Digital Control, digital Possession

在我们的日常生活中，我们越来越依赖联网设备：报警系统远程报告闯入；冰箱很快就能独立订餐了，更不用说联网的汽车和手表了。连接设备为用户和企业创造了新的机会。与此同时，它使提供商有可能随意影响设备。因此，对设备的控制在用户和提供商之间分离：后者可以通过阻止集成软件或云访问来阻止设备的使用。因此，他可以把高科技设备变成电子垃圾。用户对提供者的依赖性是我研究的起点。通常，利益冲突可以通过合同法来解决。但是，如果用户和提供者之间根本没有任何契约呢？如果用户从最初的购买者那里收到设备，可能就是这种情况。在这种情况下，用户受限于物权法的保护。我的书调查了所有权和占有权在多大程度上保护用户在数字-即软件-或基于网络-使用设备。这项研究有助于就物权法在日益数字化的世界中的重要性展开一般性辩论。为了回答这一指导性问题，本文探讨了物权法的各种基本问题。分析了物质性的特征和作为客体的性质作为界定财产的前提。它详细阐述了供应商对设备的数字控制，即他改变设备中集成的软件的能力，构成了对设备的一种物理控制。因此，它建立了设备的部分共同占有并限制了用户对占有的保护。即使没有对设备进行物理修改，对物体的数字使用也会受到损害。因此，即使物体的实质没有改变，物体的预期用途在多大程度上受到对物保护的问题也变得更加紧迫。在模拟装置的情况下很少出现这个问题，因为这些装置的可能用途源于它们的物质，因此对用途的干扰通常只有通过改变装置的物质才有可能。因此，这项研究审查了数字设备的哪些功能仍然是预期用途的一部分，哪些功能是设备本身固有的，因此受到对物保护，哪些功能仅仅是在合同基础上提供的补充功能。对于不影响设备本身但影响其连通性的干扰，本研究进一步分析了对财产-环境关系干扰的动态保护。在联邦最高法院著名的舰队案很久之后，这种保护仍然存在争议。该研究提出了一种新的方法，该方法基于对这组案例的统一理解，即基于网络的财产使用损害。

In our everyday life, we rely increasingly on connected devices: Alarm systems report break-ins remotely; refrigerators will soon order food independently, not to mention connected cars and watches. Connecting devices creates new opportunities for users and business. At the same time, it gives the provider the potential to influence the device at will. Control over the device is thereby split between the user and the provider: the latter can prevent the use of the device by blocking the integrated software or cloud access. He can thus turn a high-tech device into electronic waste. This dependence of the user on the provider is the starting point of my investigation. Oftentimes, conflicting interests may be dealt with through contract law. But what if there is no contract at all between the user and the provider? This may be the case if the user received the device from the initial purchaser. In this case, the user is restricted to protection under property law. My book investigates the extent to which ownership and possession protect the user in the digital - i.e. software- or networkbased - use of the device. The study contributes to general debates about the significance of property law in an increasingly digitalised world. To answer the guiding question, my dissertation deals with various basic questions of property law. It analyses the characteristics of corporeality and the quality as an object as prerequisites for the definition of property. It elaborates that the provider's digital control of the device, i.e. his ability to change the software integrated in the device, constitutes a type of physical control of the device. As such it establishes partial co-possession of the device and restricts the user's protection of possession. The digital use of an object can be impaired even without a physical modification of the device. There is therefore new urgency to the question of how far the intended use of an object is protected in rem even if there is no alteration of its substance. This question rarely arises in the case of analogue devices, since the possible uses of those devices derive from their substance and thus an interference with the uses is generally only possible through a change in the substance of the device. The study therefore examines which functions of a digital device are still part of the intended use, which is inherent in the device as such and thus protected in rem, and which are merely supplementary functionalities that are supplied on a contractual basis. Concerning interferences that do not affect the device itself but its connectedness, the study further analyses the in rem protection against disturbances of the property-environment relationship. Long after the famous Fleet case of the Federal Supreme Court, this protection is still controversial. The study proposes a new approach based on a uniform understanding of this group of cases as impairments of a network-based use of property.