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Ninth Circuit Says Fair Use Must Be Considered In DMCA Takedowns

By Scott Graham
October 02, 2015

Copyright holders must take into account fair use defenses before demanding that services such as YouTube take down unauthorized content, the Ninth Circuit ruled last month.

But in a break for the recording and motion picture industries, the court further ruled that copyright owners will not be subject to damages, if they acted in good faith. Meeting that standard will not typically require a “searching or intensive” review of fair use law, Judge Richard Tallman wrote for a 2-1 majority in Lenz v. Universal Music, No. 13-1606 (Ninth Cir Sept. 14, 2015).

The decision leaves open the possibility that content creators and service providers ' such as Google Inc. and YouTube ' can use computer analytics to identify unauthorized material on the Web, Tallman wrote. That's true only if the computer analytics can somehow account for fair use, Judge Milan Smith Jr. argued in dissent.

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