Direct marketing
1 pending referralReferral C-317/25 (Groupe Canal +, 6 May 2025) 
2 preliminary rulings
of 13 Nov 2025, C-654/23 (Inteligo Media)
Article 13(1) and (2) of Directive 2002/58/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 12 July 2002 concerning the processing of personal data and the protection of privacy in the electronic communications sector (Directive on privacy and electronic communications), as amended by Directive 2009/136/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 25 November 2009, must be interpreted as meaning that the email address of a user is obtained by the publisher of an online publication ‘in the context of the sale of a product or a service’, within the meaning of Article 13(2) of that directive, where that user creates a free account on that publisher’s online platform giving him or her the right to access, free of charge, a certain number of articles of that publication, to receive, free of charge, via email, a daily newsletter containing a summary of the new legislation discussed in articles within that publication, including hyperlinks to those articles and the right to access, for a fee, additional articles and analyses of that publication. The transmission of such a newsletter constitutes a use of electronic mail ‘for the purposes of direct marketing’ for ‘similar products or services’ within the meaning of that provision.
Article 13(2) of Directive 2002/58, as amended by Directive 2009/136, read in conjunction with Article 95 of Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (General Data Protection Regulation), must be interpreted as meaning that, where the controller uses the email address of a user in order to send him or her an unsolicited communication, in accordance with Article 13(2) of that directive, the conditions for lawful processing laid down in Article 6(1) of that regulation are not applicable.
Judgment of 25 Nov 2021, C-102/20 (StWL Städtische Werke Lauf)
Article 13(1) of Directive 2002/58/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 12 July 2002 concerning the processing of personal data and the protection of privacy in the electronic communications sector (Directive on privacy and electronic communications), as amended by Directive 2009/136/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 25 November 2009, must be interpreted as meaning that the display, in the inbox of an electronic mail service user, of advertising messages in a form similar to that of real emails, and placed in the same position as those emails, without the fact that recipients are randomly determined or an assessment of the level of intensity and burden imposed on that user being relevant in that regard, constitutes ‘use of … electronic mail for the purposes of direct marketing’, which is permitted only on the condition that the user was clearly and specifically informed of the distribution methods of such advertising, including within the list of private emails received, and the user indicated specific and fully informed consent to receive such messages.
Annex I, point 26, to Directive 2005/29/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 May 2005 concerning unfair business-to-consumer commercial practices in the internal market and amending Council Directive 84/450/EEC, Directives 97/7/EC, 98/27/EC and 2002/65/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council and Regulation (EC) No 2006/2004 of the European Parliament and of the Council (‘Unfair Commercial Practices Directive’), must be interpreted as meaning that an activity consisting of the display in the inbox of an email service user of advertising messages in a form similar to that of real emails, and placed in the same position as those emails, falls within the concept of ‘persistent and unwanted solicitations’ of users of email services, within the meaning of that provision, if the display of those advertising messages is, first, sufficiently frequent and regular to be classified as ‘persistent solicitations’ and, second, may be classified as ‘unwanted solicitations’ in the absence of consent having been given by that user prior to that display.
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