Judge Rejects Google's Attempt To DMCA Its Way Out Of Being Scraped

“Because the DMCA does not apply where the work controlled by a technological measure is not protected under the Copyright Act, Google’s claims under 17 U.S.C. § 1201(a)(1)(A) and 17 U.S.C. § 1201(a)(2) are subject to dismissal as a matter of law.”

Google built a trillion dollar business by copying other people’s pages without asking. Then it sued SerpAPI for copying its search results and reached for DMCA 1201, the anti-circumvention hammer meant for DRM on actual copyrighted works. Search results are not copyrighted works. The Northern District of California said so and threw the claim out. The ladder stays down.