{"id":59683,"date":"2021-10-01T09:00:34","date_gmt":"2021-10-01T09:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/?p=59683"},"modified":"2021-10-01T09:00:34","modified_gmt":"2021-10-01T09:00:34","slug":"cloudflare-books-partial-victory-in-thothub-piracy-lawsuit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/?p=59683","title":{"rendered":"Cloudflare Books Partial Victory in \u2018Thothub\u2019 Piracy Lawsuit"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"cloudflare\"Earlier this year Texas-based model Deniece Waidhofer<\/a> sued Thothub for copyright infringement after the site\u2019s users posted many of her \u2018exclusive\u2019 photos. <\/p>\n

While Cloudflare isn\u2019t new to copyright infringement allegations, this case <\/a>has proven to be more than a nuisance. The company previously countered the claims with a motion to dismiss but Waidhofer and her legal team didn\u2019t back off. <\/p>\n

In an amended complaint some of the most egregious allegations against Cloudflare, including the RICO conspiracy, were dropped. However, the copyright infringement claims remained and with two new cosplay models joining the action, the list of defendants expanded.<\/p>\n

Cloudflare denied these new allegations and submitted a motion to dismiss the copyright infringement claims. In addition, the company filed a separate motion for sanctions, accusing the defendants of fabricating a fatally flawed \u2018infringement\u2019 theory.<\/p>\n

Court Hands Down Mixed Order<\/h2>\n

This week, US District Court Judge Fernando M. Olguin reviewed Cloudflare\u2019s motion and released a mixed order. Judge Olguin dismissed the direct copyright infringement claims against Cloudflare but denied the motion to dismiss the contributory copyright infringement allegations. <\/p>\n

The three models argued that Cloudflare directly infringed their rights by making copies of the copyrighted works on its servers and deliberately marketing its service to pirate sites. <\/p>\n

After reviewing the arguments from both sides, Judge Olguin concluded that the direct copyright infringement claim is ungrounded. Even if Cloudflare temporarily stored the infringing material, the models don\u2019t allege any \u201cvolitional\u201d conduct.<\/p>\n

In a copyright infringement context, volitional conduct refers to a causal link. This means that Cloudflare\u2019s actions should be the cause of infringing activity. That didn\u2019t become apparent from the models\u2019 complaints.<\/p>\n

No Direct Infringement (for now)<\/h2>\n

This failure to include a causal link also applies to other direct copyright infringement allegations. This includes the suggestion that Cloudflare marketed its service to pirate sites. Again, this claim wasn\u2019t backed up properly.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn short, plaintiffs have failed to sufficiently allege that Cloudflare engaged in volitional conduct. The court will thus dismiss plaintiffs\u2019 direct infringement claim with leave to amend,\u201d the court rules.<\/p>\n

This means that Cloudflare has defeated the direct copyright infringement claims, for now. The models are allowed, however, to file an amended complaint to fix the shortcomings that were highlighted by the court.<\/p>\n

Contributory Infringement Remains<\/h2>\n

Cloudflare further asked the court to dismiss the contributory copyright infringement claims. According to the models, the CDN provider knew that infringing material was being made available using its system but failed to \u201ctake simple measures\u201d to prevent further damage.<\/p>\n

These allegations were heavily contested by Cloudflare but, for now, the court believes that the facts presented in the complaint are sufficient to move the case forward.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlthough Cloudflare challenges the veracity of the allegations in the [first amended complaint], on a motion to dismiss, the court must accept the factual allegations of the complaint as true,\u201d the court concludes. <\/p>\n

There were more setbacks for Cloudflare, as the court also denied its request to sanction the models and their legal team. The company accused the rightsholders of including unsubstantiated and false claims. However, the court believes that this type of request can be considered at a later stage. <\/p>\n

Thothub Operators and Advertisers<\/h2>\n

The piracy claims are limited to Cloudflare. The advertising company MultiMedia, also known as Chaturbate, is also listed as a defendant. The court granted MultiMedia\u2019s motions to dismiss the contributory copyright claims, also with the option to amend.<\/p>\n

The RICO claims against the advertiser are dismissed with prejudice, but unfair competition claims remain intact. <\/p>\n

Finally, the models failed to identify the \u201cDoes\u201d behind the Thothub site, so all claims related to the site\u2019s alleged operators have been dropped from the lawsuit. <\/p>\n

\u2014<\/em><\/p>\n

A copy of Judge Olguin\u2019s order on the motions to dismiss and the motion for sanctions is available here (pdf)<\/a><\/p>\n

From: TF<\/a>, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.<\/p>\n

Powered by WPeMatico<\/a><\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Earlier this year Texas-based model Deniece Waidhofer sued Thothub for copyright infringement after the site\u2019s users posted many of her \u2018exclusive\u2019 photos. While Cloudflare isn\u2019t new to copyright infringement allegations, this case has proven to be more than a nuisance. The company previously countered the claims with a motion to dismiss but Waidhofer and her […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":59684,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[308],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-59683","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-torrent"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59683","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=59683"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59683\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/59684"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=59683"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=59683"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=59683"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}