Where is regulated the Image and Photo Right?
In the “Act on the Copyright of Works of the Fine Arts and Photographs” (KUG) of 1907, as a general right of personality, in criminal law in § 202a StGB (penal code) as well as just partly in Data Protection Regulations.
What does image law protect?
The “Right of persons to their own likeness” protects photographs or records from undesired access or sharing of this latter. According to § 22 KUG, pictures may be distributed or publicly displayed only with the consent of the depicted person. In case the depicted person is doubtful, he/she has the right to obtain a remuneration and in this case the consent is considered granted. After the death of a depicted persons, the consent should be passed to the family of the depicted person for a max. of 10 years. If the subject in question happens to have no children or spouse, the parents of the person are the first one to be considered. The manufacture of the portrait is not going to be directly recorded, such as its diffusion and public presentation. In opposition to copyright law, in photo law is only the depicted person to have protective rights.
Consent not required.
Without the consent required pursuant to § 22, § 23 KUG may be exhibited and distributed: portraits of contemporary history; Pictures in which the persons appear only as an accessory part beside a landscape or other places; Pictures of gathering, parades and similar operations in which the persons are represented as a passive participant; Pictures that are not made per order, if the distribution or exhibition has artistic purposes. However, these regulations are valid, only if its distribution and exhibition does not violate the legitimate interest of the depicted person or, if the latter dies, of his family.