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DMCA Protects Video Site, Judge Says

By Robert J. Ambrogi

In what is being hailed as a major victory for video-hosting sites, a federal judge in Los Angeles has dismissed Universal Music Group's copyright case against Veoh, a video site that allows users to share videos. Finding that Veoh qualifies for protection under the safe harbor provision of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, U.S. District Judge A. Howard Matz granted summary judgment dismissing Universal's suit. Universal's lawsuit contended that Veoh was aware of infringing material on its site and failed to remove it promptly. "But Veoh has shown that when it did acquire knowledge of allegedly infringing material -- whether from DMCA notices, informal notices, or other means -- it expeditiously removed such material," Matz concluded. The burden of policing copyright infringement rests on the copyright owner, he said, and a service provider is not obligated to affirmatively investigate "red flags." The judge also rejected Universal's contention that Veoh had actual knowledge of copyright infringement because it "knew that it was hosting an entire category of content -- music -- that was subject to copyright protection." To that, Matz said: If merely hosting user-contributed material capable of copyright protection were enough to impute actual knowledge to a service provider, the...

Full post as published by Legal Blog Watch on September 15, 2009 (boomark / email).