Interne Untersuchungen und Informationsaustausch

The major advantages of conducting internal investigations only come to light when the results can be disclosed to third parties. At the interface of data protection and criminal procedure law, the work explores how the group-internal transfer of the outcome and the cooperative disclosure to German and US authorities can be justified. The emphasis is placed on the suspect employee. Due to less strict investigation regulations under private law, the information transfer to authorities carries a potential risk of undermining his position as a suspect according to criminal procedure law. The contribution discusses if the new data protection law can adjust the structural imbalances and if it leads to a fairer approach to conducting internal investigations. Besides the highly relevant impact of disclosure orders from US authorities and Art. 48 DS-GVO as a “blocking statute”, the work also analyses the exclusion of gained evidence under criminal procedure law.