The court of St. Petersburg has established the status “Vkontakte” as an honest information broker, who is not engaged in the sale of phonograms and gets no profit.
MOSCOW, 7 Oct. The court of St. Petersburg on Wednesday issued its reasoning in part on the claims of the record companies Sony Music Russia, Universal Music Russia and Warner Music UK against “Vkontakte”, according to which social network is recognized as honest information broker, who is not engaged in the sale of phonograms and gets no profit, said Wednesday the owner of the social networking company Mail.Ru Group.
Three record companies in 2014 have filed against the social network three independent claim in arbitration court of St.-Petersburg and Leningrad region. The company demanded the protection of their exclusive rights to phonogram and compensation of the damage suffered. The total amount of claims amounted to 51 million rubles. In July 2015, “Vkontakte” and Sony Music Russia entered into a settlement agreement which has not been disclosed.
International Federation of producers of phonograms (IFPI) in late September reported that the court in the proceedings on the claims of the companies Universal Music and Warner Music has ordered the social network “Vkontakte” to implement effective technology content filtering to prevent copyright infringement of two record companies. In turn, the social network stated that this technology (acoustic fingerprints) is already in use.
“The court found the status “Vkontakte” as an honest information broker, who is not engaged in the sale of phonograms and gets no profit. The court stated the existence of a social network preventive measures in order to protect the holders of rights, as well as to confirm availability and the actual work of acoustic fingerprint”, — stated in the message Mail.ru Group.
“Moreover, the court found that the actions of the plaintiffs were not directed on the effective suppression of violations of their rights, because plaintiff was not given the opportunity to execute the submitted statement of violation. At the same time, the social network VK in good faith prevented the breach as soon as it became possible — it is proven that the repeated loading of the disputed phonograms impossible, and demonstrated a willingness to cooperate”, — stated in the message.
In addition, the court concluded that the social network “VK neither knew nor should have known of the illegality of the use of phonograms on the site until the appropriate treatment, and plaintiffs in the appeal not only did not provide proof of ownership, but did not identify the violations,” according to Mail.Ru Group.
