For the first time Facebook was found liable for copyright infringement

Rome. For the first time in Italy, and quite probably in the world, Facebook has been held responsible for breach of copyright and unfair competition toward a client company. 

In a number of ways and with improper and unlawful conduct Facebook took advantage of the knowledge it acquired of the Faround product designed by the Italian company Business Competence and then promoted and made available to its users "its own" application called Nearby (which has already been removed, without saying anything to anyone) with the same characteristics. The above is according to the first-instance ruling of the Court of Milan (Company law division), of 1 August, retrieved by Il Foglio by means of a simple online search.

The Faround application allowed users to see, using a geolocation system, all the venues and places of interest near users, together with the promotions and discounts offered by those venues. Nearby, however, the Facebook creature that was launched on Mark Zuckerberg’s social network in December 2012 (four months after the original) worked basically the same way, except for the coupons and discount system that characterized Faround.

Facebook was therefore ordered to not use, distribute and exploit the application; to withdraw it from the market for Italy; Facebook Inc., the parent company, Facebook Srl, the Italian company, and Facebook Ireland, Facebook’s European tax base, were ordered to pay a fine of 5,000 euro for each day of further use of the application after the 60 days after the sentence; to publish the sentence on two Italian national daily newspapers and for fifteen days on www.facebook.com ; Lastly, to pay damages to the Italian company and return the undue profit obtained so far with Nearby. 

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• Alberto Brambilla

• Nato a Milano il 27 settembre 1985, ha iniziato a scrivere vent'anni dopo durante gli studi di Scienze politiche. Smettere è impensabile. Una parentesi di libri, arte e politica locale con i primi post online. Poi, la passione per l'economia e gli intrecci - non sempre scontati - con la società, al limite della "freak economy". Prima di diventare praticante al Foglio nell'autunno 2012, dopo una collaborazione durata due anni, ha lavorato con Class Cnbc, Il Riformista, l'Istituto per gli Studi di Politica Internazionale (ISPI) e il settimanale d'inchiesta L'Espresso. Ha vinto il premio giornalistico State Street Institutional Press Awards 2013 come giornalista dell'anno nella categoria "giovani talenti" con un'inchiesta sul Monte dei Paschi di Siena.