It was agreed that Eircom customers engaged in file-sharing would be tracked by IRMA and the ISP would take action based on the music group’s recommendations. Letter writing first, then disconnections for those subscribers who continued to share content without permission.

With Eircom publicly penalizing its customer base, IRMA set about forcing other ISPs to follow suit. Its next key target was UPC, Ireland’s second largest provider, but the process didn’t get far. In an October 2010 judgment the High Court said that disconnecting file-sharers in Ireland was not backed up by law.

Since then, however, the legal position in Ireland has changed, something which has given IRMA the enthusiasm to revisit their demands of four years ago. Sony, Universal and Warner (not EMI) are now back with fresh demands that UPC takes action against piracy.

According to the Irish Times, IRMA tracked UPC customers during November 2013 and subsequently reported 7,757 copyright infringements to the ISP. Based on this evidence of apparent large-scale infringement, the labels are demanding that UPC subject its pirating customers to a graduated response scheme.

However, UPC is still refusing to move, stating that any response of that type would raise a “serious question of freedom of expression and public policy and demands fair and impartial procedures in the appropriate balancing of rights” and would need to be backed up by legislation.

Faced with a defiant ISP, IRMA has now initiated fresh legal action with the aim of forcing UPC into compliance.

The case, set to go before the Commercial Court, could turn on whether legislation introduced in Ireland during 2012 will allow a judgment in IRMA’s favor. Already the courts have shown a willingness to clamp down on illegal file-sharing, ordering ISP blockades (1,2) of sites including The Pirate Bay and KickassTorrents.

Presuming IRMA are successful, the big question is whether the strikes model will have the required effect of curbing piracy in any meaningful way. While recent research suggests that the approach does not work, the labels see things differently.

According to IRMA chairman Willie Kavanagh the Eircom three-strikes scheme has been “remarkably effective”, since only 0.2% of warned users have proceeded to the disconnection stage. Whether those users actually stopped downloading, moved to unmonitored sharing mechanisms, or simply hid their downloading activities, will probably remained unanswered.

The next hearing in the case is scheduled for April.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

At the moment customers of the Irish ISP Eircom cannot access The Pirate Bay since an uncontested 2009 High Court ruling orders the ISP to block the site. But that’s just one ISP, some people will say, and it’s easy to switch to another. Nice try.

The major recording labels, all members of the Irish Recorded Music Association (IRMA), now want that blockade to be extended to other service providers. The progressive wedge the activists warned about is getting thicker already.

To that end IRMA approached other ISPs including UPC, Imagine, Vodafone, Digiweb and Hutchison 3G to agree to a Pirate Bay blockade. As detailed in our earlier report, they all refused and IRMA turned to the courts.

Last month the ISPs confirmed that proceedings had been served on their legal representatives by the big four record labels – EMI, Sony, Universal and Warner Music – and December 17 2012 the case went before the High Court.

The case was adjourned until January 29 but in meantime the parties are required to meet before January 12 and further correspond by January 14 to hammer out some details. It is quite possible that the court will ultimately decide that the Pirate Bay blockade should be extended to these other providers.

“So what, there are other sites to use,” some people will say. Nice try.

What has transpired is that while the case appears focused on removing access to The Pirate Bay, even bigger things are being planned.

The plaintiffs (technically EMI, Ireland) have told the court that they are looking to achieve more than just a blockade of the world’s biggest torrent site. In fact, they have a list of 260 other “objectionable” websites they have identified that they would also like blocked if this attack on The Pirate Bay is a success.

What started out with Eircom agreeing to have The Pirate Bay blocked could now potentially lead to a few other Irish ISPs having to follow suit. In a worst case scenario that could play out to all ISPs having to block 260 other sites on the music industry’s hit-list. Which sites? Only they know.

So, next time you hear the argument that someone “just” wants to block The Pirate Bay, it will be easier to understand why even people who don’t support the site are against it. One thing definitely leads to another in this game, and who knows where we’ll end up.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

IRMA took UPC to court after it refused to implement a three-strikes scheme, but the High Court sided with the ISP ruling that there are no laws that demand website blockades or file-sharers to be cut off.

This week, however, it transpires that both parties have been engaged in another court battle, one that has apparently been lost by UPC.

It appears that IRMA has taken UPC to court once again, this time with a concrete demand for the company to block access to The Pirate Bay. As a result, UPC users now see the following notice (removed, see update below) when they browse to The Pirate Bay.

“The Pirate Bay has been blocked. The website you are trying to reach is currently unavailable. Further to a request from IRMA, the Irish Courts have ordered UPC to block access to The Pirate Bay website.”

