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Times Online has barred media monitoring agency Meltwater from indexing its content.

The Internet arm of Rupert Murdoch's UK broadsheet, which is set to introduce a general paywall in the spring, has taken a stand against the Norwegian company for refusing to pay UK newspapers for crawling their content.

The move comes amid fierce legal action between Meltwater and the Newspaper Licensing Agency over the validity of the latter's new 'web database licences', which would charge both media monitoring agencies and clients for crawling and obtaining online news.

Whilst the NLA considers the licence a legal extension of cuttings copyright for print media, Meltwater deems the fees a 'tax on hyperlinks' and has declined to pay. The case is due to appear before the Copyright Tribunal in February 2011. The Public Relations Consultants Association is backing Meltwater.

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