Denmark intervenes in EU court case over publishers' rights

The Danish government has filed a written intervention in ​the European Court of Justice's ​case pitting tech companies against Belgium's government, citing ​the potential impact of the case on the rights of Danish media houses, the Culture Ministry said on Monday.

Streamz, Google, Meta, Spotify, and Sony filed ‌a lawsuit against ⁠the ⁠Belgian government in 2023. They did so primarily because they believe that Belgium's implementation of Article 15 of the Digital Single Market (DSM) Directive undermines EU law concerning press publishers' rights.

The government has decided to intervene in the Streamz case, as it is known, in favour of Belgium and participate in the oral hearing on ⁠July 6-7.


‌Denmark will primarily focus on ensuring that Meta ​and other ​tech giants are held accountable for paying for ⁠newspaper articles or other content uploaded to their platforms.

​The Culture Ministry participates in a Danish procedural ​delegation intervening in the case.

According to the ministry, a ruling in favour of Google, Spotify, Meta, Streamz and Sony could dilute press publishers' rights under the DSM directive.

At the oral hearing, Denmark will urge the ECJ to clearly define the ‌scope of press publishers' rights, and the responsibility that tech giants have to pay the press publishers ​when the ​publishers' content appears on ⁠their platforms.

Denmark's Culture Minister Zenia Stampe said tech giants should not be allowed to use media content without paying for it.

"In ​the end, it hits the Danish media hard and damages our democracy," Stampe added.

In addition to the Streamz case, Denmark has also participated in the landmark European copyright lawsuit dealing with the legality of Google's training of artificial intelligence on press releases.