Fair Game: Norwegian won't challenge Google in Scientology case

Norwegian won't challenge Google in Scientology case

Reuters
Friday March 22
By Elinor Mills Abreu

http://biz.yahoo.com/rf/020322/n22206750_1.html

SAN FRANCISCO - A Norwegian man whose hobby is criticizing the Church of Scientology on the Internet said on Friday he did not plan to challenge the removal of most of his Web sites from Google search results because that would put him at risk of being sued in the United States.

Andreas Heldal-Lund said Google Inc. notified him in an e-mail on Thursday that a long list of his Web sites were removed from results of the popular search engine because the Church of Scientology had complained that they contained church-owned copyrights.

Citing the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the Church asked Google to remove the Web sites. Under the law, Mountain View, California-based Google can protect itself from being held liable by immediately removing the sites, the company said in its e-mail to Heldal-Lund.

In a phone interview with Reuters, Heldal-Lund said Google soon replaced the home page, http://www.xenu.net, saying trademarks are not covered under the DMCA and the Church had claimed that page violated its trademark.

However, Linda Simmons Hight, a spokeswoman for the Church of Scientology, said on Friday that the organization only complained to Google about Web sites that it felt violated copyrights and not trademarks.

A Google spokesman said the company declined to comment further on the matter on Friday.

As many as a hundred other sites maintained by Heldal-Lund remain blocked from the Google results, although they could be reinstated, according to a lawyer for the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

Under the DMCA, after notifying the Web master of the sites that are removed and receiving "counter-notification," Google could replace the sites, said Robin Gross, a staff attorney for the San Francisco-based EFF, an organization that advocates free speech online.

Hight denied that the Church was trying to silence its critics.

"There are certain people who are attempting to make this a free speech issue. That's a red herring," she said. "We have been in favor of free speech since before these people were born."

Hight said the Church is merely trying to protect its intellectual property, but she also complained that the anti-Scientology Web sites have incited violence against Church members.

'NORMAL NORWEGIAN GUY'

Heldal-Lund, 37, denied any wrongdoing. "I live in Norway under Norwegian law. The servers are in Norway and Holland," he told Reuters. "According to the laws, how I understand them, I'm not breaking any laws. It's fair use. If a Norwegian court tells me I'm in breach of the law, I'll comply."

In the United States and other countries, fair use provisions allow people limited use of copyrighted material for educational, entertainment and other purposes.

Heldal-Lund said he was surprised Google removed his sites from the Google results without telling him first, but said that he was wary of challenging that action.

"In the DMCA, to file a counter-claim or notification I need to submit to American jurisdiction and I can't do that," Heldal-Lund said. The Church "could file a case against me in America, and I can't travel all the way over there for that."

Heldal-Lund said he was consulting with lawyers to figure out what he could do to get his Web sites back in Google's search results.

Although the sites are accessible if you know the exact Web address, most visitors are likely to reach them via a search engine.

Heldal-Lund said he became interested in the Los Angeles-based Church of Scientology in 1996 after hearing that a Norwegian citizen successfully sued the Church for fraud.

"They've threatened me for five years (over the Web sites) but haven't dared sue me," he said. "I'm just a normal Norwegian guy with the belief that this has to be done."