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What is an address?
Two men in front of a YouTube logo
Photo: Dado Ruvic / REUTERS
If a rights holder sues because someone has illegally uploaded a film on YouTube, the Google subsidiary only has to give the plaintiff the name and postal address of the user.
Further data such as the e-mail address, telephone number or the IP address of the connection used to upload the respective film, however, could not be required, the Federal Court of Justice (BGH) ruled on Thursday in Karlsruhe (Az. I ZR 153/17).
One is bound to a corresponding decision of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) from July, said the presiding judge of the 1st civil senate, Thomas Koch.
The background to this is a lawsuit brought by the film collecting company Constantin for comprehensive information.
The specific case concerns films that have been uploaded to YouTube and viewed thousands of times before they were blocked.
There is a dispute between the two sides as to what information YouTube has to provide about the users who have uploaded the films.
A regulation added to the Copyright Act in 1990 obliges operators to provide "names and addresses".
According to YouTube, neither is available in the cases that landed before the Federal Court of Justice.
The film distributor Constantin therefore wanted to find out the e-mail addresses and telephone numbers of three users who had put the films "Parker" and "Scary Movie 5" on YouTube in 2013 and 2014.
Constantin also wanted to know which IP addresses were used.
The BGH initially suspended the proceedings and asked the ECJ to clarify what is meant by the word “address” in the relevant directive (Az. C-264/19).
According to EU law, an address is a postal address
more on the subject
Legal dispute over illegal film uploads: ECJ should comment on YouTube's obligations to provide information
The European Court of Justice then found that this usually only records the postal address.
If the term "address" is not further specified, as in the directive, it does not refer to an email address, telephone number or IP address.
The ECJ also pointed out that the EU states could grant rights holders a further right to information.
However, an appropriate balance between the various fundamental rights must be guaranteed and the principle of proportionality must be observed.
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mak / afp / dpa
