SMD: Court orders intervention in media database for the first time

The case made a number of headlines in Switzerland: a senior civil servant was "targeted by the judiciary", various media reported in 2008. He was allegedly involved in the manipulation of a video. The problem for the person concerned: Hardly any media reported on the fact that an expert opinion later exonerated him and no criminal proceedings were opened.

He therefore took legal action against the Swiss Media Database (SMD), as the NZZ made public. The SMD manages the archives for Swiss media companies, which now contain around 13 million documents and are used by around 7,000 journalists in their daily work. The plaintiff felt that his personal rights had been violated and argued that his office was so exposed to the media that the reproduction of the current status in the archives was of the utmost importance to him.

The district court of Lucerne-Land ruled in his favor on November 26, 2010. It ordered the SMD to add the following addendum to the articles written by the man "targeted by the judiciary": The man "was exonerated by the expert opinion commissioned by the Schwyz interrogation office. No criminal proceedings were opened against him."

Controversial court decision

This is the first time that SMD - which has been in existence since 1996 - has been forced to take such a measure by a court ruling. This mechanism contradicts the archive system, said SMD Chairman of the Board of Directors André Maerz when asked by the news agency SDA. He considers the situation "bizarre", as the articles were correct at the time of publication. Nor would anyone think of changing reports on sporting events retrospectively because the winner was later convicted of doping. Nevertheless, the SMD swallows the toad and does not take the ruling any further.

However, the Lucerne ruling could have consequences for media companies. The retroactive correction of an article that was correct at the time of publication "overshoots the mark", said Christoph Zimmer, spokesman for the Zurich-based Tamedia Group, to SDA. There is a danger "that such requests will increase". Former Press Council President Peter Studer takes a different view. He considers the ruling of the Lucerne-Land district court to be correct and "very well founded". The Data Protection Act mentions the possibility of a note in data collections - however, there have hardly been any such cases to date.

According to a note at the end of the report, the SDA pursues an offensive practice: as soon as it becomes aware of errors brought to its attention by customers or the public, it corrects the corresponding reports in its service and in its own database.