In a decision of last Friday, the 21st Civil Chamber of the Munich I Regional Court referred questions on the interpretation of European regulations on copyright to the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg in a so-called preliminary ruling.
The background is a legal dispute in which a publishing house sued the owner of an internet connection for damages because an audio book by the author D. B. was offered for download to other internet users via the latter's connection by way of file sharing without authorisation. The defendant denied having committed the infringement. At the same time, he stated that his parents had also had access to his internet connection.
The Regional Court understands a recently published decision of the Federal Court of Justice (Case No. I ZR 154/15) on file sharing to mean that in this factual situation, liability for damages on the part of the connection owner is excluded, since third parties can also be considered as perpetrators of the infringement. However, since an action by the publisher against the parents, who are only known to have had general access to the internet connection in question, is also unlikely to have any chance of success, the Chamber referred the question to the European Court of Justice as to whether such a handling of the copyright claim for damages constitutes an effective and dissuasive sanction for copyright infringements by way of file sharing, as required by European law from the Member States (Directive 2001/29/EC and 2004/48/EC).
Source: Press release 01/17 of the Munich Regional Court I in civil matters
Goldberg Attorneys at Law 2017
Attorney at Law Michael Ullrich, LL.M. (Information Law)
Specialist lawyer for information technology law
E-mail: info@goldberg.de