The first user reports of the blockade came in yesterday morning but at the time only a few customers were affected. As the day progressed, more and more subscribers were redirected to the blocking notification.

Thus far UPC has yet to release a public statement, and according to user reports customer service representatives have not been briefed on the new change either. We were also unable to find a public record of the ruling, which appears to contradict a 2010 High Court verdict.

As noted, UPC has resisted IRMA’s demands to have The Pirate Bay blocked in Ireland in the past. However, the company’s Netherlands division was recently forced by The Court of The Hague to block the site after complaints from anti-piracy group BREIN.

Ireland is by no means the first country in Europe where the Pirate Bay is blocked by court order. Similar verdicts were previously handed down in the UK, Italy, the Netherlands, Denmark, Belgium and Finland.

Despite the blockade, UPC subscribers can still use The Pirate Bay through proxy sites, as happened massively in the UK earlier this year. There, the proxy site operated by the local Pirate Party is now among the 250 most visited websites in the region.

The above shows that while these blockades may stop some people from accessing a site, the really determined have plenty of options. Also, of those who simply give up on accessing The Pirate Bay, many will simply switch to other torrent sites.

Proof of the ineffectiveness of the censorship attempts was recently highlighted by several Dutch and UK Internet providers, who claimed that BitTorrent traffic didn’t decline after the blockades were implemented.

In other words, blocking The Pirate Bay doesn’t appear to have the desired effect.

On the contrary, The Pirate Bay team believes that they benefit from the blockades and that all the press attention serves as promotion. And they may have a point as the BitTorrent site continues to break traffic records week after week.

Finally, it is worth noting that although ISPs over the water in the UK are also “forced” by court order to block The Pirate Bay, they have put up little resistance in court. UPC customers will be hoping that their ISP did rather more in this case.

Update: The mystery has been solved. UPC says the blockade was just a test. The company does not explain why IRMA or a court order were mentioned on the redirect page.

TorrentFreak received the following message:

“UPC Ireland’s position has not changed. UPC is not required by any court or authority to block the pirate bay and does not intend to voluntarily block the pirate bay. Periodically testing is carried out across our European network which may have been observed by Irish customers.”

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

The case went to the High Court but although Mr Justice Peter Charleton acknowledged that recording companies were being harmed by Internet piracy, he said that laws to cut off file-sharers were not enforceable in Ireland.

“It is not surprising that the legislative response laid down in our country in the Copyright and Related Rights Act 2000, at a time when this problem was not perceived to be as threatening to the creative and retail economy as it has become in 2010, has made no proper provision for the blocking, diverting or interrupting of internet communications intent on breaching copyright,” he said in his judgment.

By not having this legislative mechanism in place, Justice Charleton said that Ireland is not in compliance with its obligations under European law. The only thing the courts can force an Internet host to carry out, he said, is the removal of infringing material.

Now, through its ‘Consultation on Amendment to Copyright and Related Rights Act, 2000′, the Irish government is taking steps to change legislation to close this apparent loophole.

“It must be emphasised that this proposed amendment is not about the introduction of a statutory regulatory regime in relation to copyright infringement such as the French ‘Hadopi’ system or the ‘Three strikes’ regime set out in the Digital Economy Act in the United Kingdom,” notes the proposal.

Nevertheless, while they do not implement a statutory regime, adoption of the proposals could yield a similar result, a situation welcomed by IRMA.

“We have always been looking for the right to take injunctions against ISPs if they are not dealing with illegality on their networks,” said IRMA chief executive Dick Doyle.

The proposals published yesterday are open for public consultation with a closing date of July 1st, just over a week away. Submissions should be sent to IPU@djei.ie or posted to the Intellectual Property Unit, Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, Kildare Street, Dublin 2.

The proposals come on the back of the news that due to an administrative computer error, in October last year Eircom wrongly sent out around 300 “first strike” warning letters to innocent subscribers. The error is now being investigated by the Irish Data Protection Commissioner.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

The latest attempt at blocking a website comes from Verein für Anti-Piraterie der österreichischen Film und Videobranche (VAP) – the anti-piracy association of the Austrian film and video industry.

In October, VAP approached several ISPs with a request to block Kino.to, a popular movie streaming portal which ranks in the top 50 sites of both Germany and Austria. Kino.to hosts no illicit content itself but indexes material stored on file-hosters and other streaming services.

More than 1500 IP addresses and nine domains are present on a VAP blocking wish list including MegaVideo.com, duckload.com, Freeload.to, Speedload.to and Archive.to.

Internet Service Providers Austria (ISPA) responded robustly to the request on behalf of their members, stating clearly that ISPs are mere carriers of information and that the request has no legal basis.

“It would be better for the rights holders to think about innovative business models,” said Secretary-General Andreas Wildberger.

