How bad is this
SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) - Google expressed disappointment and privacy groups voiced outrage Thursday after a judge ordered Google to give entertainment giant Viacom details of video-watching habits of visitors to its popular video-sharing website YouTube.
On Tuesday US District Court Judge Louis Stanton backed Viacom's request for data on which YouTube users watch which videos on the website.
Viacom is seeking the data as potential evidence for a billion-dollar copyright suit against Google, which Viacom charges acts as a willing accomplice to Internet users that put clips of Viacom's copyrighted television programs on YouTube.
"We are disappointed the court granted Viacom's overreaching demand for viewing history," Google senior litigation counsel Catherine Lacavera told AFP in an email Thursday.
As part of the order, google will provide vaicom
1) All the user logins of people that watched the viacom media and uploaded it
2) Everything else that they watched
3) And the IP address of all such users
On 3rd clause there is still some room for negotiation, here is what google is saying
"We are pleased the court put some limits on discovery, including refusing to allow Viacom to access users' private videos and our search technology," Lacavera said.
"We will ask Viacom to respect users' privacy and allow us to anonymize the logs before producing them under the court's order."
Google condemns the lawsuit as an attack on the underpinnings of the Internet, while Viacom argues that the California-based Internet search colossus and especially its subsidiary YouTube are involved in "massive" copyright infringement.
Each time a video is played, YouTube's "Logging" database records the user ID and IP address of the viewer, the date and time of the request and the ID of the clip – and includes details of videos embedded on websites other than YouTube.
"While the Logging database is large, all of its contents can be copied onto a few 'over-the-shelf' four-terabyte hard drives," Judge Stanton said, in response to Google's claim that providing the data would be too difficult.
"The motion to compel production of all data from the Logging database concerning each time a YouTube video has been viewed on the YouTube website or through embedding on a third-party website is granted."
A dangerous precedent.
Wonder how soon this starts happening in India. The music communities are running unabated
Youtube to hand over user data
Re: Youtube to hand over user data
