Belgian copyright lawyers demand $77 million from Google

May 30, 2008
Intellectual Property News and Interesting Facts

Copyright defence group Copiepresse, an organisation that protects the rights and interests of a number of Belgian news organisations and publications, is demanding damages totalling $77.2 million from search engine giant Google. The long-running court clash, which we first reported way back when, relates to Google’s reproduction of headlines and extracts from a number of Belgian newspapers on the Google News service. A Belgian court ruled last year that Google could no longer aggregate news from the Belgian sources. If other courts in other countries follow suit, Google News would almost certainly cease to exist in its current form