Research On Copyright Content Filtering Obligation Of Internet Service Providers

Since entering the information network era,work copying and dissemination has become highly convenient,which weakens the control of copyright owners over works.As a result,online piracy is increasingly rampant.Intermediate platforms that provide search,storage,caching and other service can yet be exempted from liability through "safe harbor".The implementation of copyright law has become more difficult in the Internet era,and seeking better solutions has become an urgent need for practice.In recent years,content filtering technology has become the choice of voluntary cooperation between some Internet service providers and rights holders to combat network infringement.In order to solve the "value gap",the EU took the lead in legislative reform through the Directive of Copyright in the Digital Single Market,which substantially established the copyright content filtering obligation of online content sharing service providers.However,the obligation of filtering faces many challenges,such as harming users’ basic rights,harming innovation and competition,threatening fair use,false "value gap" and violating the principle of prohibiting general monitoring under existing laws.This article responds to the controversial focus of copyright content filtering obligation,and demonstrate the rationality and feasibility of that obligation,by stating the optimality of content filtering technology to fight against network infringement,the reasonable guarantee of users’ basic rights,and optimality of economic benefits.Finally,this paper analyzes the path of establishing copyright content filtering obligation in China by mirroring EU legislation.Some matters of Art.17 of the Directive are far from clear,such as ambiguous scope of subjects,unclear definition of behavior,insufficient legislative arguments and unclear liabilities.But in terms of interest balance,Art.17 sets a good example.Therefore,Combined with the positive and negative composing experience of EU legislation and the status quo of Chinese legislation,this paper proposes to construct the copyright content filtering obligations of network service providers based on fault liability:(1)Copyright content filtering obligation is preconditioned on necessary information of copyrighted content provided by right owners;(2)ISPs that have taken reasonable content filtering measures to prevent infringement are presumed to be no fault of the infringement;(3)Design reasonable procedures to protect legitimate rights and interests of users;(4)Disclosure and filing of algorithm;(5)The service provider and the infringing users shall bear joint and several liability externally,and internally liable according to their respective faults;(6)Copyright content filtering obligation,as a higher duty of care,coexists with the duty of care under the existing “safe harbor” rule.