Is the silver lining in the cloud hanging over YouTube no more than a silver thread actually?

It appears from the website of the Electronic Frontier Foundation that Viacom has formally responded to the concerns of the EFF in relation to the nature of the silver lining reported in the last post.

The EFF was concerned that the agreement between YouTube and Viacom in relation to the disclosure of the data of users of YouTube was not backed up by a court order. The obvious danger with that is that both parties can alter the agreement at a later date.

Viacom has now informed the EFF that the latter will be notified in advance if the agreement is to be amended so that the EFF can either discuss its concerns with YouTube and Viacom or raise more formal objections in Court.

Viacom has also forwarded a draft Protective Order to the EFF. CyberPanda agrees with the EFF that it is crucial that the scope and nature of the disclosure of the data should be formally defined by a court order. It is undeniable that Viacom has shown a lot of goodwill in this matter. Nonetheless, it will be in the best interests of the data subjects if the disclosure was more formally regulated by a Court order. That will breach the gap between the silver thread and the silver lining.

The silver lining in the cloud hanging over YouTube.

Users of YouTube and indeed YouTube itself will, no doubt, be relieved that Viacom has now agreed for YouTube to handover the viewing history of its users without handing over any data that might enable Viacom to actually identify the specific user.

This is a welcome development which will no doubt be applauded by privacy activitists and users of YouTube as well since the original demand would have undoubtedly raised serious privacy concerns.

This is however a very tiny silver lining in the big cloud hanging over YouTube as the copyright infringement lawsuit is all but over.