Tech Notes – Page 4 – digital innovation & civil liberties (+DSA)

Posted in Art. 12 EcomD, Art. 13 EcomD, Art. 14 EcomD, safe harbours

CJEU on Applicability of the Safe Harbors to Free-of-Charge Websites

CJEU seems to be on copyright spree these days. Technische Universität Darmstadt C-117/13 , Deckmyn C-201/13 , Commission v Council C-114/12 , Pez Hejduk C-441/13 and Art & Allposters C-419/13 are all the cases I hope to be able to come back to on this blog. While these cases can wait, CJEU’s new

#CETA: Should Canadian Internet Intermediaries Worry?

The Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) is a proposed free trade agreement between Canada and the European Union. It is yet another alphabet soup that was cooked by our dear policy makers without first asking the public if it is hungry for any change of intellectual property protection/enforcement. As most of the other alphabet

Austrian Supreme Court Confirms Open-Ended Website Blocking Injunctions [UPC Telekabel Wien]

Last Thursday, the Austrian Supreme Court (OGH) issued the decision (OGH, 4 Ob 71/14s) in the proceedings that gave rise to the UPC Telekabel C-314/12 reference before the Court of Justice of the European Union. OGH confirmed the lower court decision, which granted an open-ended website blocking injunction against the biggest Austrian ISP. Although the

Posted in Art. 12 EcomD, privacy, Tor

Austrian Court Sentenced a Tor Exit Node Operator

Last week, Austrian Regional Criminal Court in Graz (Landesgericht für Strafsachen in Graz) sentenced 22-year old William Weber to 3 months jail time with 3 years probation period for aiding distribution of child pornography by operating a Tor Exit Node, according to FutureZone.at. For those who don’t know Tor Project, it is a Free Software

Posted in Art. 14 EcomD, defamation, ECHR, freedom of expression

ECtHR: Delfi AS v Estonia Hearing

Today, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights is holding a hearing in an important intermediary liability case – Delfi AS v. Estonia (web-stream here). The Court is hoped to correct many issues which the Chamber judgement so flagrantly overlooked, and as a consequence alarmed 69 organizations to support the re-hearing of

Should We Centralize the Right to be Forgotten Clearing House?

Being in Silicon Valley during the time when the honourable Court of Justice of the European Union “cracks” its epic right to be forgotten ruling, is a very interesting social experience. Suddenly, the European part of you receives a strange lot of attention among tech folks in all the small talks. No wonder.

Posted in BGH, CJEU, data protection, data scraping, database right, unfair comptetition

BGH: Screen Scraping Does Not Constitute Unfair Competition

German Federal Supreme Court (BGH) is in a new case on meta search engines and screen scraping — Flugvermittlung im Internet, I ZR 224/12 — again proving its superior expertise and better sense of the real world compared to the Court of Justice of the EU. In a case involving notorious litigant Ryaniar who sued

Posted in CJEU, data protection, data retention, EU, privacy

Data Retention Challenge Earns Historical Victory for Privacy

I am sure all of you already know by this time about the epic privacy ruling – Digital Rights Ireland C-293/12 – that the Court of Justice of the EU yesterday handed down. This post won’t be a usual legal analysis on which you are used to. I think that more learned colleagues and experts

Posted in Art. 5(3), Court of Justice, jurisdiction

CJEU Confirms Pinckney Ruling

For all the private international law & IP law enthusiast, it might of interest that in the meantime of waiting for Coty Prestige C-360/12 ruling, the CJEU issued its Hi Hotel C-387/12 ruling last week (without an advice from Advocate General). Hi Hotel partially pre-determines the outcome of Coty Prestige with the main message –

Posted in Art. 11 EnforD, Art. 8(3) InfoSoc, CJEU, website blocking, webstreaming

CJEU Allowed Website Blocking Injunctions With Some Reservations

So the CJEU finally issued its UPC Telekabel Wien C-314/12 decision. It contains several good points, but also some missed opportunities (the rejections of a need of specific measures is quite a disappointment), and black-box type of issues, where only the time will tell. But before I get to the ruling, it is very interesting