German Supreme Court rules that ad blockers are legal, in favor of Adblock Plus, and throws out a case brought by Axel Springer
Context & Ripple Effects
This ruling closes a legal arc that began with Adblock Plus's earlier court victory over German publishers in 2015: Axel Springer escalated to the Supreme Court and lost again, meaning Germany's highest court has now twice affirmed users' right to block ads. The decision lands on a publisher already repositioning — Axel Springer later urged the EU to stop Google's Chrome cookie phase-out (complaining alongside hundreds of German publishers) and joined the $2.3B group lawsuit against Google's ad practices.
First-order effects
- Adblock Plus can distribute its blocker in Germany without further legal threat from publishers, and Axel Springer's litigation route to protecting ad revenue is now exhausted at the top court.
Second-order effects
- German publishers lose the courts as a lever against user-side blocking and redirect pressure toward regulators and platform giants — the same Axel Springer that lost here is the one petitioning the EU over Chrome cookies and suing Google over digital advertising.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, European publishers' revenue defense migrates from suing tools that filter ads to regulating platforms and monetizing content through licensing — a shift visible in Axel Springer's later moves toward EU intervention and collective action against Google.
The trend: European publishers are shifting from courtroom battles against ad-blocking tools to regulatory pressure and licensing deals as their primary defense of ad revenue.