New administrative notice-and-takedown procedure in Greece

Via Katfriend Yannos Paramythiotis (Paramythiotis & Partners) comes the news that Greece has recently adopted a new administrative procedure to tackle online copyright infringements.

Here’s what Yannos writes:

“A new administrative notice-and-takedown procedure was introduced into Greek Law through Article 52 of Law 4481/2017, published in the State Gazette on 20 July last.

According to this provision, which was transposed into the Greek Copyright Act (Law 2121/1993) as Article 66E, in case of alleged online copyright infringement, copyright holders shall have the right to file an application with the Committee for the notification of online copyright infringements.

This Committee, which is yet to be set up by means of a Ministerial Decision, shall consist of the chairman of the board of the Hellenic Copyright Organization, a representative of the Hellenic Telecommunications and Post Commission and a representative of the Hellenic Data Protection Authority, and shall be supported by the staff of the Hellenic Copyright Organization. 

The relevant form for the application along with all documents that prove ownership of the relevant copyright by the applicant shall be filed online.

For each application a fee to the Hellenic Copyright Organization shall be paid, the amount of which is yet to be determined by means of a Ministerial Decision.

For the admissibility of the application rightholders shall demonstrate that they have submitted a prior copyright takedown notice to the provider, if the provider provides for such a procedure (e.g. YouTube copyright infringement notification), but without success.

Within 10 business days from the filing of the application the Committee shall decide if the case is to be dismissed on specifically set grounds, i.e. formalities and application manifestly unfounded.

If the case proceeds, the Committee shall send a notice to the concerned ISPs and - when possible - to the hosting provider and administrator or/and owner of the infringing website.

Already busy drafting
some takedown notices

The addressees shall then have 5 business days to present the Committee with reasoned objections or 10 business days to comply with or to obtain a licence from the rightholder.

If the case proceeds, the Committee, within 40 business days, shall issue its decision, which either dismisses the case or requires the addressees to remove the infringing content or block access to it, depending on what their role is.

The relevant ISPs shall then have 3 business days to comply with the decision. The administrative fine for each day of non-compliance is between EUR 500 and EUR 1,000.

The law expressly excludes end-user behaviour (illegal downloading, peer to peer sharing, streaming) and cloud services from its scope. It also declares that this administrative procedure does not suspend or influence proceedings before courts for the same case. In any case the Committee shall dismiss the application if the rightholder has already brought an action for the same case before courts.

This new administrative procedure seems to add a powerful weapon to the rightholders’ arsenal to combat piracy. However one must wait until its actual implementation before its practical significance can be appreciated fully.

As far as stakeholders are concerned, so far there have been no public reactions. It is however expected that the Committee’s decisions shall be challenged before the administrative courts, especially by ISPs.”

Thanks so much Yannos for this update. The new procedure adopted by Greece has significant points of resemblance with the Italian experience, notably the relatively recent AGCOM Regulation on online copyright infringements [Katposts here; here for a recent update].