Advice on the approval of the German Corona-Warn-App in Denmark

Just like Denmark and several other countries, Germany has its own app for tracing and stopping COVID19, giving citizens the opportunity of being notified if they have been in close contact to someone infected with COVID19. This app forms part of Germany’s readiness during the pandemic as it increases the opportunities of interrupting infection chains and stopping the infection from spreading.

During the summer of 2020, the German Ministry of Health wanted to extend the coverage range of the app in order for it to be applied in other countries too – in particular in the border areas of Germany’s neighbouring countries, where many people cross the borders every day, e.g. for work reasons. And naturally, one of these countries was Denmark.

Associated partner, Henrik Christian Strand of Holst, was therefore approached by a law firm in Berlin – as they know each other through the international counselling network, IR Global – and together with the personal data experts at Holst, he provided advice to the German Ministry of Health about Danish rules on personal data.

Although much law on personal data is regulated at EU level, e.g. by means of the GDPR, a lot of nation-al legislation also had to be taken into account. For instance, rules on marketing and consumer protec-tion and what falls under legislation on medicinal products were to be considered. Another aspect were the Danish personal ID numbers which are comprised by the Danish Personal Data Act.

Today the German Corona-Warn-App is approved and being applied in Denmark.