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Why can some businesses ignore the DMCA?
I understand that the DMCA is a U.S. copyright law, but why can some European server businesses ignore it while others cannot, even though they all operate solely in Europe and are located in the same region, such as the Netherlands? What are the reasons behind this? If a business receives a DMCA notice and does not respond, will they be fined? Why are some businesses able to ignore it? I would like to understand this better.
Comments
Because the ones that ignore DMCA complaints choose to do so as an ethical decision and use upstream resources from other companies that also choose to ignore DMCA complaints
Ones that don’t either choose to act on DMCA complaints or use upstream resources from companies that do act on DMCA complaints preventing them from ignoring DMCA complaints
in short DCMA is only enforceable in the US, however EU countries will most likely have similiar law.
The UK has its own laws similar to the DMCA, primarily the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. So technically in the UK DMCA is ignored but the UK equivilent isn't, I imagine how it works in other countries (most likely will only punish locally made content, although I could be wrong)
Like Jamph said, same with Netherlands too. @LiteServer has explained in their discord that they do not follow US DMCA but NL has their own equivalent DMCA Law that they have to abide by.
However, if Liteserver receives a DMCA email from the United States, they must process it, while other Dutch merchants can ignore DMCA unless they violate their country's laws. Why is this?
Technically I believe they can all ignore it (DMCA) by law, but I imagine for the ones that forward it, its because it less of a headache to forward it and get users to remove it
Yes, in NL we have the "Auteurswet" which is an equivalent of DMCA. Any NL ISP has to comply with this law
Countries that are not the USA do have DMCA equivalent laws, but do those equivalent laws apply to material NOT produced in the US?
Does EUCD not apply only to content created and protected by it?
This is why DMCA abuse exists. People will “enforce” DMCA where it does not apply because its easier to just nuke and forget than actually follow process
If you only receive DMCA emails and do not receive emails that violate your country's laws, will you ask the user to handle it?
I see the scope is broader than I thought. Interesting
I wonder why almost all the abusive use seems to fall under DMCA though. Anyone know?
https://buyvm.net/ Luxembourg
DMCA is only American, Other countries may have similar, weaker versions(most countries), or rarely enforce copyright law in general and make it very expensive and difficult making it not worth it to sue/attempt to charge someone paying $10 a month for a server. Like if someone from Vietnam sends a letter to a US hosting service saying political content they host is illegal then most likely that host will just ignore it because that is a vietnam law - similar concept with DMCA in other countries.
I think DMCA is just synonyms with takedown requests in general. They are most likely receiving abuse notices with the relevant law for their country. I at least know that those I get refer to the European Copyright Act or similar, and not DMCA.
To answer OP, if you own your own IP space and servers then the provider can pretty much do as he pleases. In most cases copyright infringement requests are merely copyright trolls and can be disregarded. Very few established companies want to take this risk though, as according to EU law after they have been made aware of any criminal activity that the provider themselves can be held liable for any misconduct happening on their services.
This is why most take the requests seriously even if there is a minimal risk involved. There is just no point in defending a $3/month customer for such a hassle.
It might just be a question of time before there is a serious copyright notice that will get acted on. This can go many ways and usually ends up in court and can take years. It you aren't well prepared then you can be fined substantial, i.e. company bankrupting amounts.
In the end, I also believe that many companies want to play by the rules and not support hosting illegal content. That's also a great gateway to attracting the wrong kind of clients.
They certainly have, however, the EU mechanisms for enforcing compliance are much-much less developed than the US ones.
So, being an EU company with EU upstreams, you do not have to act on DMCA complaints, however many people use those compaints to detect abusers within their network.
You can't simply have a ToS/AUP saying you ignore the local law and be done with it, yes, ignoring DMCA is legal in the EU, however, IP rights violations are not, so, if you are a legal company, you then have to obey the local law and a DMCA complaint will show you which of your customers are flaunting the EU laws as well.
Of course, replace EU here with other countries. Some are fully non-compliant with the IP rights international regulations, Iran, comes to mind, while others are choosing not to enforce their international obligations, such as Russia and many others, so, in short, it is possible, DMCA is an US law, not an international regulation, but you must take into consideration the local laws at all times.
Non U.S. based companies/hosting providers accepting DMCA itself is illegal since DMCA is U.S. only law. You can't force that law in other countries unless it's government accepts it. Non U.S. companies should accept their own country's copyright infringement law.
In many countries in Europe or Asia or Middle East, you have to get a lawyers letter/subpoena or court order to take down the content. Only few countries allow online form/email to take down content by original copyright holder (just like DMCA in USA) and so this is mis-used.
Let's say I have a article about "dog care" published in 2021. Someone can copy entire article and post on their site with publishing date in 2019 and send a dmca to my web host in USA and they have to take down my content. But there is "counter notice" that i can send to this fake copyright holder and if they don't go in court against me then the host has to re-upload/enable my article. Now how many users will send counter notice? Very few. How many hosts actually work on this/how staff for this. Most big companies like Godaddy/OVH/Hetzner etc might have 2-3 people, rest, the owner of hosting company itself handles abuse reports.
Also, in DMCA, a user can copy original article from a Europe/Asia based website, and when he receives DMCA he can counter notice it knowing that the original copyright holder has no means/time/money to hire US lawyer and go to U.S. court to take down a picture/article, right? Who goes to court are big corporations like HBO, Disney, Sony, or some wealthy artist/photographer/painter, etc.
So DMCA is used by most web hosts, outside U.S is because they don't want to deal with lawyer letters and court orders. One dmca email and they will take down your article. 10 dmca emails and may be they'll take your entire site down. That's what many times happens. In DMCA there is no one to verify who is actual/original owner of the content. Its neither job of hosting provider, but they have to abide by dmca law and remove content as if their customer is guilty. and this is where it gets troublesome for original creators.
I like to host in countries where there is a serious copyright laws and only true, genuine owner goes to lawyer (as it requires $$$) to take down content, that means, they'll not fake a complaint and take down my original work. whereas in dmca, sitting a home in front of your computer, you can take down anyone's content and that's the big mis-use of dmca. It had done more harm than good. DMCA was brought by those tv/music/movie companies as they wanted some easy DIY measure than going to courts.
P.S. i know some hosts/domain registrar in HK/China who require a real, registered copyright-letter (that is you have to go to coypright office to register and pay for your art work/photo/article/blog post) and if you have such registered copyright, then only they'll take down the infringing content)