The §34a Sachkundeprüfung draws every written question from seven legal subject areas set out in § 7 BewachV. Here is what each one actually asks you to know, straight from the regulation and the statutes behind it.
What does public security and order law cover?
This area centres on a negative rule: taking a security job gives you no sovereign powers. A guard acts with the same rights as any private person, plus whatever the client delegates from their own domestic authority under house rights. Article 1(3) of the Basic Law binds state authority, not private guards, to the fundamental rights, but that does not mean a guard may freely infringe someone else’s rights either. This subject area also covers trade law and § 34a of the Gewerbeordnung itself, the licence requirement that makes the whole exam necessary in the first place.
What does data protection law cover?
Security work generates personal data constantly: video footage, visitor lists, incident reports. The GDPR does not permit collecting or storing any of it automatically. Every processing operation needs a legal basis, and in day-to-day guarding that basis is almost always the legitimate interest ground in Article 6(1)(f) GDPR, weighed against the rights of the person being recorded or logged. This subject area draws on the GDPR and the Bundesdatenschutzgesetz as they apply specifically to guarding.
What does the Bürgerliches Gesetzbuch (BGB) section cover?
The Civil Code gives a guard two things at once: justification for interventions that would otherwise be a civil wrong, and liability when those interventions go too far. The central provision is § 227 BGB, self-defence, which requires a present, unlawful attack. Exam questions in this area also touch possession, property, house rights, and found-property rules, and the most common trap is applying self-defence to an attack that has already ended.
What does criminal and criminal procedure law cover?
Provisional arrest under § 127(1) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (StPO) is the sharpest power a guard holds, and one of the most frequently misapplied. It requires catching or pursuing someone in the act, with the person either suspected of fleeing or unable to have their identity established on the spot, and it permits holding them only until the police arrive, nothing more. This subject area also covers the StGB more broadly, weapons handling under the Waffengesetz, and the everyday citizen’s-arrest and self-defence rights that apply to any private person.
What does the accident-prevention subject area cover?
This section is built on DGUV Vorschrift 23, the accident-prevention rule for guard and security services, alongside DGUV Vorschrift 1. It addresses two parties: the operator, who must organise the work and provide the right equipment, and the individual guard, who must follow standing orders. One provision comes up often in exam questions: § 4 of DGUV Vorschrift 23 bars guarding staff from following any client instruction that conflicts with the security assignment itself.
What does “dealing with people” cover?
This subject area is the main focus of the oral exam, which makes it easy to underrate while studying for the written paper. Its guiding principle is simple: help, but do not put yourself in danger, a rule that governs de-escalation technique and behaviour in dangerous situations alike. Helping effectively means organising a response first rather than becoming a second person who needs rescuing, and that applies to a guard just as much as to any bystander.
What does the security technology subject area cover?
The core idea here is that mechanical security has to come first: burglary protection depends on physical barriers, and alarm systems are, as a rule, a supplement to that mechanical protection rather than a replacement for it. Mechanical measures slow an intruder down; alarm and access-control technology shortens the time it takes for someone to respond. This subject area covers mechanical security, alarm and reporting systems, and access control at a basic level.
How are the seven subject areas weighted on the real exam?
Neither the DIHK nor individual Chambers of Industry and Commerce publish an official breakdown of how many of the 82 written questions come from each subject area. Any per-topic question count you see, in this article included, is an estimate of syllabus weight rather than a published quota, so treat exact numbers with caution and make sure your preparation covers all seven areas rather than betting on a particular split.
Every topic above comes from § 7 BewachV, the Bürgerliches Gesetzbuch, the StGB and StPO, the Waffengesetz, the GDPR, and DGUV Vorschrift 23 and Vorschrift 1, all freely available starting from gesetze-im-internet.de. RiverMap Learning’s §34a Sachkunde practice app drills all seven subject areas with original questions that cite the specific provision behind each answer, plus short study notes per subject area for the concepts that trip candidates up most often.