Impressum

An Impressum (from Latin impressum, 'the impressed, engraved, pressed in, impression') is a legally mandated statement of the ownership and authorship of a document, which must be included in books, newspapers, magazines, websites, and business correspondence published or otherwise made available to consumers in Germany and certain other German-speaking countries, such as Austria and Switzerland, and also in countries historically influenced by German culture, such as Hungary. The Telemediengesetz (German, meaning 'Telemedia Act') mandates the use of an Impressum.

The Telemediengesetz requires that German websites disclose information about the publisher, including their name and address, telephone number or e-mail address, trade registry number, VAT number, and other information depending on the type of company. German websites are defined as being published by individuals or organisations that are based in Germany, so an Impressum is required regardless of whether a site is in the .de domain.

Historically, the German Impressum requirement has its roots in the censorship laws of 19th century and earlier monarchies, and has been criticized as illiberal and contrary to the principle of free speech; most other countries have no comparable requirement.

This law has created privacy concerns for individuals who maintain blogs or personal homepages. The law has also caused lawyers to scrutinise websites for this information and send Abmahnung (cease and desist) letters to their maintainers in the event it is missing.

Facebook offers a way for users to add an Impressum for user-created public pages.

This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.