Russia: Internet users responsible for piracy
January 17, 2011
Internet users — not Internet companies — should be held legally accountable for uploading pirated content on web sites, Russian Communications and Press Minister Igor Shchyogolev has said.
But Shchyogolev added that it is in the responsibility of the Internet companies to delete illegal content “upon the signal from the lawful property rights owner.”
The comment is the first official reaction to the problem of intellectual property rights infringement on the Internet, following the publication in October of an open letter to the government asking to help solve the issue by five leading Internet companies. The companies, including Google Russia, Mail.Ru and Yandex, asked that disputes over intellectual property rights on the Internet be resolved directly between the owners of such rights and their violators.