Focal points

Right to information

Information law is about researching the normative rules for granting rights to information in accordance with the principle of information justice. Due to their enormous economic importance, intellectual property such as databases, know-how and ideas require legal classification, especially in view of the advanced global networking through the Internet. From a civil law perspective in particular, it is often unclear who “owns” which data and to what extent. This is where the research activities of the civil law department come in, particularly in the following areas:

  • Copyright
  • IT contract law
  • Legal issues of electronic commerce
  • Industrial property rights
  • Questions of private international law and international civil procedure law
  • Competition and antitrust law
  • Data protection law (GDPR and special laws)
  • Domain allocation law, in particular dispute resolution (UDRP; CAC)
  • Liability issues on the Internet
  • Blockchain, Bitcoin and LegalTech

Telecommunications law

The liberalized telecommunications market also brings with it numerous legal problems. There is a need for civil law research in particular with regard to:

  • Rights of way
  • Consumer and data protection at telecommunications companies
  • Competition and antitrust law
  • Access and fee regulation
  • Internet of Things (IoT) and autonomous driving

Media law

Media law covers a broad area which, in addition to civil law, is strongly influenced by public law. In the age of file sharing, cloud computing and the like, the focus of civil law considerations is on copyright aspects and legal problems of media distribution. The ITM’s research focuses on the following areas:

  • Film law
  • Music law
  • Press and personality rights

Legal informatics

Legal informatics deals with the changes brought about by the use of IT for legal research and the work of judges, lawyers and administrative lawyers. The ITM’s activities focus on the following topics:

  • Use of interactive media in teaching
  • Possibilities and limits of artificial intelligence in law
  • Possible uses of legal expert systems
  • Development and maintenance of legal databases / electronic publishing
  • Electronic commerce in the legal sector
  • Digital signatures
  • AI, LegalTech and blockchain

The ITM maintains interdisciplinary contact with the research institutions located on the Leonardo Campus in particular, such as the Institute for Information Systems, the Münster Academy of Art and the departments of architecture and design at Münster University of Applied Sciences. Prof. Hoeren is a lecturer at the Kunstakademie Münster and an associate professor at the Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Information Technology (FIT). He is co-director of the research network ERCIS of the Institute of Information Systems. These collaborations are also due to the unique location of the ITM on the Leonardo Campus.

The curricula for the specialization area (legal basis) can be found here