The China Written Works Copyright Society told AFP its data showed at least 17,922 books had been scanned and included in Google Books, the Internet giant’s project to digitise millions of books and post them online.

“Google has violated a widely-accepted international copyright rule that any scanning, collecting and using of protected works should obtain permission and pay a fee before usage,” society deputy general-director Zhang Hongbo told AFP.

The society is a body tasked by China’s government with collecting information on copyrights involving written material.

Zhang said the books involved the works of at least 570 Chinese writers and new complaints from writers and publishers were coming in every day.

“None of the writers we contacted said he or she received any notice from Google for the usage of their works,” Zhang said, adding they had not been paid either.

Zhang said his group would ask Google to acknowledge the infringement of Chinese copyrights and seek a negotiated solution, but he did not rule out a lawsuit.

Source : Konaxis