Study of the SM Higgs boson in the $ZZ$ channel at CMS

On July 4^th, 2012 the ATLAS and CMS collaborations announced the discovery of a new Higgs-like resonance at a mass of about 126 GeV. To determine if the observed resonance is compatible with a SM Higgs boson, the resonance characteristics (mass, couplings, spin) must be measured with high precision. The ZZ channel (H -> ZZ^* -> 4l, l = e,mu) is one of the most promising channels for these measurements. The CMS analysis H -> ZZ^* -> 4l is presented, covering its most important aspects: lepton identification, isolation variables, kinematics, event selection, and background control. The talk presents the most recent CMS results on the search for the standard model Higgs boson in the ZZ channel, using the full dataset recorded at the LHC from pp collisions at centre of mass energies of 7 and 8 TeV. The properties of the new boson, such as the mass and spin, are discussed in detail.