Private address
removed from the
Register.
Private address
removed from the
Register.
from
Anyone who founds a GmbH or acts as a managing director regularly submits documents to the commercial register court. These documents not only end up in the register files, but can also be accessed by anyone free of charge and without registration via the joint register portal of the federal states. But what if they also contain the private residential address and personal signature? Do managing directors have the law to have this data deleted? And what happens if the same data also appears in the registers of other companies?
What was the case about?
Two managing directors of a GmbH & Co. KG had submitted applications to the commercial register in 2021. In addition to the necessary company details, the documents also contained their private residential addresses and their handwritten signatures. As the commercial register has been accessible online free of charge for everyone since July 2021, this data has been freely available since then.
The two managing directors then applied to the Hamburg registry court to replace the original documents with corrected versions. The new documents were to contain the business address of the respective company instead of the private address and a simple “gez.” note with a typewritten name instead of the signature. They argued that criminals were retrieving register entries on a large scale in order to create profiles of natural persons from the collected data.
Both the registry court and the Hanseatic Higher Regional Court rejected the application. The lower court justified its decision by stating that the private addresses and signatures of the applicants could still be found in the register files of other companies anyway. There was therefore no legitimate interest in the exchange.
What did the Federal Court of Justice decide?
The Federal Court of Justice overturned Decision of 18.02.2026 -Az. II ZB 2/25 annulled both preliminary rulings and referred the case back to the Hamburg Local Court. In its reasoning, it clarified several key legal issues.
Firstly, the Federal Court of Justice clarified that the data subject does not have to have a “legal interest” in asserting the right to erasure under data protection law that goes beyond the requirements set out in the Regulation itself. The reasons for which the right to erasure is excluded are listed exhaustively in the GDPR. No further hurdles are to be recognized.
The lower court’s idea that a request for replacement would be of no legal interest because the same data is also available in other register folders was expressly rejected by the Federal Court of Justice. The aim of the right to erasure does not require that a personal date be removed from all storage sources at once. The purging of individual register folders alone reduces the risk of data being siphoned off through mass retrieval. Furthermore, informational self-determination is a fundamental right that allows the data subject to proceed selectively and only request erasure in relation to individual storage locations.
The data subject can largely determine the scope of their right to erasure themselves, for example by restricting their request to certain data, types of data, but also to certain forms, purposes or parts of the processing.
Why is the registry court not allowed to store this data permanently?
In this context, the Federal Court of Justice has decided a fundamental question of register law that has been controversial until now: Is there a general principle in commercial register law that requires all submitted documents to be stored permanently, even if they contain data that does not have to be entered?
The court denies this. Private addresses and signatures of managing directors of a GmbH & Co. KG are not part of the legally required registration details. The legislator has not prescribed their collection and thus made it clear that they are not required for the transparency and information function of the register. Data that goes beyond what is required by law is referred to by the Federal Court of Justice as “non-mandatory data”. There is no legal basis under data protection law for their permanent storage.
This is also not contradicted by the argument that the HGB requires the disclosure of “submitted documents”. The Federal Court of Justice interpreted this provision in accordance with European law. It covers the documents in their current form in the register folder, not necessarily the original documents in their original state. In addition, the legislator has created a regulation that expressly allows the exchange of documents in the register folder.
What happens to the original documents?
The Federal Court of Justice points out that the original documents are not destroyed by the exchange. They are transferred to the register file, which is not publicly accessible, while the corrected document is included in the register file with a reference to the exchange. The exchange process itself is permanently documented. Anyone who can assert a legitimate interest, for example in legal proceedings, can continue to request access to the register file. This preserves the register’s evidentiary function.
What does this mean for those affected and for companies?
Managing directors, shareholders and other natural persons whose private addresses or handwritten signatures are contained in applications for entry in the commercial register can now request the exchange of the documents in question on the basis of this Federal Court of Justice ruling. The prerequisite is that the data is not part of the legally required registration details.
Conversely, in future notaries can take care to avoid overly obligatory data from the outset when submitting applications: Private addresses can be replaced by business addresses, original signatures can be indicated by a “signed” note. The Notarization Act expressly permits this.
Conclusion
With this decision, the Federal Court of Justice has created legal certainty on an issue of practical relevance. According to this ruling, the removal of personal data submitted to the commercial register that goes beyond what is legally required can be demanded. There is no general principle in commercial register law that enforces the permanent storage of data that is not required by law. The following applies: no data storage without a legal basis, not even in the register.
The decision is likely to trigger a large number of similar applications and pose new practical challenges for register maintenance. It remains to be seen how and whether registry courts will react to the changed legal situation in the short term.
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