06.05.2022
The Court of Justice of the European Union on 26 April 2022, by its decision, rejected the appeal filed by Poland for the annulment of Article 17 of Directive 2019/790 on intellectual property rights and relatives in the digital single market (CDSM).
More specifically, the Republic of Poland has brought an action for annulment of Article 17 (4) (b) and (c), in fine, of Directive 2019/790 and, in the alternative, for the annulment of that article in its entirety. The Republic of Poland argued, in essence, that these provisions oblige providers to pre-emptively monitor all content that their users intend to upload through computer-aided automation tools, without any guarantees of respect for the right to freedom of expression and information (3).
The Grand Chamber of the Court has ruled for the first time on the interpretation of Directive 2019/790. It dismisses Poland 's action, considering that the obligation of providers under this directive, which consists in the automatic control of the content available on the Internet by users, is surrounded by appropriate guarantees, to guarantee the right to freedom of expression and information and to ensure a fair balance between this right on the one hand and intellectual property rights on the other.