Germany’s High Court Strikes Down Common File-Sharing Defense

Germany’s highest court has rejected an argument frequently used by defendants in internet file-sharing cases to keep copyright holders from learning their identity.

The The Federal Supreme Court (BGH) ruled July 13 that it is unnecessary for plaintiffs seeking to enforce their intellectual property rights to get a separate court order to get user information from a defendant’s internet service provider (BGH (Ger.), Az.: I ZR 197/16, 7/13/17).

The rightsholder accused the defendant of uploading the computer game “Dead Island” to a file-sharing site through a third-party internet service provider connection over Deutsche Telekom AG’s network.

The ruling ...