UK Cracks Down On Internet Music Piracy

By Mike Sachoff - Thu, 07/24/2008 - 09:35

ISPs support move

Britain's major online service providers have joined a government initiated plan to deal with the illegal downloading of music and films.

Internet service providers will send warning letters to users who are suspected of illegal file sharing. Around 6 million Britons are believed to have downloaded files illegally over the past year, costing the music and film industries millions in lost revenue.

The plan mirrors similar moves by France to convince Internet service providers to deal with copyright infringement on their networks and countries such as Australia, Demark, Japan and New Zealand are also considering such moves.

Under the government-backed deal, Virgin Media, BskyB, Carphone Warehouse, BT, Orange and Tiscali have agreed to help reduce the illegal sharing of content.

They will send letters to heavy downloaders of illegal content each week during a three-month trail, warning them they are being watched. The ISPs and content owners will then partner with media regulator Ofcom to create a Code of Practice on how to proceed if the letters are not effective.

Possible sanctions against illegal downloaders includes a three-strikes-and -you're out warning, slowing access for illegal downloader's, or filtering to block illegal songs from being downloaded.

"The UK agreement is a big step towards reaching a solution to online piracy, and it shows that the process of engaging ISPs that was set in motion in France last year is gathering real momentum internationally," said John Kennedy, the CEO of the IFPI body which oversees the music industry.

News Tags: Technology, Legal, UK, Online Piracy

About the author:
Mike is a staff writer for WebProNews.

4 Comments

By Gareth - Design (WPN reader) - Tue, 07/29/2008 - 03:54

Good

I think this is a good idea. If i were ever to download a tune I would expect to pay! Thats the way it is. Vinyl is the future!

By Crashoverride (WPN reader) - Tue, 07/29/2008 - 02:54

What Next?

Ok simple to get round this. Simply set up a proxy server with user name and password. this will encrypt all data so they cant spy on you.

Next tip use rss feeds instead of the actual torrent sites to see torrents.

Ok so like the previous post a provider will get on your back for downloading gigs a day.

As a web developer I download and upload gigs a day so am i going to get this letter ? I dont think so and if I do they can go and suck a egg.

I also beleave utorrent may be working on this issue as well.

Happy Downloading

One more thing they have not taken in to consideration Torrent sites and peer to peer software was designed to help people like me to share work that we have made and also for the budding song writer and so on to share their programes music and vids with the world. so how are they gona tell if your downloading a ilegal file ? maybe put spyware in to a film and make it a trap erm isnt their such thing as entrapment and also invasion of privacy.

OK one more thing I got to get of my chest.

If they do but some kind of tracing programe in a fake movie or song what ever doesnt this come under malicious code intended to send data back to a unauthorised person mmmmmmmmm think about it.

By Guest (WPN reader) - Mon, 07/28/2008 - 05:31

"You're being watched"

what ever happend to pravacy. they could be doing anything with the infomation they get from intercepting our internet conection! i dont feel safe sending sensative infomation online anymore.

By Guest (WPN reader) - Sat, 07/26/2008 - 12:23

> costing the music and

> costing the music and film industries millions in lost revenue

This is such a fallacy. Just because someone downloads something doesn't mean he would have paid for it otherwise, which means, the company wouldn't have earn any money anyway.

> You're being watched

And then what? After sending letters to suspicious people, what do they do? How do they "prove" anything? Just because someone is downloading many GBs every day doesn't mean it's all pirated content (or any at all).