Important ruling of CJEU on jurisdiction in legal entities personal rights protection cases

Court of Justice of European Union issued an important ruling related to jurisdiction of EU Member States with regard to lawsuit on breaching personal rights of legal entities.

According to ruling issued by CJEU, the company which personal rights were breached in the Internet, is entitled to bring a lawsuit to the court of EU Member State in which the centre of its business is located. The main argument, which spoke in favour of such position of CJEU was that the damage caused by breaching personal rights of legal entity in the Internet is revealed in the place where the company is currently operating. It shall be noted that if the company conducts its business in several countries, then the place of conducting the major activities will be decisive.

The ruling settled the dispute between Estonian company and the Swedish trade federation, which placed the Estonian company on a publicly available blacklist of companies, accused of several malpractices – in this case fraud.