2011-05-02 11:15:11
With respect to the Baidu Library case, Kong Xiangjun, the president of the Third Civil Division of Supreme People's Court, expressed on April 19 that the Supreme Court would draw up a judicial interpretation on network copyright to match the principles of Safe Harbor Rule.
Baidu taking Safe Harbor Rule as an excuse of infringement
In the second half of 2010, Dangdang, Hudong, SNDA, Motie Book and other companies required Baidu to remove the infringing books from its library. Since then, 22 authors including Li Cheng, Dangnian Mingyue, Han Han, Zhu Deyong, Peng Haoxiang and Lu Chuan jointly released a statement claiming they would sue Baidu Library for infringing copyrights. China Written Works Copyright Society also issued a statement to support the right holders' indictment against Baidu and called for relevant publishing houses, private publication agencies and writers to jointly sue Baidu to safeguard their legitimate rights.
Baidu responded that all the manuscripts and data were uploaded by netizens and Baidu itself has never uploaded infringing works; therefore, Baidu hasn’t infringed upon the interests of publishers at all.
It's reported that Baidu is using Safe Harbor Rule, that is, for Internet companies which do not create contents, it's responsible to remove the contents when required; if not required, it is not responsible for the genuineness of any content.
Internet copyright infringements accounting for half of all copyright disputes
At the press conference, when asked about the infringement issue of Baidu Library, Kong Xiangjun said he was currently unsure whether Baidu had entered proceedings in local courts.
He said that the copyright infringing cases accounted for half of all IP disputes and infringements involved with Internet copyright accounted for half of all the copyright infringing cases. When ruling the cases related with Internet copyright, the court should take into consideration of the following aspects: IPR protection, the development of network technology and user's information right to hear and rule.
Kong also said, "With respect to the Safe Harbor Rule, the Supreme People's Court will draw up a judicial interpretation on Internet copyright cases and will clarify the principles of Safe Harbor Rule to protect the rights of copyright owners, Internet service providers as well as users."
Related news:
6,000 people incriminated for IP infringement
On April 19, 2011, the Supreme People's Court issued the White Paper on Intellectual Property Judicial Protection by Chinese Courts in 2010. As indicated in the paper, the IP related cases of first instance increased by 7.7% from last year; 6,000 people were thus incriminated.
It was stipulated in the paper that in 2010 the courts at all levelshad rendered IP related civil decisions for 41,718, withe an increase of 36.74% over 2009, concluded 2,590 IP administrative cases of first instance, up 25%, and approved 1,254 criminal cases, up 24.53%.