Supreme Court of Lithuania, Civil Case No. 3K-3-586/2012

Document type
Court Decision
Country
(1) The court explained that claim against an information society service provider for removal of illegal information can be made regardless of whether he is a passive intermediary (when his activity is of technical, automatic, and passive nature), or actively collects information about the service recipients. This distinction is relevant only for determining the liability of the service provider. If service provider plays an active role so that it has knowledge or control of the hosted data, such service provide can be held liable for dissemination of unlawful information, and limitation of liability which is applicable to hosting intermediaries, does not apply to such active service provider.
(2) The court also clarified that take down requests must be resolved even if the service recipient is unknown or does not participate in the proceedings.
(3) The obligation to remove transmitted and (or) stored illegal information cannot be identified as a defining the application of legal liability (civil, administrative, criminal) of a service provider for illegal information storage and dissemination. The request to remove illegal information from a web page is an independent legal remedy for non-pecuniary damage (i.e. non-contractual liability) thus fewer facts must to be met in order to adjust the claim and it does not depend on the application of civil liability of the information society service provider. When requiring to remove transmitted and (or) stored illegal information, circumstances that must to be proved are: the illegality (sensitivity) of the information, the fact of transmission and (or) storage and the fact that the defendant is an information society service provider.
Country
Year
2012
Topic, claim, or defense
General or Non-Specified
Document type
Court Decision
Issuing entity
Highest Domestic/National (including State) Court
Type of service provider
General or Non-Specified
Issues addressed
Notice Formalities
Trigger for OSP obligations
OSP obligation considered
Block or Remove
Type of law
Civil
General intermediary liability model
Takedown/Act Upon Knowledge (Includes Notice and Takedown)