The three major record labels have sued Verizon over allegations that the telecommunications giant effectively encouraged its Internet subscribers to steal copyrighted music on an “astounding” scale.
In a lawsuit filed Friday in Manhattan federal court, Universal Music Group, Warner Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment allege that Verizon has “buried its head in the sand” in the face of repeated warnings of hacking on its network, creating a 'safe haven'. ” for illegal activity.
“While Verizon is famous for its 'Can you hear me now?' advertising campaign, it has deliberately chosen not to listen to complaints from copyright holders,” the labels' lawyers wrote. customers, Verizon willfully chose to ignore the plaintiffs' notices, willfully blind to that information and prioritizing its own profits over its legal obligations.”
The financial stakes for Verizon could be very high. The labels accuse the company of infringing more than 17,000 songs. If a judge handed down the maximum penalty for each of those songs, the damages could exceed $2.5 billion. The allegedly infringed tracks include music by the Beatles, Michael Jackson, Beyoncé, Katy Perry and hundreds of other top artists.
The new case is the latest in a long line of major lawsuits aimed at forcing Internet service providers to take more proactive measures to stamp out piracy on their networks. In one such case, the labels initially won a staggering $1 billion verdict against Cox Communications.
For years, ISPs were usually not held liable for individual violations by their millions of users, thanks to a “safe harbor” provided by the Digital Age Copyright Act. But starting in the mid-2010s, music companies began arguing that ISPs had lost that immunity by ignoring the DMCA's requirement that they terminate “repeat infringers” from their network.
Beginning with a landmark case filed by BMG against Cox, these arguments have repeatedly proven successful. Major companies have filed similar cases against Cox, Charter, RCN and other ISPs in courts across the country, often winning huge judgments against them.
In the new lawsuit filed Friday, the labels made the same arguments against Verizon. The company allegedly received “hundreds of thousands” of notices of illegal file sharing from specific subscribers, the lawsuit says, but “deliberately refused to take action” to “continue to collect millions of dollars from them.”
“Verizon's motivation for refusing to terminate or suspend the accounts of flagrantly infringing subscribers is simple: Verizon valued corporate profits above its legal responsibilities,” the labels' lawyers wrote.
In 2019, a federal jury in Virginia ordered Cox to pay $1 billion in a similar case, awarding the record companies more than $99,000 for each of 10,017 separate songs. Although that verdict was later overturned on appeal, Cox could face a similarly large fine when the total is recalculated at a future trial.
In technical terms, the lawsuit accuses Verizon of contributory infringement (meaning the company caused or authorized its customers to pirate the music) and vicarious infringement (meaning the ISP gained from the illegal downloading it could have stopped). .
A Verizon representative did not return a request for comment Monday.
from our partners at https://www.billboard.com/pro/verizon-music-piracy-lawsuit-major-labels-universal-warner-sony/