The Supreme Court has rejected Dutch Film Works' cassation appeal. This means that Ziggo does not have to hand over personal data of its customers to the largest film distributor in the Netherlands. How the Supreme Court arrived at this judgment is unknown. The Supreme Court's ruling reveals that.
In the ruling, the Supreme Court wrote that it considered Dutch Film Works' complaints about a lower court's ruling. "The outcome is that these complaints cannot lead to the annulment of that judgment," the Supreme Court wrote. Our country's highest court says it does not have to give reasons for its judgment under Article 81(1) of the Judicial Organization Act. It is therefore impossible to say how the court reached this conclusion.
Dutch Film Works has been fighting for the rights of filmmakers and other holders of intellectual property rights in the film industry for years. Since the introduction of the download ban in 2014, the film distributor has been trying to put an end to online piracy and illegal downloading of copyrighted films and series. To achieve this, it wants to present illegal downloaders with a settlement offer of 150 euros for every film or episode they obtained from illegal sources, such as The Pirate Bay. The Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens authorized this in 2017.
German company Tecxipio has helped Dutch Film Works by providing the IP addresses of illegal downloaders. To prosecute them, the film distributor needs their name and address information. Several judges have ruled in the past that providers such as Ziggo do not have to hand over customer data to the company. The lack of transparency and clarity was an important reason for the judges not to require Ziggo to hand over customer data to the film distributor. Thereupon, Dutch Film Works decided to appeal to the Supreme Court.
In February, the case went to trial. During its defense, Dutch Film Works argued that the court in preliminary relief proceedings had failed to recognize that the right to privacy and protection of personal data would not be affected 'to the core' if providers were to provide name and address details. The court in preliminary relief proceedings would also use an 'incorrect view of the law' by making the provision of personal data dependent on the actions Dutch Film Works intends to take against individual downloaders.
The Supreme Court rejected Dutch Film Works' arguments. The representative of filmmakers and other rightholders had not made it sufficiently plausible that the Ziggo customer behind the IP address was actually the one infringing the copyrighted material. Furthermore, Dutch Film Works had not sufficiently taken into account the interests of the internet users involved.
Dutch Film Works has also now lost the cassation appeal. The representative of Dutch filmmakers must now pay over three thousand euros, plus statutory interest on these costs to Ziggo.
