{"id":3878,"date":"2026-02-26T15:13:19","date_gmt":"2026-02-26T07:13:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/longzhuplatform.com\/?p=3878"},"modified":"2026-02-26T15:13:19","modified_gmt":"2026-02-26T07:13:19","slug":"serpapi-moves-to-dismiss-google-scraping-lawsuit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/longzhuplatform.com\/?p=3878","title":{"rendered":"SerpApi moves to dismiss Google scraping lawsuit"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p> <div id=\"articleContent\" itemprop=\"articlebody\"> <div class=\"bialty-container\"> <p>SerpApi is asking a federal court to dismiss Google\u2019s lawsuit, arguing the company is misusing copyright law to restrict access to public search results.<\/p> <ul class=\"wp-block-list\"> <li>The motion was filed Feb. 20, according to a blog post by SerpApi CEO and founder Julien Khaleghy. <\/li> <li>Google sued SerpApi in December, alleging it bypassed technical protections to scrape and resell content from Google Search.<\/li> <\/ul> <p><strong>The details:<\/strong> SerpApi argues Google is improperly invoking the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). According to Khaleghy:<\/p> <ul class=\"wp-block-list\"> <li>The DMCA protects copyrighted works, not websites or ad businesses.<\/li> <li>Google doesn\u2019t own the underlying content displayed in search results.<\/li> <li>Accessing publicly visible pages isn\u2019t \u201ccircumvention\u201d under the statute.<\/li> <\/ul> <p>Google\u2019s complaint alleged SerpApi:<\/p> <ul class=\"wp-block-list\"> <li>Circumvented bot-detection and crawling controls.<\/li> <li>Used rotating bot identities and large bot networks.<\/li> <li>Scraped licensed content from Search features, including images and real-time data.<\/li> <\/ul> <p>SerpApi said it doesn\u2019t decrypt systems, disable authentication, or access private data. Khaleghy said SerpApi retrieves the same information available to any user in a browser, without requiring a login.<\/p> <p>Khaleghy also argued Google admitted its anti-bot systems protect its advertising business \u2014 not specific copyrighted works \u2014 which he said undermines the DMCA claim.<\/p> <p>SerpApi cites the Ninth Circuit\u2019s <em>hiQ v. LinkedIn<\/em> decision warning against \u201cinformation monopolies\u201d over public data. It also cites the Sixth Circuit\u2019s <em>Impression Products v. Lexmark<\/em> ruling to argue that public-facing content can\u2019t be shielded by technical measures alone.<\/p> <p><strong>Catch up quick:<\/strong> The lawsuit follows months of escalating legal fights over scraping and AI data use.<\/p> <ul class=\"wp-block-list\"> <li><strong>Oct. 22:<\/strong> Reddit sued SerpApi, Perplexity, Oxylabs, and AWMProxy in federal court, alleging they scraped Reddit content indirectly from Google Search and reused or resold it. Reddit claimed the companies hid their identities and scraped at \u201cindustrial scale.\u201d Reddit said it set a \u201ctrap\u201d post visible only to Google\u2019s crawler that later appeared in Perplexity results. Reddit is seeking damages and a ban on further use of previously scraped data.<\/li> <li><strong>Oct. 29:<\/strong> SerpApi said it would \u201cvigorously defend\u201d itself, calling Reddit\u2019s language \u201cinflammatory\u201d and arguing public search data should remain accessible.<\/li> <li><strong>Dec. 19:<\/strong> Google sued SerpApi, alleging it bypassed security protections, ignored crawling directives, and scraped licensed Search content for resale. SerpApi responded that it operates lawfully and that accessing public search data is protected by the First Amendment.<\/li> <\/ul> <p><strong>By the numbers:<\/strong> SerpApi claims that, under Google\u2019s interpretation of the DMCA, statutory damages could theoretically total $7.06 trillion \u2014 a figure it said exceeds U.S. GDP. The number reflects SerpApi\u2019s calculation of potential per-violation penalties, not an actual damages demand.<\/p> <p><strong>What\u2019s next. <\/strong>The case now moves to the court\u2019s decision on whether Google\u2019s claims can proceed.<\/p> <p><strong>Why we care:<\/strong> The outcome could reshape how SEO platforms, AI tools, and competitive intelligence software access SERP data. A win for Google could make third-party search data harder or riskier to obtain. A win for SerpApi could strengthen arguments that publicly accessible search results can be scraped and collected.