Court Sides With Video Site Veoh in Copyright Lawsuit

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on August 28, 2008 - 8:13am.

San Francisco - A federal court has dismissed a copyright infringement claim against video-hosting site Veoh, saying that the company had done what was required under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) to respect copyrights, Reuters reported. Adult entertainment company Io Group filed suit against Veoh when ten of its videos showed up on the site, but did not first file a takedown notice, as is stipulated under the DMCA. The company argued that Veoh should be responsible for reviewing all videos uploaded to its site before they become available for viewing.

U.S. District Judge Howard Lloyd disagreed, though, saying Veoh did its duty under the DMCA when it removed the videos.

"The DMCA was intended to facilitate the growth of electronic commerce, not squelch it... The court finds no reasonable juror could conclude that a comprehensive review of every file would be feasible," Judge Lloyd wrote, in his ruling.

Fellow video-hosting site YouTube (NASD: GOOG) praised the decision.

"It is great to see the court confirm that the DMCA protects services like YouTube that follow the law and respect copyrights," chief counsel Zahavah Levine told Reuters.

However, Judge Lloyd cautioned against seeing the ruling as precedent-setting.

"The decision rendered here is confined to the particular combination of facts in this case and is not intended to push the bounds of the safe harbor so wide that less than scrupulous service providers may claim its protection," Judge Lloyd wrote.

Viacom (NYSE: VIA), which has a $1 billion copyright lawsuit pending against YouTube, also commented for Reuters.

"YouTube is a business built on infringement that has failed to take reasonable measures to respect the rights of creators and content owners. Google and YouTube have engaged in massive copyright infringement -- conduct that is not protected by any law, including the DMCA."