Europe shields the copyright of photographs on the Internet

A ruling of the Court of Justice of the EU maintains that publishing a snapshot on a website whose free access has been authorized for another Internet site requires a new permission from the creator. The Internet is a complicated space for creators. Although this tool serves to disseminate your work, it can also be used to copy your works without permission. In this sense, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has once again given a boost to the artists with a ruling related to the provision of photographs and has armored, in a certain way, the copyright of these images when they are used on websites that do not have the authorization of their author. The case on which the CJEU has pronounced faced the photographer Dirk Renck-hoff, who authorized the operators of a site dedicated to travel to publish a of his photos, with a school in the Land of North Rhine-Westphalia, in Germany, that published on its website the school work of a student who illustrated this document with the photograph of Renckhoff. According to the ruling, which has gone unnoticed since it was made public on August 7, "the putting on line of a work protected by copyright on a website different from the one in which the initial communication was made with the The authorization of the owner of the copyright must be qualified, in circumstances such as those at issue in the litigation, of making that work available to a new public ". New publicFor Ignacio Temiño, managing partner of Abril Abogados, what is new about the ruling is that the CJEU affirms that "the fact that said photograph has been taken from a website where it was disclosed in open and with permission, does not legitimize the school for spread it on your own website. " The lawyer also points out that it is relevant "the clarification made by the court of the concept of a new public, which is still an indeterminate legal concept, which after its last sentences, mainly in the matter of links, had been interpreted with the -equived- belief that everything that is accessible through the Internet is freely available. "Alejandro Touriño, managing partner of Ecija, is also speaking on this same line. The lawyer emphasizes that "it is a sentence that is part of the line of protection of intellectual property rights established by European legislation on copyright and marked by precedent case law" and adds, by way of summary, that the ruling supports that "the owner of the rights in a work may prevent a third party from copying and pasting that photograph and publishing it in another place, since it has not authorized it." Touriño notes that "the judgment supports the position of the rights holders that disseminate works on the Internet and confirms that the publication of a work on the Internet does not imply that the rights holder renounces his ius prohibendi against third parties, making it clear that publishing on the Internet is not synonymous with renouncing rights " Something that Temiño corroborates to ensure that the ruling goes so far as to say that not allowing the author, in a case such as the one being tried, to invoke his rights to authorize or not the exploitation of his work, would violate the fair balance that must exist in the environment digital between the rights and interests of the holders of rights and users. "Another relevant aspect of the decision of the CJEU is the differentiation it makes between what happened in this case with the issues related to the links." The ruling differentiates, my judgment in a correct manner, between that situation and the use of links, where the CJEU understands - in line with previous jurisprudence - that these contribute to the proper functioning of the Internet and do not cause harm to the rights holder, which does happen when someone copy and paste in another place without the authorization of the owner, "says Touriño. Teaching Another aspect to consider is the balance between the use of photographs for educational purposes or research and copyright. "It is a question that is addressed but not thoroughly, since the use of the image in the student's work was not being judged, but rather the fact that this work was disseminated through the web of the educational center. The CJEU does clarify that the concept of a new public is not based on the nature of the educational purpose or the use made of the photograph, but on the act of making available, and reminds that there must be a fair balance between the right to education and the protection of intellectual property rights, "concludes Temiño.