From how many followers does a channel need a legal notice? The question comes up constantly and it is put wrongly, because the number of subscribers does not appear in the statute. What does appear is the way the channel is run.
What the obligation actually hangs on
Germany's Digital Services Act ties the general information duties to digital services provided on a business basis, normally for remuneration. That phrase is the whole test, and it contains two elements that want reading separately.
On a business basis means an activity that is planned and set up to last for some time. It is not about profit in the tax sense, but about the operation not being purely occasional.
Normally for remuneration describes the nature of the service, not whether payment happened in the individual case. Services that are usually paid for fall within it, even where a single use is free.
Why no simple yes-or-no follows from that
Because both elements call for an assessment. A channel on which paid collaborations have appeared regularly for two years sits differently from an account where somebody once showed a product they had been given.
Anyone who finds themselves in the middle should not let the question rest. Putting up a legal notice where it might not be required costs nothing. Leaving it out where it was required is the more expensive mistake, because it gets noticed from outside.
What goes in it
The law requires information kept easily recognisable, directly accessible and constantly available. For a natural person producing videos independently, that is essentially the name, an address at which they can be served, and details enabling rapid electronic contact, usually an email address.
Depending on the situation, more follows: the VAT identification number where one exists, register details for registered companies, and, for regulated professions, the competent chamber and the professional title.
What does not suffice. A post office box instead of an address for service. A contact form as the only channel. And a reference to "contact me by direct message", because that ties reachability to a platform.
The point that causes the most discomfort
The address. Anyone working from home is publishing their home address, and for many that is the real reason to postpone the whole thing.
The usual ways out are known and each comes with limits: a business address, a coworking contract, or a provider supplying an address for service. What does not work is leaving the address out and hoping nobody asks.
The page in five lines
Anyone wanting it done writes the following and is finished:
- First and last name, as it also appears on invoices.
- An address for service, street, number, postcode, town.
- An email address that is actually read.
- The VAT identification number, where one exists.
- Responsible for the content, with the same name and the same address.
Five lines, written once, valid for years. The effort does not arise in the writing but in the postponing.
The objection that delays it
"But I am not a company." That addresses the legal form and not the criterion. The duty does not attach to a company but to a service run on a business basis; an individual regularly publishing paid collaborations can fall within it without ever having founded anything.
The second objection is more honest and helps just as little: "Nobody reads it." It is indeed rarely read, but it is looked for precisely when somebody has a reason to, and at that moment it is either there or it is not.
Where you put it
Here is the properly German problem, because no network has a field for it and the biography often runs to a hundred and fifty characters.
The common solution is a link. You set up a plain page, call it the legal notice, and link to it from the profile. What matters is only that the link's label recognisably leads there and that the page is readable without further clicks.
What goes wrong. An aggregated link service whose landing page carries the entry among eight others does not make the information directly accessible. Where such a service is used, the legal notice belongs at the top and not at the bottom.
One channel, several networks
The page is created once and linked from every profile. That is the whole effort, and it arises only once. What does not work is a legal notice on one network and none on the other three.
Why the brand looks at it
For a company booking creators, an existing legal notice is a simple signal: this person runs their channel as an activity and not as a hobby.
That has a practical side effect that is rarely named. Choosing between two comparable offers, a missing legal notice counts against whoever lacks it, because it burdens the collaboration with an open question from the start.
Sources
Checked on 8 September 2026. This guide is not legal advice and does not replace an assessment of the individual case. Where this guide and the official source disagree, the source prevails.
