Cloudflare demands sanctions on copyright plaintiffs
Web security service Cloudflare and three adult models are accusing each other of “frivolous” claims and have called for sanctions in a piracy lawsuit.
Cloudflare is facing copyright infringement claims over services it allegedly provided to an adult website which displayed content stolen from the models’ paid-for channels on OnlyFans and Patreon.
But Cloudflare has asked a judge to sanction the models, Deniece Waidhofer, Margaret McGehee, and Ryuu Lavitz, for what it calls “simply false” allegations made without evidence.
Specifically, Cloudflare says claims that adult website Thothub availed of its Argo Tunnel product, a cornerstone of the models’ complaint, are not true.
“Plaintiffs’ [complaint] attempts to reach out and implicate Cloudflare under a dubious theory of secondary copyright liability, based on the false allegation that Cloudflare created and deployed a product (Argo Tunnel) for the purpose of supporting the alleged violations of the direct infringers,” said a Cloudflare court filing.
It continued: “But it is clear that Argo Tunnel is a cybersecurity product of general applicability, created for and used by thousands of users. And fatal to plaintiffs’ claims, Argo Tunnel was never used by the Thothub.tv website or any of its subdomains, which were the alleged source of the direct infringement.”
Cloudflare says the unsubstantiated allegations warrant sanction on the plaintiffs. The company says the plaintiffs failed to conduct a reasonable investigation, and “abused the judicial process by knowingly or recklessly maintaining false and frivolous allegations for the improper purpose of harassing Cloudflare with overbroad copyright infringement claims”.
Yet the models have shown no indication of rowing back on their allegations and responded by filing a motion of their own calling for sanctions on Cloudflare.
According to the plaintiffs, Cloudlflare’s motion “does not come close to meeting the extraordinary standard to show that the Argo Tunnel allegations are legally or factually baseless, nor that the allegations were made without a reasonable and competent inquiry by plaintiffs’ counsel”.
They also cited evidence from an expert witness who concluded that it was likely Thothub was making use of an Argo Tunnel. They argue that Cloudflare should now be sanctioned for its “tactical abuse” of the rules.
“Cloudflare bizarrely argues that ‘the only evidence available conclusively shows that Cloudflare did not provide Argo Tunnel service to Thothub’. What evidence? Cloudflare produces no documentation or other admissible evidence in support of its assertion,” their motion states.
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