14 DAY TRIAL // Google and copyright have never mixed very well. The company is a strong believer in ‘fair use’ and seems to have a relaxed, though cautious, attitude towards the issue. It proved this with Google Books, for which it got sued, and it proved it with YouTube, to a degree, and it got sued for that as well. It hasn’t lost either case, mind you, and the main search engine seems largely impervious to this kind of attacks, anyway.
That, though, may change, as the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) has filed a request with Google to remove search results that lead to what it claims are pages containing infringing files. But what’s unique about this request is that it also listed several file-locker sites by their main URL, not the address of a specific file.
The BPI claims that it regularly asks Google to remove links like this. Usually, it says, Google complies, based on its own internal procedures. It’s not much of a secret that Google is willing to remove search results at the request of companies, in case of copyright infringement, or of governments and agencies, depending on the local laws. While it is willing to go to the extremes of what the law allows, like with Google Books, it usually plays it safe.
But, so far, there have been few requests from the major labels, despite their usual fervor when pursuing these issues. Even the RIAA didn’t feel it could take on Google. In the case of the BPI, which is in a way the British equivalent of the RIAA, it may be that it is going a bit beyond what the major labels would want, especially with the rumored Google Music service coming later this year.
However, it looks like Google hasn’t actually stricken a deal with any of the major labels yet, and the inclusion of the entire websites in the BPI filing rather than individual files may signal another direction from the music groups. Techdirt speculates that this move may lay down the groundwork for legal action against Google, in the event that Viacom wins its lawsuit against YouTube.
What’s more, Torrent Freak has uncovered another filing with Google, this time from IFPI, which is asking it, more or less, to remove all search results linking to the Pirate Bay. It remains to be seen if this is really the beginning of a stronger stance against mainstream search engines or even of a legal battle.