Undeterred, at a press conference this week VAP announced that it now intends to force ISPs to cede to their wishes. They say they will do this by singling out one ISP in particular, UPC, to block Kino.to and other domains via a court injunction.

“Since the operators [of the 'infringing' services] cannot be found, we will hold the Internet service providers to account,” said a VAP spokesman.

In common with its division in Ireland (there it refused to cooperate with 3 strikes demands from the music industry), UPC is standing its ground.

“UPC enables its customers to access the Internet, but has no obligation and no right to selection or examination of the content provided therein,” the company said in a statement.

Werner Müller of VAP said the aim of the test case against UPC is to see whether the blocking of sites with “consistently illegal content” can be enforced via the courts.

The Pirate Party of Austria said it “is appalled but not surprised” at what it describes as a “Chinese-style” censorship attempt.

“It’s not about censorship, but rather the imposition of economic interests,” said VAP lawyer Andreas Manak.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

The deal would see the ISP introduce a 3 strikes system for dealing with subscribers who share songs to which the labels own the copyright. The implementation of the agreement was held up over legal argument, but in April this year the High Court in Dublin gave it the green light.

Part of the private agreement between IRMA and Eircom required that the ISP should not be put at a competitive disadvantage through this 3 strikes set up. That meant that IRMA would have to go after other ISPs to force them to do the same.

Among others, IRMA sought agreement from UPC, but the ISP refused to play ball and the case went to the Irish High Court. Today the result of that action was announced and for the record labels and Eircom, the result was bad news.

In a judgment published today, Mr Justice Peter Charleton acknowledged that recording companies were being harmed by Internet piracy but that laws to cut off file-sharers were not enforceable in Ireland.

“It is not surprising that the legislative response laid down in our country in the Copyright and Related Rights Act 2000, at a time when this problem was not perceived to be as threatening to the creative and retail economy as it has become in 2010, has made no proper provision for the blocking, diverting or interrupting of internet communications intent on breaching copyright,” began the judgment.

Justice Charleton noted that by not having this legislative mechanism in place, Ireland is not in compliance with its obligations under European law. He added that the only thing the courts can force an Internet host to carry out is the removal of infringing material.

“UPC has repeatedly stressed that it does not condone piracy and has always taken a strong stance against illegal activity on its network,” the company said in a statement.

“It takes all steps required by the law to combat specific infringements which are brought to its attention and will continue to co-operate with rights holders where they have obtained the necessary court orders for alleged copyright infringements.”

“Our whole premise and defence focused on the mere conduit principle which provides that an internet service provider cannot be held liable for content transmitted across its network and today’s decision supports the principle that ISPs are not liable for the actions of internet subscribers.”

The ruling leaves the music industry high and dry in Ireland and Eircom in the unfortunate position of being left at a commercial disadvantage. It will be interesting to see how the record labels and ISP handle this development.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

After initially telling everyone how it would never cave in to the labels, Eircom quickly changed its tune. A few days into the court case, suddenly there was a “world-first” agreement between the labels and the ISP.

Eircom had entered into an entirely voluntary agreement with the labels, where they would simply accuse alleged copyright infringers (via DtecNet, the RIAA and BPI anti-piracy partner), and on the third accusation the ISP would disconnect that subscriber on a Terms of Service violation.

Although it hasn’t been put into place yet due to “ongoing technical discussions concerning implementation,” this deal does seem very cosy.

And it gets cosier still. As part of the agreement with Eircom, the Big Four agreed that they would go after other ISPs to force them to agree to the same terms as Eircom did, so the company “would not be at a competitive disadvantage.”

So who would be next on the hit-list?

According to a report in the Irish Times, that honor has been bestowed on Ireland’s second-largest telco BT Ireland, and the country’s largest cable operator UPC Ireland.

On Tuesday, two sets of legal proceedings were issued at the High Court by “EMI Records (Ireland) Limited and others”, one against BT Communications Ireland and another against UPC Communications Ireland. IRMA, Ireland’s equivalent to the RIAA said it targeted these ISPs since their customers share the most music.

While a spokesman for BT said he couldn’t comment at this stage, a spokeswoman for UPC said their company position hasn’t changed. It will not enter into an agreement with the record labels that goes further than existing legislation – i.e no voluntary 3 strikes.

“There is no basis under Irish law requiring ISPs to control, access or block the Internet content its users download. In addition, the rights-holders’ proposal gives rise to serious concerns for data privacy and consumer contract law,” she said adding: “UPC intends to vigorously defend its position in court.”

Eircom took that position too, but look where they ended up – in the lap of the Big Four. Time will tell if UPC can maintain its strength against determined opposition.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.