This decision is interesting in that it uses the concept of the "notional business person", as it was introduced in T 1463/11, to assess whether a given difference over the prior art achieves a...

The legislative proposal is being discussed extensively in legal practice and academia.

Criminal tax matters were the main focus for the German Public Prosecution Offices in 2024. Large-scale criminal investigation proceedings were launched...

Germany started 2025 with rising enforcement risk as authorities intensified their efforts to combat financial crime.

Whistleblowing has never been more attractive in Germany. On March 15, 2006, the Federal Cartel Office ("FCO") published new guidelines for immunity and leniency in cartel matters ("2006 Guidelines"). The 2006 Guidelines amend and restate the conditions under which the FCO grants immunity (no imposition of fines) or extends leniency (reduction of fines), provided cartel members admit their involvement in the conduct at issue and cooperate with the agency’s investigation.

Germany is poised to fundamentally transform its corporate liability regime by quadrupling maximum fines and, for the first time, codifying statutory sentencing criteria that expressly recognize internal investigations and compliance measures as mandatory mitigating factors. The reforms, embedded within an EU environmental directive implementation, will apply across all corporate offenses and establish clear legal requirements for how companies must respond to suspected misconduct.

The Financial Action Task Force is the organisation that sets global standards (Recommendations) to prevent money laundering and financing of terrorism as well as financial crime generally.

The debate on the extradition of Ukrainian and Russian conscientious objectors has recently entered the public discourse in Germany.

"Infostealers" have transformed from niche threats into the backbone of modern cybercrime, fueling a $4.88 million average breach cost in 2024. In this article we synthesize the latest threat intelligence...

In a current decision (BGH 5 StR 394/08) the Federal Supreme Court ("Bundesgerichtshof", "BGH") has taken a stance regarding a compliance officer’s responsibility within a company.

This article is the first of a series on accounting fraud and follows on from a previous article, "The current economic climate - a golden age for fraud?", where we explained why challenging economic environments...

German criminal law differentiates between bribery in commercial practice (section 299 GCC) and bribery in connection with public officials (sections 331 ff. GCC).

In its cabinet session on 21 January 2015, the German government adopted the draft bill on combating corruption of the Ministry of Justice and Consumer Protection.

When an incident occurs at a financial institution, whether a cyberattack, an operational failure, a data breach, or internal misconduct, the immediate response is rarely a single, straightforward process.

The revised Environmental Crime Directive ("revised ECD") was published in the Official Journal of the EU on 30 April 2024 and comes into force on 20 May 2024.

On 28 June 2023, the European Commission (the Commission) published a package of legislative proposals to propel payments and the wider financial services sector further into the digital age.

Congratulations! You plan to become managing director (Geschäftsführer) of a German limited liability company (a "GmbH").

The recent festive season drove peak online shopping, travel bookings and charity giving, a time when fraudsters were most active – now increasingly armed with artificial intelligence...

Anti-Corruption & Bribery Comparative Guide for the jurisdiction of Germany, check out our comparative guides section to compare across multiple countries