Japanese manga publishers have declared victory over Cloudflare in a long-running copyright infringement liability dispute. Kadokawa, Kodansha, Shueisha and Shogakukan say that Cloudflare’s refusal to stop manga piracy sites, meant they were left with no other choice but to take legal action. The Tokyo District Court rendered its decision this morning, finding Cloudflare liable for damages after it failed to sufficiently prevent piracy.
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After a wait of more than three and a half years, the Tokyo District Court rendered its decision this morning. In a statement provided to TorrentFreak by the publishers, they declare “Victory Against Cloudflare” after the Court determined that Cloudflare is indeed liable for the pirate sites’ activities.
In a statement provided to TorrentFreak, the publishers explain that they alerted Cloudflare to the massive scale of the infringement, involving over 4,000 works and 300 million monthly visits, but their requests to stop distribution were ignored.
“We requested that the company take measures such as stopping the distribution of pirated content from servers under its management. However, Cloudflare continued to provide services to the manga piracy sites even after receiving notices from the plaintiffs,” the group says.
The publishers add that Cloudflare continued to provide services even after receiving information disclosure orders from U.S. courts, leaving them with “no choice but to file this lawsuit.”
Factors Considered in Determining Liability
Decisions in favor of Cloudflare in the United States have proven valuable over the past several years. Yet while the Tokyo District Court considered many of the same key issues, various factors led to a finding of liability instead, the publishers note.
“The judgment recognized that Cloudflare’s failure to take timely and appropriate action despite receiving infringement notices from the plaintiffs, and its negligent continuation of pirated content distribution, constituted aiding and abetting copyright infringement, and that Cloudflare bears liability for damages to the plaintiffs,” they write.
“The judgment, in that regard, attached importance to the fact that Cloudflare, without conducting any identity verification procedures, had enabled a massive manga piracy site to operate ‘under circumstances where strong anonymity was secured,’ as a basis for recognizing the company’s liability.”
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According to Japanese media, Cloudflare plans to appeal the verdict, which was expected. In comments to the USTR last month, Cloudflare referred to a long-running dispute in Japan with the potential to negatively affect future business.
“One particular dispute reflects years of effort by Japan’s government and its publishing industry to impose additional obligations on intermediaries like CDNs,” the company’s submission reads (pdf).
“A fully adjudicated ruling that finds CDNs liable for monetary damages for infringing material would set a dangerous global precedent and necessitate U.S. CDN providers to limit the provision of global services to avoid liability, severely restricting market growth and expansion into Asian Pacific markets.”
Whether that heralds Cloudflare’s exit from the region is unclear.
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Source: Tokyo Court Finds Cloudflare Liable For Manga Piracy in Long-Running Lawsuit * TorrentFreak
Robin Edgar
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