News On Linking From The CJEU

Previous cases

The CJEU already had the chance to rule on the legitimacy (under copyright law) of hyperlinks to copyrighted works in the Svensson (C-466/12) and Bestwater (C-348/13) cases. In both cases the court came to the conclusion that hyperlinks to copyrighted works freely available on another website are not "communications to the public" (ie a "new public") and therefore do not require the consent of the right holders. The question whether it would matter if the works had been made available on the website with or without the consent of the right holders was not discussed in these prior decisions. It therefore was only a matter of time until the CJEU was confronted with the question whether links to works made available on another website without the consent of the right holders required the right holders' consent (as "communications to the public"). In the court's most recent judgement on hyperlinks (C-160/15) it had the chance to answer this question.