Translated material
VKontakte Wins Lawsuit Against Universal and Warner
The Arbitration Court of St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region rejected claims against VKontakte from the recording companies Universal Music and Warner Music, which sought compensation for the distribution of phonograms on the social network.
VKontakte's announcement states that the court recognized the social network as a "bona fide information intermediary" that does not receive profit from music recordings.
Universal Music Russia CEO Dmitry Konnov and Warner Music Russia CEO Alexander Blinov refrained from commenting, explaining that they had not yet seen the text of the reasoning [of the court decision].
- Warner Music and Universal Music, as well as Sony Music, sued VKontakte in the spring of 2014, accusing the social network of copyright infringement. They demanded damages in the amount of more than 50 million rubles.
- At the end of July 2015,it became known that Sony Music had entered into a settlement agreement with VKontakte. The Vedomosti newspaper wrote that the agreement provided for guaranteed payments to copyright holders and division of profits between the social network and Sony Music.
- At the end of September, the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) reported that a court had ordered VKontakte to implement technology that prevents pirated music from being uploaded. VKontakte CEO Boris Dobrodeev noted that the social network had long ago implemented a digital fingerprint system that prevents deleted pirated phonograms from being re-uploaded.