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In a court decision made by the European Union (EU), Playboy can now block the hyperlinks of the celebrity photos. This has followed after the copyright infringement case filed by Playboy.
According to the court ruling done by the European Union regarding the copyright infringement case about the Playboy images, now, Playboy can maintain their right to stop other media publications from giving links of the Playboy images and celebrity photos, Breitbart reported.
This Playboy case of celebrity photos copyright infringement was brought and sent up to the courts following the accusations addressed to the Dutch blog GeenStkl that have breached the copyright laws. Allegedly, the Dutch blog GeenStkl published hyperlinks of the celebrity photos, the Playboy images of Britt Dekker, a TV personality without asking the permission of Sanoma Oyj, the publisher of Playboy in the Netherlands.
The decision was made on the reason that hyperlinks were released for commercial use, when in fact GeenStikl is completely cognizant that the original publication of the Playboy images had been illegally done.
To answer the verdict GeenStikl stated: "An eye on profit, that's something dirty, according to the European clowns. The consequence is that from now on, you always run the risk of being sued, just for placing a hyperlink." However, the EU court disagreed and report said that there's no doubt that the hyperlinks to the files that contain the photos was provided by GS Media and Sanoma had not authorized the publication of those photos on the internet.
Last week, according to Bloomberg, Jakob Kucharczyk, the director of CCIA Europe, a computer and communications trade group expressed that "while the European Commission is set to unveil its copyright package next week, this case shows that the freedom to hyperlink is under attack."
The court ruling can have major ramifications for media outlets that constantly utilize hyperlinks as a source of their content feeds. It could boost the publication profits however for copyright owners who insist that the utilization of their hyperlinks is a subject to copyright infringement.
Intellectual Property Attorney Tom Collins expressed that we could expect the implementation and the carrying out of checks to verify that the contents were not illegally acquired. Thus, online publications will now have "practical difficulties."
