TorrentFreak

In their ongoing battle against websites said to infringe music copyrights, record labels have initiated a fresh wave of actions aimed at forcing UK ISPs to carry out domain blocking. This third wave is set to be the biggest so far, affecting as many as 25 domains and including some of the world’s largest torrent sites and file-hosting search engines. Furthermore, the BPI – the entity coordinating the action – will ask courts to block US-based music streaming operation, Grooveshark.

In ever-more futile efforts to ‘fix’ piracy, lots of methods have been tried, and it’s doubtful there are very many left, except the obvious one of giving consumers what they want. Now the UK Intellectual Property Office has given almost £200,000 to two new projects that will almost certainly fail.

Last week, UK Prime Minister David Cameron announced a new porn filtering system that will go online sometime during the coming year. However, the blockades, which are intended to deal with porn, may end up developing into a backdoor ban on BitTorrent and other file-sharing related sites.

Two brothers from the UK in their mid-twenties have been convicted for operating websites that indexed links to unauthorized streams of copyrighted movies. The pair were charged in 2010 and this week were handed nine month suspended jail sentences and ordered to complete 150 hours of unpaid work. The convictions follow an investigation by West Yorkshire Police in collaboration with the movie industry group FACT, who feel that in the UK the tide is turning in favor of copyright holders.

Today, BT became the last major UK Internet provider to block subscriber access to The Pirate Bay. The ISP has gone further than other providers since it also restricts access to the new IP-addresses added by the deviant BitTorrent site in recent weeks. Nevertheless, even these additional efforts were quickly neutralized. Immediately after the block kicked in Pirate Bay added a set of new IP addresses to allow BT subscribers access again – for now at least.

A British couple are facing imprisonment after an MPAA sting operation revealed they were the owners of streaming links site SurfTheChannel. Aside from the use of an undercover agent who gained access to the defendants’ house under false pretenses, the case also involves an unprecedented involvement of the US authorities with a UK court case, in which a defendant in the US was offered a deal after agreeing to cooperate and testify in a trial overseas.

According to a report from a leading UK law firm, nearly 30% of UK file-sharers say they intend to pirate more movies, music, games and ebooks during the next 12 months. The entertainment industries shouldn’t be too disappointed though – 36% and 34% of paying music and movie customers say they’ll consume more in the year to come.