Yahoo takes copyright law to top German court

Yahoo says it has filed a complaint to Germany’s highest court against a year-old law that broadened copyright protection for news material used on the Internet.

The law aims to protect the copyright of news articles and other material on the Internet, but allows the use of “single words or small text passages” without royalties. Internet firms warned before it came into effect that it would amount to a tax on search engines.

Sunnyvale, California-based Yahoo said Friday that the vagueness of the rules and the resulting “unreasonable” legal uncertainty forced it to take the legislation to Germany’s Federal Constitutional Court. It argued that the law unconstitutionally limits Internet users’ freedom of information.

It wasn’t clear when the court might consider the complaint.

The EU has been in the middle of a large privacy debate surrounding Internet companies and their use of user data. Google, Microsoft and other search engines have been asked to comply with requests of users to stop linking to content that may be irrelevant or outdated as part of the ‘right to be forgotten’ ruling.

AP