Viacom Will Get Your Youtube Records

A U.S. federal judge has ordered Google Inc. to hand over to media giant Viacom the records of every video users have watched on the video-sharing site YouTube, records that include users' names and IP addresses.

Viacom is suing Google for not doing enough to keep its copyrighted videos from television shows such as The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and The Colbert Report off the popular website YouTube.

The ruling comes as part of Google's legal battle with Viacom over allegations of copyright infringement.

Digital rights group the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) called the ruling a "set-back to privacy rights".

The viewing log, which will be handed to Viacom, contains the log-in ID of users, the computer IP address (online identifier) and video clip details.

While the legal battle between the two firms is being contested in the US, it is thought the ruling will apply to YouTube users and their viewing habits everywhere.

Viacom, which owns MTV and Paramount Pictures, has alleged that YouTube is guilty of massive copyright infringement.

Viacom made several other requests that Judge Stanton denied, including access to YouTube video source code, video ID code, and information on Google's entire advertising procedure.

While it has some programs in place to scan for infringement content, YouTube claimed that there was no automatic way to tell if a video posted to YouTube was copyrighted content. Viacom was not convinced, and argued that the best way to see if YouTube is telling the truth was for YouTube to turn over its source and video ID code.

Judge Stanton disagreed and denied the request.

Google argued user data should not be handed over because of privacy concerns, but Stanton dismissed those concerns as "speculative."

San Francisco-based privacy advocacy group The Electronic Frontier Foundation said the ruling was "a setback to privacy rights, and will allow Viacom to see what you are watching on YouTube.

"We urge Viacom to back off this overbroad request and Google to take all steps necessary to challenge this order and protect the rights of its users," wrote EFF's senior staff attorney Kurt Opsahl on Wednesday.