The Hong Kong based Asia branch of the International Federation Of The Phonographic Industry has confirmed it is suing Yahoo! China for copyright infringement based on the search engine's practice of providing links to unlicensed music. IFPI's Asia Regional Director Leong May-Seey has confirmed that Beijing's Intermediate Court has accepted the case, being brought against the web firm by eleven music companies, including all of the majors.
IFPI is taking the action against Yahoo! China despite ultimately losing that similar and previously reported case against China's leading search engine Baidu last year. While the Chinese courts initially ordered Baidu to pay compensation to EMI for its MP3 search service which provided links to illegal sources of music, an appeal hearing in November overruled that decision ruling that Baidu could not be held liable for any copyright violation because it did not, itself, host any of the unlicensed content, it merely linked to it.
Yahoo! China, which is owned by a company called Alibaba (which is in turn owned 40% by Yahoo! Corp), argue that the second Baidu ruling sets a precedent that makes the IFPI's case against it unfounded. The IFPI, however, remain hopeful they will successfully win an appeal against the second Baidu judgement, so much so they are proceeding with their action against Yahoo! regardless.
IFPI chief John Kennedy said this week: "We expect to eventually win. We believe they [Baidu and Yahoo!] are involved in infringing our members' rights on a major scale".
Porter Erisman of Yahoo! China told reporters: "Yahoo! China respects intellectual property rights and supports the fight against music piracy. The courts have clearly established the precedent that search engine operators are not liable for content posted on third-party websites".