Web Scraping: A Private Law Perspective

Abstract

The Article deals with the analysis of the implications of web scraping from a private law standpoint. In the absence of a legal regime regarding online non-personal data, website managers have attempted to protect them from the automatic extraction of data by providing for anti-scraping clauses in the websites' terms of use, by alleging the violation of presumed property rights over the websites and/or their contents or by affirming that scraping could constitute a conduct counter to the principles of professional correctness. The Article provides an analysis of the legitimacy of such strategies and a critical evaluation of the criteria which judicial courts -- both in Europe and in the US -- tend to elaborate in order to determine the limits within which web scraping is to be deemed a lawful practice.