Chicago Financial News Service Feeling Not So 'Hot' Over Copyright Infringement

Image via CrunchBaseDow Jones & Co. has received undisclosed, but "substantial" damages from Briefing.com, a Chicago-based financial news Web site that admittedly infringed on Dow Jones' copyrighted material and violated the "hot news" doctrine, according to a Dow Jones news release.

Dow Jones, part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. empire, sued Briefing.com in April 2010, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York (Case No. 10-03321). The defendant conceded that it infringed on roughly 100 copyrighted articles and 70 headlines of the plaintiff during a two-week stretch.

 As part of the resolution of the case, Briefing.com accepted a permanent injunction against any further infringing on Dow Jones' articles and agreed to provide the plaintiff free access to its Web site so that it may monitored to prevent further violations.  Briefing.com further admitted to violating the "hot news" doctrine, which prohibits continuously republishing a news organization's time-sensitive news articles.  The proposed settlement is awaiting approval from the Court.