Last week’s landmark ruling compelling a Swedish ISP to block The Pirate Bay won’t spread quickly, despite copyright holders’ wishes. Telecoms giant Telia says that the ruling does not apply to them, so connectivity to the site will continue unless a court orders otherwise. Copyright holders are assessing their options.
Torrentfreak » “We Won’t Block Pirate Bay,” Swedish Telecoms Giant Says »
A new study from Sweden has found that just over half of all young people admit to obtaining movies and TV shows from the Internet without paying, a figure that rockets to 70% among young men. With The Pirate Bay about to be blocked by one ISP with more to follow, can piracy rates be controlled?
TorrentFreak » Study: 70% of Young Swedish Men Are Video Pirates »
A Swedish appeals court (the court for market and patent related issues) today ruled that the Internet service provider Bredbandsbolaget must block the Pirate Bay and the streaming service Swefilmer.
By definition, this is censorship.
Also, it is a ruling in direct conflict with the EU the eCommerce-directives principle of »mere conduit« stating that net operators can not be held liable for what users are doing in their cables.
However, this is in line with court rulings in other European countries. And the court claims that the decision is based on EU law.
To confuse things further, the ISP has not been subject to any criminal charges or accusations of illegal activities. Nevertheless, the court seems to refer to a general »responsibilty« to stem illegal activities.
Where all of this leave the »mere conduit« principle (in the EU eCommerce directive) is unclear. Apparently, there are two conflicting sets of rules.
To abolish »mere conduit« is like holding the Post Office responsible for what is written and sent by mail. Or to hold road operators responsible for the intentions and actions of people traveling in cars using their infrastructure.
This is not reasonable. The ruling will open up for more censorship and surveillance.
And to top things of, no matter what, this form of blocking is not very effective and quite easy to circumvent.
/ HAX
Torrentfreak: The Pirate Bay Must Be Blocked in Sweden, Court of Appeal Rules »
Authorities in Sweden are mulling new measures to deal with evolving ‘pirate’ sites. As part of a legislative review, the government wants to assess potential legal tools, including categorizing large-scale infringement as organized crime, tougher sentences, domain seizures, and site-blocking.
TorrentFreak: Swedish Govt. Mulls Tougher Punishments to Tackle Pirate Sites »
Google removed over 900 million pirate site URLs from its search results in 2016. The staggering number is an increase of nearly 100% compared to the year before. While Google has taken some steps to make pirate sites less visible, it continues to disagree with rightsholders on how to move forward.
TorrentFreak: Google Removed Over 900 Million ‘Pirate’ Links in 2016 »
A group of prominent legal scholars has warned that the EU Commission’s plans to modernize copyright law in Europe appear to be incompatible with EU law. One of the main problems is the mandatory piracy filter Internet services are required to use, which largely ignore existing case law and human rights.
TorrentFreak: Mandatory Piracy Filters May Violate EU Law, Scholars Warn »
Some months ago the Swedish anti-piracy initiative Spridningskollen was launched by a few entertainment companies, a debt collecting agency, and a PR firm. The idea was to threaten illegal file shares with economic claims – and if they do not pay, with legal actions.
This raised quite some noise. In the frontline of the protests stood Bahnhof, a very privacy-oriented Internet service provider.
After intense media coverage and public outcry, today Spridningskollen announced that it will fold its operations and that no economic claims for illegal file sharing will be sent out in its name.
Hopefully, this will lead to Swedish copyright holders and entertainment companies working with providing their fans and customers with better services instead of threatening them.
/ HAX
The Internet Infrastructure Coalition is urging the U.S. Government not to blindly follow the RIAA and MPAA’s input regarding online piracy threats. The group, which represents tech firms including Google, Amazon and Verisign, warns that the future of the Internet is at stake.
Torrentfreak: “MPAA and RIAA’s Anti-Piracy Plans Harm The Internet” »
Proposed amendments to the UK’s Digital Economy Bill have revealed a desire by some MPs to force search engines to tackle piracy. A new clause would require search engines to come to a voluntary arrangement with rightsholders, or face being forced into one by the government.
TorrentFreak: UK Considers Fines to Force Search Engines to Tackle Piracy »
The European Commission has a new idea – to fight copyright infringements by targeting companies who advertise on file sharing sites. To nobody’s surprise, what the commission suggests is a mess.
EDRi:s Joe McNamee:
It is currently discussing “guiding principles” for withdrawal of services by advertising companies to penalise and prevent “commercial scale” infringements. Tellingly, the final paragraph of the “guiding principles” contains very similar wording to the ill-fated “Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement” (ACTA) that was rejected in 2012.
Like ACTA, the “guiding principles” include illusory “safeguards”, such as references to non-existent legal terms like “fundamental principles” and “fair process” (not due process). Like ACTA, it refers to “commercial scale”, as if this was a safeguard. The European Commission itself has previously said that the term is too vague in existing law.
The text also refers to a “right to access lawful content”, even though there is no such “right”. We have a right to freedom of movement (not a right to legal movement), we have a right to freedom of communication. The implication of the expression “right to access lawful content” is that everything we do or say should be assumed to be illegal until proven otherwise. This is profoundly objectionable.
Why is it that every time the European Commission address issues like copyright, file sharing and a free and open Internet – they totally loose it?
The commissioners are supposed to be the elite of European bureaucracy and they have top legal advisors. But do they even know what they are doing? Or do they deliberately conspire to deceive the public?
/ HAX
