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German courts deal blow to Google stating Image Search Thumbnails violate copyright
Google Inc. (NSDQ: GOOG), the owner of the world’s most popular web search engine has recently lost two copyright lawsuits in Germany over the search engine’s rights to display photos and artwork as thumbnails in a preview of search results. The regional court of Hamburg has ruled that Google’s preview of a picture by German photographer Michael Bernhard violates his copyright. In a second case. Thomas Horn, who holds the copyrights on images of comics that were displayed, has also won a second case against Google according to an email by court spokeswoman Sabine Westphalen.
In a response to the Rulings Google has stated plans to appeal the decision stating “Google is disappointed and intends to appeal the ruling to the German Supreme Court because we believe that services like Google Image Search are entirely legal? Today’s decision is very bad for Internet users in Germany, it is a major step backwards for German e-business in general, and it is bad for the thousands of websites who receive valuable traffic through Image Search and similar services.”
Posted in: Legal / Copyright, News, Photographers
