Date Closed

June 28, 2017

Lead Office

Toronto

On June 28, 2017, the Supreme Court of Canada released its landmark decision and upheld the granting of an interlocutory injunction by the BC Supreme Court (and allowed by the BC Court of Appeal) requiring Google to cease indexing or referencing certain search results on its Internet search engine. In sum, Google can now be ordered to remove search results anywhere in the world that point to a website that unlawfully sells the intellectual property of another company.

This is a case that has drawn global attention, as it is the first case in any country in which a plaintiff has successfully obtained a court order against a search engine to remove infringing search results worldwide. This ruling sets an important precedent as Equustek orders can apply worldwide and across all of Google's search engines.

McCarthy Tétrault LLP intervened at the Supreme Court and BC Court of Appeal on behalf of various industry organizations representing music labels and other content creators worldwide, in support of Equustek’s position, with a team of Barry Sookman, Dan Glover, and Miranda Lam.