Nintendo picks up a win in piracy protection court ruling
Nintendo has managed to prosecute an Italian distributor of hardware that enabled pirated games to run on its devices. In a ruling made by the First Instance Tribunal of Milan, it was decided that the importer of “circumvention devices” such as game copiers and mod chips enabled piracy.
Two other queries were referred to the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), both of which were necessary to see if Nintendo’s use of security was proportionately justified. In the end, it was ruled that circumvention devices were mainly designed to allow illegally pirated software. The CJEU also agreed with Nintendo that its security measures were fair and in line with Italian copyright law.
Nintendo said the following in a statement:
“Nintendo is pleased that this ruling is consistent with a long line of judicial precedents established at national courts in a number of Member States including Belgium, France, Germany, Netherlands, Spain and the UK. This decision is also entirely in line with several decisions from the Italian Supreme Court (Criminal Division) against sellers of circumvention devices as well as a recent ruling from the criminal appeal courts in Florence, which confirmed a first instance criminal decision, against the owners of PC Box.”
