Not a lawyer, but I suspected this might be a problem eventually.

Oh Germany. What is it about?

I imagine all they can legally really do is target the relays caching the post, but clients are pulling the content locally, so we do not host.

Poor job at blurring. Just post the note at this point.

Bahaha

fefe interim (npub1gh…v9nlf) on Nostr

Short Text Note by fefe interim

seen on relay.ditto.pub

I agree, but I don't understand why judges do judge stuff.

Thats the issue. They often sue regardless of technicalities.

Exactly.

But then I suppose its our job to go the distance to defend 🙄 If anyone knows any lawyers on nostr who can chime in, that would be a help.

Hellllloooo John 👋 Am i legally allowed to tell this person to foook off?

@SuiGenerisJohn ?

Just delete it from your relay. This is nostr not bitcoin.

I think you'll be required to block access to a list of notes for the site at the domain level. Even if you don't control the actual data you are still the one listed at the registrar.

Its not our relay

Feels like then that should be normal I guess. Or at least we all hope so.

I'm actually working on a process for this on nostr.blue with the proliferation of nostr music from non-copyright holders. I suspect claims being issued in the future and trying to be ready for things like that ahead of time.

We can remove any caching for the note, but I think thats all. It really is like blaming the browser for content from a url you entered

i guess its time to barbra streisand the fuck out of that note

their strong belief in free speech obviously

There are many such legal caltrops lurking in the shadows.

i guess nostr made it. If someone cares about a random note for nostr so much that its hunting down http gateway operators then nostr has succeeded? View quoted note →

Not a lawyer, but suspect you’ll be forced to block that note on your domain. So will any client that also gets named directly.

I don’t think this is the first time 🤷‍♂️

#asknostr

a lawyer .... I see the words “Germany” and “Munich Regional Court” ... Yes, my jurisdiction ... “Please don't hesitate to contact us with confidence ...” Every case is a journey—you just have to take it.

Time to go all in on FIPS?

Time to use "nowhere" more.

Do you a link to the note?

Definitely @SuiGenerisJohn should be the man 😎

My guess would be that it's the responsibility of the relays who host it. But litigating that might get expensive.

They may not want to, but they are about to learn what Nostr is really quick

Not sure if legally relevant, but I'm curious: What exactly does njump do? Is there browser-side code that queries the relays directly? Or do the njump servers query the relays and then forward the response to the browser?

My hearts warmed by this. Ben if you want to dm me separately I’m not a lawyer in Europe but I’d have questions to maybe point you in the right direction. I know some lawyers in EU that might be able to help too.

That note appears to be… legit? What the hell, the pleb is posting archive.org links from a news site if I understood correctly. Fishy takedown.

do you happen to know the lawyer who represented Jock Palfreeman by any chance? i wish i'd got him when i was in the can. i did end up hiring him to resolve a standing block against me leaving bulgaria. he sat in the court for an hour leafing through my case file and 3 days later called me and told me (as i sat in a little hotel nearby the border with romania) that i was clear. hah. then i walked across the EU commission funded bridge, some rando romanian guard asked to see my passport and then directed me to jump the fence far before the road checkpoint on the other side further up the road. haha. they probably wouldn't have stopped me anyway, he didn't call anyone to check on me.

I do not, but you are an unusual one mleku. I’m here for it.

well, hopefully i won't be of any need for a eu based lawyer. hoping that i can leave the region in the next year, sooner the better

been trying to find the note, some characters that are hidden are still visible while other are opaque. if only we knew if what OS this was on we could find default font and try and compare

ben posted it already

The power of decentralisation!!!! Your answer should be. "Dear sir even if I really really really wanted I can't remove this content "

I hope no one needs a lawyer all the time. My job depends on people having an awful time. I think about this often.

Thanks buddy

I guess you're gonna have to put a blocklist on the site and put a "this mofo with a sensitive soul threatened me so I had to hide the content" disclaimer.

Can a German court order removal of content from a foreign server that is not operating a business in Germany? Never before, but this type of thing is in litigation right now between the UK Ofcom regulator and 4chan in the US.

The EU loves overstepping their jurisdiction, being the champions of free speech they are.

A relay that is just a proxy

It's so easy to flud the network with similar messages but twick the note so that a new eventid is created

Yeah. It’s not really enforceable even if the platform in question does its best to block the events. My guess is that would just go after a domain takedown.

Isn't telling people to fuck of a fundamental value of your human rights 😁

major politician's son got the courts to silence allegations that he was naughty

It’s about the son of a former german finance minister. Not one single hit if you search the “German” internet 🤪

pass me the event to republish it in my relay👀

one moment! do they still link personal data to their NOSTR accounts?

What was the note so I can repost it

It's a bit like someone criticizing you for embedding nasty posts in your website. Yes, technically someone else is hosting it, but to the average user it looks identical to if you were hosting it yourself.

To confirm that the event_id at the link matches the nevent in the screenshot: $ nak encode nevent cce3ad3583968ccba5e47ed92296343aa2c9aaf7f8267455986f616358679fbe

The negotiation between the right of free speech and the right of personal freedom.

