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This case considered the relative jurisdiction of EU Member States under the Brussels I convention in a copyright case involving online CD sales. It concluded that mere site accessibility, rather than targeting, could be enough to support jurisdiction. It noted that copyright was distinct from other claims previously considered by the court, both because of specific provisions in the Regulation and because copyright arises simultaneously in all Member States. As the court explained its reasoning, "Article 5(3) of Council Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 of 22 December 2000 on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters must be interpreted as meaning that, in the event of alleged infringement of copyrights protected by the Member State of the court seised, the latter has...

(1) The ECJ was asked to decide whether sites that link to streams are responsible for communicating copyrighted works to the public. In this case, the defendant operated a website based on free, unauthorised live streaming of television programmes, including those protected by the claimant’s copyright. (2) The ECJ confirmed that any retransmission of a terrestrial television broadcast over the Internet constitutes a communication to the public. In particular, the concept of ‘communication to the public’ covers a retransmission of the works included in a terrestrial television broadcast (a) where the retransmission is made by an organisation other than the original broadcaster, (b) by means of an internet stream made available to the subscribers of that other organisation who may receive that retransmission by logging...

The ECJ had to decide whether a Belgian court could require Netlog, the Belgian equivalent to Facebook, to immediately cease making available works from SABAM‘s repertoire by installing a filtering system, which would oblige Netlog to actively monitor all the data of its users and to prevent future IPR-infringements. The ECJ decided that European law must be interpreted as precluding a national court from issuing an injunction against a hosting service provider which requires it to install a system for filtering: (1) information which is stored on its servers by its service users; (2) which applies indiscriminately to all of those users; (3) as a preventative measure; (4) exclusively at its expense; and (5) for an unlimited period, (6) which is capable of identifying electronic files containing musical, cinematographic...

(1) The ECJ had to decide whether a Belgian collective rights managment organization (SABAM) could require an internet service provider, namely Scarlet and Tiscali, to install a filtering system with a view to preventing the illegal downloading of files. (2) The ECJ ruled that EU law must must be interpreted as precluding an injunction made against an internet service provider which requires it to install a system for filtering (i) all electronic communications passing via its services, in particular those involving the use of peer-to-peer software; (ii) which applies indiscriminately to all its customers; (iii) as a preventive measure; (iv) exclusively at its expense; and (v) for an unlimited period, (vi) which is capable of identifying on that provider’s network the movement of electronic files containing a musical...

Promusicae sought an order from a commercial court in Spain to force Telefónica, a Spanish ISP, to divulge identities corresponding to IP addresses that Promusicae had collected in its own investigations of illegal file sharing. The Spanish court granted Promusicae’s request. Telefónica appealed to the ECJ in regards the interpretations of the Community Law, Articles 15(2) and 18 of Directive 2000/31, Article 8(1) and (2) of Directive 2001/29, Article 8 of Directive 2004/48 and Articles 17(2) and 47 of the Charter on the limits of ISPs’ responsibilities to assist in criminal investigation versus civil proceedings. Balancing ISP customers’ privacy with content industry’s ability to protect its intellectual property, theECJ held that European law alone does not require ISPs to disclose their subscribers’ identities to...