Microsoft Uses DMCA To Block Many Links To Competing Open Office
from the total-dmca-failure dept
Another day, another example of excessive DMCA takedown actions. The latest is that Microsoft has been issuing DMCA takedowns to Google directing the search engine to remove links to Open Office. Open Office, of course, is the open source competitor to Microsoft, and Microsoft has no copyright-related rights over it. As TorrentFreak points out, this does not appear to be a one-off occurrence. In June, Microsoft filed more than a dozen takedown notices that took down links to Open Office. Again, it is likely that what happened was yet another case of a really broken automated system, but that's no excuse at all. We're talking about flat out censorship, by abusing a legal process, to attack a direct competitor of Microsoft. But, because there's no real punishment for filing completely bogus DMCA notices, Microsoft can get away with this and continue to file identical notices with no real recourse.Filed Under: copyright, dmca, notice and takedown, open office
Companies: microsoft
