14 DAY TRIAL // Google has won another YouTube copyright lawsuit, brought against it by content creators. A Spanish court ruled that YouTube was not responsible for the content uploaded by its users and is not obligated to pre-screen content.
Instead, the content owners are the ones responsible for finding infringing videos and notifying YouTube about them. This ruling falls in place with a similar ruling in a case brought against the site in the US by Viacom.
"Today a federal court in Madrid dismissed charges of copyright infringement against YouTube," Aaron Ferstman, Head of Communications for YouTube - Europe, the Middle East and Africa, announced.
"This decision is a clear victory for the Internet and the rules that govern it. Spanish broadcaster Telecinco had claimed that YouTube should be liable when users upload copyright-infringing material," he added.
"The court rejected Telecinco’s claim, noting that YouTube offers content owners tools to remove copyright infringing content and this means that it is the responsibility of the copyright owner – not YouTube – to identify and tell YouTube when infringing content is on its website," he explained.
Google's blog post goes on to list the same arguments it has made in all similar cases. It believes that the ruling provides for a healthy internet.
Without protection for service providers from liability, most of the web's most popular services would not be able to exist and this includes YouTube, but also sites like Flickr and even the mighty Facebook.
Google says it would be impossible to go through the 24-hours worth of material uploaded to YouTube every minute.
Instead, the video sharing site provides one of the most comprehensive filtering technology. Content creators can set up a Content ID account and then have YouTube automatically search every video ever uploaded to see if they infringe.
This defense has worked in the US and it has now been accepted in Spain as well, with the judge saying that YouTube provides owners with the tools to defend themselves so it is not liable.
Unfortunately, a court in Germany didn't see it that way, saying that YouTube is responsible for the actions of its users. Google is appealing that decision.