Today the advancement of the Internet has brought a great convenience in us, but in the meantime different various social problems and the criminal acts which go through an Internet appeared neck to neck. The wide range of the copyright infringement w...
Today the advancement of the Internet has brought a great convenience in us, but in the meantime different various social problems and the criminal acts which go through an Internet appeared neck to neck. The wide range of the copyright infringement which occurs through internet is also a representative type of such social problems, and with respect to a law against such copyright infringement through internet, the important subject of the legal responsibility is the online service provider who provides such internet service (OSP).
As OSP has the ability to prevent or restrict the various copyright infringement which occurs through the service operated by himself(herself), if OSP for the profit of him(her)self connives such copyright infringement, or, further, leads away and/or promotes such copyright infringement, civil and/or criminal responsibility must be as a matter of course recognized.
Hitherto OSP's legal responsibility is plentifully discussed in the field of the civil affair, and there has been deep discussion only about the certain type of service, that is, P2P service, but the type of online service becomes very variously, and research about criminal liability is necessarily at a point in carrying out in different terms from civil liability.
With respect to the music work, when the form of criminal liability according to OSP types is studied, first of all, the principal offender or joint principal offender of direct infringement of copyright may be constituted in case of Streaming Service providers, and the joint principal offender by feasance may be, in principle, constituted together with the users who commit direct infringement act in case of P2P services or Web hard service.
Then again, in case of the Internet Portal Service, it assumes that only an abetter(aid AND abet) by nonfeasance may be constituted in light of establishment goal or feature of the service.
Meantime, with respect to OSP's responsibilities, it seems that most opinions take the position which restricts the responsibility of the service provider under the proposition of a technical protection, however, in order to prevent indiscriminate lawsuit against the multiple users, and if ever to create the healthy internet environment which attaches importance to a copyright protection, it appears that it is necessary to put the increased responsibility fitted for the influence and technical power on the service provider.
In this regard, in order to solve the confusion in interpretation and the problems in the application of the law which are currently manifested, it is thought that the legislative solution is ultimately required. Namely, by newly furnishing the provisions of grounds for responsibility, separate duty assessment and penalty for OSP, the argument of attrition as to whether to punish OSP or the type of responsibility etc. must be avoided at the time of infringement of copyright, and on the other hand the active protection of copyright by OSP and the user protection thereby must be extracted.