On Monday, eBay came out of the legal battle against Tiffany on top, as a federal judge considered that the latter wanted to gain too much control over eBay’s online transactions, which do include fake items but perfectly good secondhand Tiffany products as well.  

Tiffany, one of the leading US luxury brand names, filed a suit against eBay after finding duplicate versions of its goods being sold on the hugely popular website.

As New York’s U.S. District Judge Richard Sullivan sees things, it is up to Tiffany to ensure protection against the misuse of its name. He basically encouraged the company to go after the counterfeiters instead of taking on the market in which they commercialize their products.

According to Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond in Virginia, this ruling is of paramount importance for online commerce in general, as it switches responsibility from the website to those who post items on it. However, he said he expects Tiffany to start an alliance with other retailers and try to obtain law modiffications from Congress.

Nichola Sharp, eBay spokeswoman, said the court’s ruling confirms the website’s efforts "to keep counterfeits off the site". Obviously enough, Tiffany people feel differently. Mark Aaron, a Tiffany vice president, said the "district court's erroneous reading of the law" has shocked and deeply disappointed them.

Although it has won this round, eBay may very well soon be recalled within an appeal. The website’s situation has been quite complicated: about two weeks ago, the Commercial Court of Paris made eBay pay $63 million to Luis Vuitton and several other luxury retailers in a somewhat similar copyright infringement lawsuit.