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Court Decision

Payam Tamiz v Google Inc [2013] EWCA Civ 68

The claimant in those proceedings complained about the defamatory comments posted on a blog hosted on Blogger.com, a website operated by Google. It was held that once Google is notified of the defamatory comments on Blogger and fails to remove them within a reasonable time, it might incur liability as the “secondary” publisher of said content. Regarding the defence set out in s. 1 of the Defamation Act 1996 (see above), it was held that Google could not be regarded as the publisher of the comments within the meaning of s. 1(2), and while the company was found to have taken reasonable care with regards to the publication of the statement, it could be denied the defence due to the finding that it knew or should have known that its activity is likely to prolong the publication of the defamatory material. However, the s. 1...
Court Decision

Davison v Habeeb and others [2011] EWHC 3031 (QB)

This case concerned a defamatory blog post which appeared on Blogger.com, a website operated by Google. The claimant sought to make Google liable as a publisher of the defamatory statement. Despite the case having been ultimately dismissed due to there being no “real and substantial tort” (only five people were proven to have accessed the defamatory statement), the court found that - at least following the notification - Google can be liable for the defamatory statements posted on Blogger, as a publisher. It’s also worth to add that the court decided that Google could be protected in this case by the “hosting” safe harbour set out in reg. 19 of the E-Commerce Regulations 2002 (see above).
Court Decision

Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp v British Telecommunications plc [2011] EWHC 1981 (Ch)

The “Newzbin 2” case. Shortly after the decision in Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp v Newzbin Ltd 2010 (described below), the Usenet indexing service was reactivated as Newzbin2. Upon noticing the reinstatement of the convicted website, Fox and other copyright owners successfully applied for a blocking injunction against Newzbin2, based on section 97A of the CDPA 1988 (see above). The requested injunction was aimed at forcing BT (the largest ISP in UK) to prevent its subscribers from accessing the Newzbin2 website.
Court Decision

ITV Broadcasting Ltd v TV Catchup Ltd [2011] EWHC 1874 (Pat)

The defendant operated a website based on free, unauthorised live streaming of television programmes; including those protected by the claimant’s copyright. It was provisionally decided that the defendant’s service did infringe upon the right of communication to the public and the right to reproduction; however the court decided to refer a series of questions to the CJEU, which were covered in the case C-607/11 ITV Broadcasting Ltd v TV Catchup Ltd. The CJEU is currently considering a further reference made in the same proceedings.