What does anyone think about the news report about Google (owners of You Tube), having to give a full log of everyone who had view a YouTube video and which videos they have view to Viacom due to some copyright thing.

 

Personally I think it sucks.

Edited July 6, 200817 yr by Mark.

Does this mean the users could get in trouble for watching copyrighted material??

I think it's absolutely stupid personally.

 

Are people actually sad enough to crawl through the files of litterally hundreds of millions of people who've watched thousnads of YouTube videos? Oh my. Is a complete invasion of privacy imo.

i dont get it... whats the legal angle? they want to shop people who are viewing unauthorised footage?... whos sad enough to trawl through that?...i dunno..

vlog about this subject here.

 

Article

--------------------------------------------------

Google must divulge YouTube log

Source: bbc.co.uk

 

Google must divulge the viewing habits of every user who has ever watched

any video on YouTube, a US court has ruled.

 

The ruling comes as part of Google's legal battle with Viacom over

allegations of copyright infringement.

 

Digital rights group the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) called the

ruling a "set-back to privacy rights".

 

The viewing log, which will be handed to Viacom, contains the log-in ID of

users, the computer IP address (online identifier) and video clip details.

 

While the legal battle between the two firms is being contested in the US,

it is thought the ruling will apply to YouTube users and their viewing

habits everywhere.

 

Viacom, which owns MTV and Paramount Pictures, has alleged that YouTube is

guilty of massive copyright infringement.

 

The UK's Premier League association is also seeking class action status with

Viacom on the issue, alleging YouTube, which was bought by Google in 2006,

has been used to watch football highlights.

 

Legal action

 

When it initiated legal action in March 2007 Viacom said it had identified

about 160,000 unauthorised clips of its programmes on the website, which had

been viewed more than 1.5 billion times.

 

Following the launch of its billion-dollar lawsuit, YouTube introduced

filtering tools in an effort to prevent copyright materials from appearing

on the site.

 

The US court declined Viacom's request that Google be forced to hand over

the source code of YouTube, saying it was a "trade secret" that should not

be disclosed.

 

But it said privacy concerns expressed by Google about handing over the log

were "speculative".

 

Google's senior litigation counsel Catherine Lacavera said in a statement:

"We are disappointed the court granted Viacom's over-reaching demand for

viewing history.

 

"We will ask Viacom to respect users' privacy and allow us to anonymise the

logs before producing them under the court's order."

 

The ruling will see the viewing habits of millions of YouTube users given to

Viacom, totalling more than 12 terabytes of data.

 

Viacom said it wanted the data to "compare the attractiveness of allegedly

infringing video with that of non-infringing videos."

 

'Erroneous ruling'

 

Leading privacy expert Simon Davies told BBC News that the privacy of

millions of YouTube users was threatened.

 

He said: "The chickens have come home to roost for Google.

 

"Their arrogance and refusal to listen to friendly advice has resulted in

the privacy of tens of millions being placed under threat."

 

Mr Davies said privacy campaigners had warned Google for years that IP

addresses were personally identifiable information.

 

Google pledged last year to anonymise IP addresses for search information

but it has said nothing about YouTube data.

 

Mr Davies said: "Governments and organisations are realising that companies

like Google have a warehouse full of data. And while that data is stored it

is under threat of being used and putting privacy in danger."

 

The EFF said: "The Court's erroneous ruling is a set-back to privacy rights,

and will allow Viacom to see what you are watching on YouTube.

 

"We urge Viacom to back off this overbroad request and Google to take all

steps necessary to challenge this order and protect the rights of its

users."

 

The body said the ruling was also potentially unlawful because the log data

did contain personally identifiable data.

 

The court also ruled that Google disclose to Viacom the details of all

videos that have been removed from the site for any reason.

 

Absolute. Fukkin'. Disgrace. <_<

 

Yep, this is it folks, yet MORE evidence that the freedom of the Internet is ultimately going to be killed off by the bloody CORPORATIONS.....

whos sad enough to trawl through that?...i dunno..

 

Mate, these sorts of Corporate scum hire armies of Lawyers who get paid vast sums of money to do exactly this sort of thing....

 

Remember, they're LAWYERS..... Not normal people.... ;)

 

Absoloutely Ridiculous!

Aren''t they trying to prove that people only want to use youtube to watch copyrighted material rather than people posting blogs.. which is true, but this is a stupid way to go about it.

Another vlog on this here.

 

Another vlog on this issue with some good advice.

Boycott all viacom related products.

Another one here.

Absolutely pathetic to be honest.

Really doesnt come as a surprise though as Viacom are the biggest money grabbing idiots there are.

I agree about boycotting everything to do with Viacom, they really have no lives at all, just money money money.