Court Rules Operators Not Liable for Third Party Content Hosted Via RSS Feed

BERLIN — The German Federal Court in Karlsruhe has ruled that website operators are not liable for content hosted via RSS feeds, a decision attorneys predict will encourage the use of this function across the internet.

In the ruling on Case Az: VI ZR 144/11, delivered on March 27 but only made public on May 30, Germany’s highest court expressly stated that operators were not obliged by law to check RSS content before hosting it and that they could not be found liable for content hosted via an automated news stream unless they in some way made it their own. ...