 (260); 101, 361 (382-383)). The need for protection of the user of
an information technology system is however not solely restricted to data to be allotted to his or her privacy. Such an attribution also frequently depends on the context in
which the data came about and into which it is brought by linking with other data. In
many cases, the data itself does not reveal what significance it has for the person
concerned and which it may gain by inclusion in other contexts. The consequence of
this is that, inevitably, not only private data is collected by the infiltration of the system, but access to all data is facilitated, so that a comprehensive picture of the user of
the system may emerge.
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(2) The right to informational self-determination goes beyond the protection of privacy. It confers on the individual, in principle, the power to determine for himself or herself the disclosure and use of his or her personal data (see BVerfGE 65, 1 (43); 84,
192 (194)). It supports and expands the protection of freedom of conduct and privacy
in terms of fundamental rights by already making it start at the level of endangerment
of the personality. Such an endangerment situation can already arise in the run-up to
concrete threats to specific legal interests, in particular if personal information can be
used and linked in a manner which the person concerned can neither detect nor prevent. The extent of protection of the right to informational self-determination is not restricted here to information which is already sensitive by its nature and hence already
protected by fundamental rights. Depending on the purpose of access and the existing processing and linking facilities, the use of personal data which per se has only little information content can also have an impact on the privacy and freedom of conduct of the person concerned in terms of fundamental rights (see Federal
Constitutional Court, Order of 13 June 2007 – 1 BvR 1550/03 et al. –, Neue Juristis-
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