The Süddeutsche Zeitungreports that Thomas Petri, the Bavarian Data Protection Commissioner wants to have an external data protection supervisor deployed at the European Patent Office.It has become a matter of public knowledge that publicly accessible computers at the EPO were placed under observation using surveillance technology after the receipt of letters containing [allegedly] defamatory remarks against the Management.

Data Protection Commissioner Petri previously investigated the data protection arrangements at the EPO in the Spring of 2014 following a complaint and he came to the conclusion that they were deficient. "It emerged that nobody was really in charge", told Petri.

Translations in English,French andDutch are available by scrolling through the document.

IPKat provides an overview of the events at the European Patent Office since 1 January 2015.Merpel concludes as follows:

• "The Administrative Council (AC) has shown some signs of independent thought, but there's a lot more to do if it is to bring the EPO into line with the standards of the national patent offices whose heads make up the AC."
• "The delegates know full well that if they tried to subject their own staff at home to the same regime as in the EPO (i.e. the investigations, the unilateral changes to promotion structures and invalidity benefits), they would find themselves in court and probably out of a job due to the revolt of civil servants. But when they board the plane to Munich, somehow the standards slip."
• "The AC continues to approve proposals for social reforms when it knows that the staff’s input into these proposals have been deliberately silenced. They are aware of the atmosphere of fear pervading the office, and now they know that someone in the EPO is spying on attorneys and potentially on themselves.Will this be enough for someone to cry "halt"? Merpel is, as she said, eternally hopeful."

In a well attended General Assembly, staff of the EPO adopted a resolution to be sent to Heiko Maas, Federal Minister of Justice and Consumer Protection.The letter informs Heiko Maas of the investigation of staff representatives and/or union executives by the company Control Risks during the trilateral talks on union recognition.

A copy of the letter can be found here. Translations inEnglish,French andDutch are also available.

FOSS Patents reveals the document signed by the Data Protection Officer of the European Patent Officeauthorising the covert surveillance of publicly accessible computers in the Munich ISAR building. Florian Mueller comments as follows:

"There is now conclusive evidence that the EPO has violated basic human rights not only of its staff but even of unsuspecting visitors of one of the EPO's Munich facilities.[...] [T]he request that the "data protection officer" (who is more than 25 years late to serve as a Stasi official) authorized merely refers to freedom-of-speech issues: "a sustained campaign of defamatory and insulting communications against [the EPO's Jack Warner] Vice President Zejlko Topic, other senior managers of the Office and possibly Administrative Council Delegates, in the form of normal post and electronic mail."

The Huffington Post, a website partly owned by Le Monde, published a tribune signed by Members of the French Parliament, the French Senate and the European Parliament.The signatories regret that the success story of the European Patent Office is "now endangered since 2012 by authoritarian social policies which do not respect the fundamental rights of staff".

Translations in English, German and Dutch are available by scrolling through the document.

The Münchner Merkur(printable version) reports on the spying scandal at the European Patent Office:

"[E]mployees were tracked with spy software. Patent attorneys and members of the Administrative Council may also have been affected. [...]The goings-on inside the EPO nowadays resemble what was previously thought to only occur in China or at the FIFA.[...] As a result of the surveillance a member of EPO Boards of Appeal was suspended because he is alleged to have disseminated defamatory statementsabout the Office and its managers. [...] Meanwhile, it remains unclear whether or not the suspended EPO staff member was really guilty of defamation or whether he was merely stating the truth. His remarks reportedly referred to the EPO Vice-President, Zeljko Topic, and included allegations of corruption relating to his time at the Croatian Patent Office."

A similar article was published in the Badische Zeitung.A translation in English can be found by scrolling through the document.

The Süddeutsche Zeitung (printable version) reveals a spy scandal at the European Patent Office.

Towards the end of last year, in the EPO ISAR building, "publicly accessible computers were placed under surveillance [...] by means of cameras and so-called keyloggers. This allows the recording of what the user types, which pages he accesses and how he communicates." These computers were "provided especially for the members of the Administrative Council" and "visitors to the Patent Office who typically sojourn on the first floor also include patent attorneys".

"The matter is also particularly sensitive because during the period in which the surveillance was being carried out the 142th Meeting of the Administrative Council also took place in the building, namely on 10. and 11. December 2014. In addition, the Budget and Finance Committee also met during the period in question. The computers are apparently located near the room where the Council meets."

Translations in English,French andDutch are available by scrolling through the document.The article was also published in the paper version of 9 June 2015.

IPKat reports on the article of the Süddeutsche Zeitung, "Europäisches Patentamt überwachte Mitarbeiter mit Keyloggern" revealing a spy scandal at the European Patent Office and provides an English translation.

The external company, Control Risks, is performing interrogations of staff representatives and/or union executives at the initiative of the investigation unit, itself under the direct authority of President Benoît Battistelli. During the last meeting on union recognition, Jesper Kongstad, Chairman of the Administrative Council, took note of the issue, and declined to comment or act on this serious development. The investigations not only continue, but seem to have been extended to even more staff representatives, some of whom are active participants to the trilateral meetings.

In a letter to Mr Kongstad, SUEPO now asks him to react. A copy of the letter can be found here.

De Volkskrant(printable version) reports on the information that the EPO has commissioned the company Control Risks to investigate elected representatives of the Staff Committee and/or Staff Union.

This is the "the latest weapon to be added to EPOrg president Benoît Battistelli’s reign of terror" where "systematic investigations are being carried out on employees known to be active within unions orthose who have been chosen as staff representatives."

Translations in English, French and German are available by scrolling through the document.The article was also published in the paper version of 5 June 2015.