Google told to remove Belgian news reprints
A Belgian Court has ordered US internet search giant Google to stop reproducing articles, photos and graphics from French and German language Belgian newspapers on its news site from Tuesday.
By Agencies |
BRUSSELS: A Belgian Court has ordered US internet search giant Google to stop reproducing articles, photos and graphics from French and German language Belgian newspapers on its news site from Tuesday.
Under the judgement handed down on September 5, the Brussels court ruled that Google must pay a euro1m fine daily if it does not comply.
The internet group was liable to pay another half a million euros per day if it failed to publish the ruling on its Belgian website “google.be” continuously for five days with 10 days of being notified of the court’s ruling.
The case was brought by Copiepresse, which represents French and German language papers in Belgium including Le Soir and Libre Belgique.
“The way in which Google News currently operates causes the publishers of the daily press to lose control of their websites and their contents,” the court ruled.
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A report from an expert witness, submitted in court, said that “the use of Google News circumvents the advertising of the publishers who get a considerable amount of their revenue from these advertisements.”It said that “Google News short-circuits many other elements” like references to copyright protection or the authorisation of the use of data. In a statement, Google said it “only found out about this lawsuit and the court’s decision ...almost two weeks after the actual hearing. As a result we were not able to make our case directly to the judge.”
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