Germany group trademarks far-right codes to choke hate merch revenue

A Hamburg anti-right-wing extremism nonprofit has tried to starve hate groups at the cash register by claiming trademark rights over far-right codes, slogans and symbols that extremists have used to sell shirts and other merchandise. The campaign, Rights Against the Right, treats trademark law as a legal trapdoor: if a code can be registered and controlled, it cannot be freely monetized by the groups that trade in it.

Laut gegen Nazis e.V., founded in August 2004 by music producer Jörn Menge, launched the project in 2024 with the Berlin agency Jung von Matt. The idea grew out of a blunt reality in Germany: many Nazi symbols are already banned, but extremist networks have adapted by using abbreviations, coded phrases and numbers that can still move through online stores and streetwear channels. The group’s answer has been to file trademarks for those codes and block their commercial use.

The campaign later fed into Fashion against Fascism, an open-source database that Laut gegen Nazis said contained almost 200 far-right codes in April 2024. The database was built to be used through an API and a web crawler so brands and marketplaces can screen listings for extremist language before it turns into revenue. Zalando said the initiative was being developed with partners including ABOUT YOU, Avocadostore, BAUR, bevh, bonprix, Fast Forward, Underpressure and Vinted, turning the effort into a wider retail filter rather than a one-off publicity move.

That approach has already been tested in court against Tommy Frenck, the Thuringian neo-Nazi who ran the online shop Druck18 and was described as a central figure in the right-wing extremist scene. The shop was portrayed as one of Germany’s highest-revenue far-right merchandise networks, and a court later confirmed the legality of Laut gegen Nazis’ trademark approach in summary proceedings while ordering Frenck to pay legal and procedural costs. Frenck has also been linked to the neo-Nazi beer Deutsches Reichsbräu, which DW reported was advertised at €18.88, a number sequence with neo-Nazi coded meaning.

Germany’s trademark system gives the campaign its leverage. Protection can arise through registration at the German Patent and Trademark Office or through acquired reputation from use, and applicants are expected to check for earlier rights before filing. The DPMA examines absolute grounds for refusal during the application process, while conflicts with earlier rights can be raised through opposition or cancellation. That legal structure has made trademark law a rare commercial choke point against extremist branding.

The strategy has already been praised in award listings as “the first trademark that stops trading Nazi merch,” and it has expanded to target newer coded symbols such as ESSESS, which coverage said was used by far-right groups to spread ideology and generate income. For democracies looking for ways to cut off hate movements without turning every ugly symbol into a fresh free-expression fight, Germany’s experiment suggests one narrow but potent model: attack the business model, not just the rhetoric.