The Court of Justice of the European Union, in its judgment of 30 April 2024 in case C-470/21, laid down important principles as to the instruments to be taken against Internet piracy.
In particular, it established that a public authority in charge of fighting online counterfeiting can access the identification data of counterfeiters from the IPs used to commit the offenses.
Balancing IP rights with privacy rights is certainly a sensitive issue, often debated even in our courtrooms. In this decision, the Court recognized that Member States may impose a general obligation on ISPs providing Internet access to preserve IP addresses for the purpose of prosecuting crime and allow a competent national authority to access civil identity data linked to IP addresses, provided that an “effectively watertight” separation of the different categories of data is ensured so as not to allow precise conclusions to be drawn on the privacy of data subjects. Otherwise, access is still possible, but must be subject to prior control by an independent court or administrative body.
