Victory for music and film industries as Google begins piracy crackdown

[Jazzy]

Google has begun a crackdown on internet piracy by relegating websites that often host unlawful copies of films and music, in what is being seen as a victory for the entertainment industry.



From this week the main Google search engine will take into account the number of copyright infringement notices it has received in relation to each website when it determines their ranking.



Websites that are frequently accused of piracy will appear lower in results, said Amit Singhal, Google’s head of engineering.



“Since we re-booted our copyright removals over two years ago, we’ve been given much more data by copyright owners about infringing content online,” he said.



“In fact, we’re now receiving and processing more copyright removal notices every day than we did in all of 2009 - more than 4.3 million URLs in the last 30 days alone.”



Google's concession to copyright holders follows years of criticism that it was turning a blind eye to blatant piracy by including rogue websites high up in search results. The entertainment industry has been lobbying governments to force Google’s hand, including in Britain.

Full article



This might be good if Google was the only available search engine.

 

[DrLeftover]

The G-word is the elephant in the room.



Most others will now begin doing the same, if only to make a show of it to avoid copyright violation lawsuits.

 

[Evil Eye]

if only to make a show of it to avoid copyright violation lawsuits.

Which is probably why Google's doing it in the first place.



So... when looking for pirated content, start at page 3

 

[JetWing34]

Oh boy, this is what happens when one search engine censors its website to avoid copyright issues.