🫂

Ben, this sucks but it is not as much a legal home run as you may think. There is a thing called "Störerhaftung" which means even entities who simply relay/spread "unlawful information" (aggregators, search engines etc) can made to take the site off their index. To what extemd this applies here, I asked an expert: my Kagi Research agent 😀 Section 5 and 7 particularly relevant. [Background: whether the post the actually violates complainer's rights actually does so, is dubious. It's a high ranking politican's son who allegedly beat his wife, and uses daddy's political influence and the legal system to squash any reporting on it, and links in search engines and aggregators] <agent response> Here is a thorough legal assessment of this takedown notice under German law. --- # Legal Assessment of the Takedown Notice ## 1. What the Notice Claims The sender claims: - A specific piece of content (a Nostr note) accessible via the aggregator's website "unlawfully identifies" them. - The Munich Regional Court I (Landgericht München I) issued a judgment on **18 December 2025** (Case No. **26 O 13971/25**) against **Reddit**, prohibiting further dissemination of this content. - On this basis, the aggregator must remove the content. --- ## 2. The Core Legal Problem: Judgments Only Bind the Parties (Inter Partes) This is the most fundamental flaw in the notice. Under German civil procedure law (**§ 322 ZPO**), the binding effect of a court judgment (*materielle Rechtskraft*) is strictly **inter partes** — it only binds the **parties to the case**. 【4】 A judgment against **Reddit** creates **no legal obligation whatsoever** for a Nostr aggregator. The aggregator: - Was not a party to the Munich proceedings - Was never served - Had no opportunity to defend itself - Cannot be bound by a judgment it had no part in The notice is therefore **legally misleading** in implying the aggregator is bound by the Reddit ruling. Even if the case is real and the judgment valid, it is simply irrelevant to the aggregator as a matter of German procedural law. > **Practical note:** No public record of case 26 O 13971/25 was found in any legal database. The case number format is plausible for LG München I, but its existence and content cannot be independently verified. This raises the possibility that the notice is exaggerating or misrepresenting the judgment's scope. --- ## 3. German Law on Aggregator/Search Engine Liability (*Störerhaftung*) Since the aggregator is not bound by the Reddit judgment, the question becomes: **does the aggregator have an independent legal obligation to remove the content?** ### The Legal Framework German law does not give search engines and aggregators a statutory safe harbor under the **Telemediengesetz (TMG)** for hyperlinks and location tools — the legislature never extended §§ 8–10 TMG to cover them. 【1】 Instead, their liability is governed by general tort law and a body of BGH case law. Since **February 2024**, the EU **Digital Services Act (DSA)** has replaced the TMG's liability provisions. Under **DSA Art. 6**, hosting/intermediary providers are not liable for illegal third-party content if they act expeditiously upon obtaining actual knowledge of it. 【2】 ### Key BGH Case Law | Case | Ruling | Relevance | |---|---|---| | **BGH I ZR 259/00 – *Paperboy*** (2003) | A search/aggregation service linking to third-party content does not infringe by the act of linking alone; deep-linking is permissible | Aggregators are not primary infringers | | **BGH VI ZR 144/11 – RSS-Feed** (2012) | Embedding an RSS feed is not "adopting" (*zu-eigen-machen*) third-party content; *Störerhaftung* requires a breach of duty of care; if content is removed promptly after a complaint, no injunction claim (*Unterlassungsanspruch*) arises | Notice-and-takedown is the operative standard | The BGH's RSS-Feed ruling is particularly on point: an aggregator that embeds or displays third-party content **does not make that content its own**, and **Störerhaftung only arises if it fails to act after being notified** of a specific infringement. 【3】<kcite>@www.otto-schmidt.de/blog/it-recht-blog/bgh-storerhaftung-auf-dem-weg-zu-notice-and-takedown-ITBLOG0000704.html#621-626</parameter> The BGH has also held that the liability of search engines for possibly unlawful expressions in their references should be **lowered** because of the significance of such services for freedom of expression and information. 【1】 --- ## 4. The Nostr-Specific Technical Facts Are Legally Significant The technical background you described is highly relevant: - The content is **not hosted** by the aggregator — it lives on decentralized Nostr relays. - The aggregator merely **indexes and displays links** to content on those relays, analogous to a search engine. - The aggregator likely **cannot delete** the content from the Nostr network; it can only remove its own index entry or display. Under German law, this matters because: 1. A provider that does not *host* content has **even weaker liability** than one that does. 2. The aggregator is closer to a **pure search engine** (Paperboy doctrine) than a hosting provider. 3. The aggregator is not "making the content its own" (*zu-eigen-machen*) by aggregating public relay data. --- ## 5. What the Notice *Does* Legally Accomplish Despite its flaws, the notice is **not entirely without legal effect**: > ⚠️ **This notice constitutes formal "knowledge" (*Kenntnis*) under German law.** From the moment the aggregator receives this notice, it can no longer claim ignorance of the alleged infringement. Under the *Störerhaftung* doctrine and the DSA's notice-and-takedown mechanism: - If the aggregator **fails to act** after receiving this notice, and a German court later finds the content unlawful, the aggregator **could become liable** for continued display. - The aggregator should therefore **assess the merits** of the underlying claim (is the content actually unlawfully identifying the person under German personal rights law?). --- ## 6. Summary Assessment | Issue | Assessment | |---|---| | Is the aggregator bound by the Reddit judgment? | **No.** Judgments are inter partes; the aggregator was not a party. | | Does the aggregator host the content? | **No.** It aggregates from public Nostr relays — analogous to a search engine. | | Is the aggregator a primary infringer? | **Very unlikely.** BGH *Paperboy* doctrine protects aggregation/linking. | | Does the notice create any legal obligation? | **Yes, conditionally.** It triggers the notice-and-takedown mechanism. The aggregator now has knowledge and must assess the claim. | | Is the content actually unlawful? | **Unknown — must be assessed independently.** The notice's claim that it "unlawfully identifies" the person needs to be evaluated on its merits under German *Persönlichkeitsrecht* (§§ 823, 1004 BGB). | | Is the notice legally sound? | **Largely not.** It misrepresents the effect of the Reddit judgment on third parties and conflates hosting with aggregation. | --- ## 7. Recommended Response The aggregator should: 1. **Not simply comply** based on the Reddit judgment alone — it has no binding force here. 2. **Independently assess** whether the content actually violates German personal rights law (*allgemeines Persönlichkeitsrecht*, §§ 823 I, 1004 BGB). 3. If the content is **clearly unlawful** (e.g., doxxing, false statements of fact), remove the index entry from the aggregator's display to avoid *Störerhaftung*. 4. If the content is **not clearly unlawful**, respond in writing that the aggregator is not bound by the Reddit judgment, is not a hosting provider, and operates as an aggregator/search engine under the BGH *Paperboy* doctrine and DSA Art. 6. 5. **Seek German legal counsel** if the plaintiff escalates, as personal rights (*Persönlichkeitsrecht*) claims in Germany can be pursued aggressively and courts can issue preliminary injunctions (*einstweilige Verfügungen*) quickly.

