A federal appeals court has revived Viacom Inc's lawsuit accusing Google Inc of allowing copyrighted videos on its YouTube service without permission.

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said a reasonable jury could have found that YouTube knew of specific infringing activity on its website. As a result, it said a lower court made a mistake in dismissing Viacom's $1 billion lawsuit.

(Reporting By Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Gerald E. McCormick)

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