Comments On Tort Liability Of Copyright Of Internet Service Provider And Relative Rules In Regulation On The Protection Of The Right To Network Dissemination Of Information

Internet Service Providers provide the carriers and platforms for the work or information dissemination. But in most cases, the ISP bears the brunt whenever the right infringement events occur, especially when the copyright owners cannot find the on-line infringers, ISP mostly become the defendant side in lawsuits. However, what is the legal liability of ISP towards on-line author's rights? And what kind of responsibility should be bear in cases of tort? In this article, the author aims to delve into this issue and make it clear.This article analyses this issue beginning with the concept and category of ISP which (stands for Internet Service Providers) is an on-line organization that provides information service for the public on Internet. There are 3 varieties of ISP according to the service provided by them: IAP (stands for Internet Access Provider); IPP (stands for Internet Platform Provider) and ICP (stands for Internet Content Provider).The rights that consist of right of authorship, right of reputation, and right of privacy of right-holders may be encroached on by ISP in process of providing service. This article mainly introduces the tort liability of copyright of ISP. Doctrine of tort liability fixation applies to Copyright Law of the PRC according to the regulations in General Principles of Civil Law of the PRC, that tort liability doctrine is the general principle of Copyright Law of the PRC while doctrine of no-fault liability is assistant principle. Foreign Copyright Laws are stipulated that doctrine of tort liability fixation is infringement of copyright applies to doctrine of no-fault liability while amends for copyright infringing acts applies to tort liability doctrine. Different kinds of ISPs apply to separate doctrines such as tort liability doctrine and doctrine of no-fault liability according to the characters of service supplied by them. The legal responsibilities bear by ISP which are by reason of joint tort, neglect of duty or injuring actions should obtain important conditions constituting tort liability: fault, injuring actions, damage and causality. On this basis, this article analyzed the circs in which ISP bear are direct and indirect tort liability. The basic forms of liabilities bear by ISP are ceasing the infringing act, compensating for a loss and extending a formal apology.Regulation on the Protection of the Right to Network Dissemination of Information which come into force upon 7/1/2006 used relative stipulations in The Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 of USA and Electronic Commerce Directive of EU for reference. It imposed the limitation of liability on access or transmission service, system caching service, information storage service, and link or search service provided by ISP. This regulation which has stipulated that ISP should be responsible for notification, deleting program, and assistance in investigation made up the insufficiency of former Internet intellectual property protection legislation and will be better and more comprehensive norms of on-line intellectual property protection.