Zachary Nelson
Matthew RimmerGoogle sues people who “weaponized” #DMCA to remove rivals’ search results https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2023/11/google-sues-people-who-weaponized-dmca-to-remove-rivals-search-results/ Google's lawsuit charges defendants with misrepresentation of #copyright infringement, breach of contract, and intentional interference with contractual relations. Google seeks financial damages, court costs, and an injunction prohibiting the activity described in the lawsuit. The requested injunction would also prohibit defendants from "creating or attempting to create any Gmail accounts" and from "using any Google products or services to promote any of Defendants' websites or products."
James Akers@drrimmer I found myself applauding this until I remembered that Google is such a giant company that they probably don't really need the money. Perhaps the damages money could be sent to those who were unjustly taken down from those illegitimate DMCA requests? After all, Google should have that information from their indefinite data retention policies.
Kathleen Lu@JamesAkers @drrimmer given that the defendants are in Vietnam, Google will likely never be able to collect a single penny in damages.
@kathleenthelaw @drrimmer hopefully Google at least pays attention to future DMCA requests... Assuming they don't have too many requests to review
@JamesAkers @drrimmer They have too many to review. What they might be able to do with an injunction is be more aggressive with their fraud detection algorithms, where it gives them a better defense should those algorithms overcorrect.