Scraping
Tags: auteursrecht, copyright, databank law, databankenrecht, database, investering, investment, scrapen, scraping, sui generis.
It is possible to extract the information on someone else’s website and process it on your own website. This is called scraping or web scraping. This scraping can in some cases violate the rights of the website owner.
Copyright Infringement
In some cases, scraping a website may infringe copyright. If the scraped information complies with the work test developed in copyright – that is, that the information has its own original character and bears a personal stamp from the author – the information is protected under copyright and therefore reproduction and publication thereof is infringement.
In certain cases, however, the information on websites will not comply with this website and will only contain factual information, such as sports results or a list of houses for sale. Scraping this factual information can in some cases still infringe the rights of the owner of the website, because it violates sui generis database law.
Infringement of Sui Generis Database Law
In addition to creative choices and originality (see copyright), investments in data are also protected. These investments are protected under sui generis database law. According to the law, a database is “a collection of works, data or other independent elements, organized systematically or methodically, and accessible separately by electronic means or otherwise”.
In order to qualify for protection under sui generis database law, the acquisition, verification or presentation of the contents of that database must demonstrate, qualitatively or quantitatively, substantial investment in order to qualify for database protection.
Query Substantial Part of the Database
Furthermore, only requesting a substantial part of the database is an infringement of the rights of the rightholder. It is therefore permitted to request insubstantial parts unless this is done repeatedly in order to eventually request a substantial part. This is referred to as the “milking out” of the database and may, therefore, infringe database law.
Do you have a question or a problem with regard to website scraping or database law? Call or email Wouter Dammers from LAWFOX to get an initial estimate of the situation.
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