Section 12
Federal Commissioner for Freedom of
Information
(1) Anyone considering their right to access to information pursuant to this Act to have
been violated may appeal to the Federal Commissioner for Freedom of Information.
(2) The function of Federal Commissioner for Freedom of Information shall be
performed by the Federal Commissioner for Data Protection.
(3) The provisions of the Federal Data Protection Act on the monitoring tasks of the
Federal Commissioner for Data Protection (Section 24 (1) and (3) to (5)), on
complaints (Section 25 (1), sentence 1, nos. 1 and 4, sentence 2 and sub-sections 2
and 3) and on further tasks pursuant to Section 26 (1) to (3) shall apply mutatis
mutandis.
Section 13
Amendments to other
regulations
(1) The Federal Data Protection Act, as promulgated on 14 January 2003
(Federal Law Gazette I, p. 66), shall be amended as follows:
In the information in the table of contents regarding Chapter III in Part II and
Sections 21 to 26 and in Section 4c (2), sentence 2, Section 4d (1), (6), sentence 3,
Section 6 (2), sentence 4, Section 10 (3), sentence 1, Section 19 (5), sentence 2,
Section 6, sentence 1, in the title of Chapter III in Part II, in Sections 21 to 26, in
Section 42 (1), sentence 1, 2nd clause, Section 4, sentence 3 and Section 44 (2),
sentence 2, the words “for Data Protection”are to be replaced in each instance by
the words “for Data Protection and Freedom of Information”.
(2) The following sentence is to be added to Section 5 (4) of the Federal Records
Office Act (BArchG) of 6 January 1988 (Federal Law Gazette I, p. 62), most recently
amended by the Act of 5 June 2002 (Federal Law Gazette I, p. 1782):
“The same shall apply to archival materials, where access to the information was
available in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act (IFG) prior to transfer to
the Federal archives or the archives of the legislative bodies.”
Section 14
Reporting and
evaluation
The Federal Government shall report to the German Bundestag on application of this
Act two years prior to its expiry. The German Bundestag shall evaluate the Act on a
scientific basis one year prior to its expiry.