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ARTICLE · 13 MAY 2017

Digital Copyright Ruling Creates New Vulnerabilities for Moderated Online Platforms

Reed Smith
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A recent federal appeals court decision may lead online platforms that post user-generated content filtered by moderators to think twice before posting copyrighted material.

United StatesMedia, Telecoms, IT, Entertainment
Bradley H. Dlatt
Bradley H. Dlatt
Jason Gordon
Jason Gordon
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A recent federal appeals court decision may lead online platforms that post user-generated content filtered by moderators to think twice before posting copyrighted material. In Mavrix Photographs, LLC v. LiveJournal, Inc., the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals recently held that the Digital Millennium Copyright Act's ("DMCA") safe harbor for "infringement of copyright by reason of the storage [of material] at the direction of a user" may not protect moderated online platforms.

This suit arose out of allegations of copyright infringement by Mavrix Photographs, LLC ("Mavrix"), "a celebrity photography company specializing in candid photographs of celebrities in tropical locations," against LiveJournal, Inc. ("LiveJournal"), a curated social media platform.  Mavrix alleged that "Oh No They Didn't!" ("ONTD"), a popular LiveJournal community dedicated to celebrity news, posted twenty Mavrix-copyrighted photographs between 2010 and 2014, in violation of the DMCA. 

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