<\/p> <p><strong>The blog post.<\/strong> Google v. SerpApi: We\u2019re filing a Motion to Dismiss. Here\u2019s why we\u2019re in the right.<\/p> <p><strong><em>Dig deeper. Inside SearchGuard: How Google detects bots and what the SerpAPI lawsuit reveals<\/em><\/strong><\/p> <\/div> <hr\/> <p class=\"article-disclosure\"> <em>Search Engine Land is owned by Semrush. We remain committed to providing high-quality coverage of marketing topics. Unless otherwise noted, this page\u2019s content was written by either an employee or a paid contractor of Semrush Inc.<\/em> <\/p> <hr\/> <div class=\"author-about py-4\"> <div class=\"card bg-light\"> <div class=\"row gx-0\"> <div class=\"col-12 col-lg-auto\"> <div class=\"authorImage p-2\"> <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"img-fluid rounded avatar-border\" alt=\"Danny Goodwin\" width=\"140\" height=\"140\" src=\"https:\/\/searchengineland.com\/wp-content\/seloads\/2024\/07\/Danny-Goodwin-scaled.jpeg.webp\" title=\"SerpApi moves to dismiss Google scraping lawsuit\u63d2\u56fe\" \/><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"img-fluid rounded avatar-border\" src=\"https:\/\/searchengineland.com\/wp-content\/seloads\/2024\/07\/Danny-Goodwin-scaled.jpeg.webp\" alt=\"Danny Goodwin\" width=\"140\" height=\"140\" title=\"SerpApi moves to dismiss Google scraping lawsuit\u63d2\u56fe1\" \/> <\/div> <\/p><\/div> <div class=\"col-12 col-lg\"> <div class=\"card-body author-body p-2\"> <div id=\"authorBio-23878\" class=\"author-desc\"> <p>Danny Goodwin is Editorial Director of Search Engine Land &amp; Search Marketing Expo &#8211; SMX. He joined Search Engine Land in 2022 as Senior Editor. In addition to reporting on the latest search marketing news, he manages Search Engine Land\u2019s SME (Subject Matter Expert) program. He also helps program U.S. SMX events. <\/p> <p>Goodwin has been editing and writing about the latest developments and trends in search and digital marketing since 2007. He previously was Executive Editor of Search Engine Journal (from 2017 to 2022), managing editor of Momentology (from 2014-2016) and editor of Search Engine Watch (from 2007 to 2014). He has spoken at many major search conferences and virtual events, and has been sourced for his expertise by a wide range of publications and podcasts.<\/p> <\/p><\/div> <\/p><\/div> <\/p><\/div> <\/p><\/div> <\/p><\/div> <\/div> <p> <!-- START SIDEBAR LOWER SPACE --><\/p> <p><!-- END SIDEBAR LOWER SPACE --><\/p><\/div> <p>News#SerpApi #moves #dismiss #Google #scraping #lawsuit1772089999<\/p> ","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>SerpApi is asking a federal court to dismiss Google\u2019s lawsuit, arguing the company is misusing copyright law to restrict access to public search results. The motion was filed Feb. 20, according to a blog post by SerpApi CEO and founder Julien Khaleghy. Google sued SerpApi in December, alleging it bypassed technical protections to scrape and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3879,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[13152,75,1967,13151,83,13153,4088],"class_list":["post-3878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-careers","tag-dismiss","tag-google","tag-lawsuit","tag-moves","tag-news","tag-scraping","tag-serpapi"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/longzhuplatform.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3878","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/longzhuplatform.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/longzhuplatform.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/longzhuplatform.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/longzhuplatform.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3878"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/longzhuplatform.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3878\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/longzhuplatform.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3879"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/longzhuplatform.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/longzhuplatform.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/longzhuplatform.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}