The publishing houses AST and Eksmo, which are part of the Eksmo-AST group, have filed a lawsuit against the Telegram messenger over pirated copies of books. Kommersant drew attention to this. Now Roskomnadzor is obliged to block access to books.
AST and Eksmo filed two lawsuits against Telegram on July 20, it follows from the Moscow City Court's card index. AST complained about pirated copies of Stephen King's 11/22/63 and Doctor Sleep, Napoleon Hill's Think and Grow Rich, Dmitry Glukhovsky's Metro 2033 posted on the Telegram mobile application and Telegram channels. The reason for the claim “Exmo” was the posting in the messenger of copies of the books “Ni Sy” by Jen Sinsero and “Mara and Darkness” by Leah Arden.
In both cases, the court satisfied the requirement for interim measures and ordered Roskomnadzor to “stop creating technical conditions for the placement, distribution and other use” of pirated content in Telegram.
As the newspaper notes, these are the first lawsuits against Telegram from Eksmo-AST. Previously, publishers used the messenger and Apple and Google directly to seek the removal of pirated content. However, the Association for the Protection of Copyright on the Internet (AZAPI, representing Eksmo-AST in court) is seeking the introduction of digital fingerprints technology, which would make it possible to systematically remove pirated content. Now AZAPI is trying to gain a “critical mass” of court decisions, which would make it possible to block Telegram for repeated violations, said Maxim Ryabyko, a member of the board of the association.
In the spring of 2019, the Eksmo publishing house filed a lawsuit against the VKontakte social network. The reason for the proceedings was an audiobook based on the novel “Dark Forest” by Chinese writer Liu Tsisin, translated by Olga Glushkova (pseudonym – Dmitry Nakamura). “Eksmo” sought to impose a fine on the social network. Prior to that, the court had already ordered Roskomnadzor to block access to the audiobook.
In the autumn of the same year, the Vedomosti newspaper wrote that publishing houses, including Eksmo and AST, had agreed with VKontakte on pre-moderation of books during download to combat piracy.
From October 2020, new rules came into force to block applications that host pirated content. The amendments affected, in particular, content in applications for mobile devices. In June, the State Duma proposed removing links to pirated sites without a court order.