They don't care. You have to pay for it.

Not his territory, but @SuiGenerisJohn

I knew it was gonna be a Mastodon user lmao

Sounds very similar to what bitcoin trackers go through. They don't host the data but they facilitate the links to it. It's not 100% the same but very similar.

I bitcoin too much. I meant bittorrent of course.

If only there were someone experienced that could help you navigate this...

Just block all of Germany on that domain and link to the relevant court ruling?

fuck that shit

I need to talk to the Nostr manager @Derek Ross

I'm not an expert on German law, but I do deal with cross border contracts and disputes. depends on where you are, your website is hosted, etc. but if you're outside Germany then who gives a fuck what some Munich court ruled? they have no jurisdiction beyond German borders. although I think there is an EU-wide law around the right to privacy online. I travel regularly to a country where pornography is illegal for example. the government cannot sue pornhub for simply making it available online nor can they force them to geo-block the country. all they could do is prosecute a local for accessing it, theoretically (possibly a loophole if you don't download as the law was written before the interwebs and talks about possession of material). however, if you're identifying someone and there's accusations involved then you might run foul of your local slander or defamation laws. but then the onus is on them to prove intent, so if you're just drawing from relays and not specifically promoting this thing then you might be ok. lots of gray areas still to be resolved around online content. only certainty is some lawyers will get very, very rich off ut all

yes, you're a terrible person and should be ashamed of yourself 🤣 my work revolves around things going wrong too. I deal with contract disputes and usually issues stem from people not understanding contracts at all and signing them without reading it. I've often thought contract law should be a compolsury class at high school. we use them for so many things andnif most of the public had a basic understanding how they work in their country then not inky would things run smoother but companies like gym, telecoms, etc would have to act a lot more reasonably. Most of their crap isn't really enforceable

yeah, and for the most part they depend on it being too expensive to litigate. i just ran through this game with payoneer. still gonna file a complaint though anyway. they didn't include whatsapp for 2FA outside of signup so my argument is that is a bait and switch. got locked out of my own money for almost 3 weeks until i was forced to get a backup for my starlink after the router failed and turned out the data sim number could receive their stupid codes. if the case goes in my favor i might get a little compensation for 2 weeks of damages but it's just slack who even does that, "can't use whatsapp to get codes to authorise withdrawals but we'll let you open and have money put in it with it just fine" fuckers.

It happened several times to njump.me, but for CASM content. I usually briefly explained that njump is just a viewer for something hosted elsewhere, and then blocked the content. It's easy to understand that for media, but your case is different both for the nature of the content. and because it seems related to the textual part, so you should highlight to relays architecture, that is a little harder to grasp. I would ask to a lawyer that know that specific jurisdiction how to manage the issue.

So Germany wants to censor posts. I would just ignore it and continue with life.

Regulations are always Corruption