Limitations on liability, often called “safe harbors,” shelter service providers from copyright infringement suits. At the same time, copyright owners would forgo pursuing service providers for the copyright infringement of their users, in exchange for assistance in identifying and acting against those infringers. created tradeoffs within the DMCA: service providers would receive liability protections in exchange for assisting copyright owners in identifying and dealing with infringers who misuse the service providers' systems. One federal district court assessed the “dual purpose and balance” of the DMCA in the following manner:Ĭongress. in order to attract the substantial investments necessary to continue the expansion and upgrading of the Internet.' At the same time, Congress desired to preserve 'strong incentives for service providers and copyright owners to cooperate to detect and deal with copyright infringements that take place in the digital networked environment.' The DMCA therefore includes several conditions that the service provider must satisfy in order to qualify for protection from liability, and requires that the service providers’ activities be encompassed within one of four specified categories of conduct. The Act's legislative history indicates that Congress wanted to provide service providers with 'more certainty. The increased certainty provided by the safe harbors, however, creates a strong incentive for service providers to take advantage of them, if it makes sense for their operation. Compliance with the requirements of the safe harbors is optional for service providers, not mandatory. The subsection also provides a detailed procedure that a copyright owner must follow in order to obtain a subpoena from a federal court compelling the service provider to reveal the identity of the suspected infringing user.Īlling outside the safe harbors does not make you liable for infringement.

Subsection 512(h) obligates service providers to divulge to copyright owners the identity of a subscriber suspected of copyright infringement. In exchange for immunity from liability, the DMCA requires service providers to cooperate with copyright owners to address infringing activities conducted by the providers' customers. This safe harbor immunity is available only to parties that qualify as a ' service provider' as defined by the DMCA, and only after the provider complies with certain eligibility requirements. Title II of the DMCA amended chapter 5 of the 1976 Copyright Act, and created a new Section 512 to limit the liability of service providers for claims of copyright infringement relating to materials online. Concerned about potentially significant legal vulnerability of service providers, Congress passed the 'Online Copyright Infringement Liability Limitation Act,' Title II of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) of 1998, which created limitations on the liability of OSPs and ISPs for copyright infringement arising from their users' activities on their digital networks. The potential for Internet users to infringe copyrights online could expose service providers to claims of secondary copyright liability, such as contributory and vicarious copyright infringement. Online service providers ( OSPs) and Internet service providers ( ISPs) provide critical infrastructure support to the Internet, allowing millions of people to access online content and electronically communicate and interact with each other. Title II of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act ( DMCA) of 1998, Pub.

5 Judicial Interpretation of the Safe Harbors.4.7 No Affirmative Duty to Police Infringing Activity.4.6 Eligibility Threshold for Safe Harbor.4.3 §512(c) Information Residing on Systems or Networks at the Direction of Users.4.1 §512(a) Transitory Digital Network Communications.

Safe harbor