According to the theory, Internet subscribers who are continually warned that their behavior is being monitored will, sooner or later, change their attitudes and stop obtaining content from unauthorized sources.

One of the first countries to see value in the idea was France, and under the supportive eye of ex-President Nicolas Sarkozy, Hadopi was born. The taxpayer-funded agency would oversee monitoring of Internet subscribers along with a mechanism for sending them successive warnings, each designed to be more worrying than the last. Controversially, the final warning would result in Internet disconnection.

However, the idea that these threats would entice subscribers into music and movie stores and away from unauthorized sites in a meaningful way never came to be. In June, a nine-member panel lead by former Canal Plus chairman Pierre Lescure produced a 700 page report advising on policies for advancing entertainment industries in the digital age.

Among other things, the panel concluded that the three strikes mechanism had failed to benefit authorized services as promised. It also recommended that the ultimate sanction of Internet disconnections for infringers should be dumped.

That recommendation has now been carried out by the French Government.

Earlier this morning the Ministry of Culture published official decree No. 0157 of July 9, 2013 which removed “the additional misdemeanor punishable by suspension of access to a communication service.”

The changes come too late for the only individual to have fallen foul of France’s disconnection law. In June and after millions of warnings sent, a single Internet subscriber was fined 600 euros and suspended from the Internet for two weeks after failing to respond to “strike” notices.

Today’s changes by the French don’t mean that infringing file-sharers can relax though. The decree goes on to explain that file-sharing offenses may still be punishable by a fine, up to 1500 euros in the case of gross negligence.

To this end, the decree clarifies that ISPs must provide access to names, address and other personal details of subscribers in order to facilitate the implementation of a system for issuing automating file-sharing fines. Disconnections may have been removed, but the war against individuals will continue.

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

The customer in question will be without Internet access for two weeks and must also pay a 600 euro fine. Quoting officials, PC Inpact reports that the file-sharer was caught sharing one or two files and failed to respond to earlier warnings.

If no appeal is filed within 10 days the file-sharer’s Internet provider will move forward with the disconnection. For 15 days the customer will be denied access to the Internet, but the ISP must ensure that e-mail, instant messaging and other VOIP services continue to work.

The sentencing comes at a peculiar time. Last month a nine-member panel recommended that the Government scraps the Hadopi agency, the body that currently oversees the graduated response system.

In a detailed report the panel concluded that although there was a reduction in file-sharing on P2P networks such as BitTorrent, there had also been an increase in use of other services such as streaming sites and cyberlockers which are not covered by Hadopi. In addition the panel concluded that the three-strikes scheme had failed to benefit legal services.

The ineffectiveness of the three-strikes policy was confirmed two weeks ago by a music industry group. In a separate report the group concluded that the anti-piracy law had failed to halt the decline in music sales.

But while Hadopi might be dead soon, file-sharing penalties are not going away.

Based on a recommendation from the panel, the Government now plans to replace the current system of Internet disconnections with automated fines. Under Hadopi, fines extended to a theoretical maximum of around 1,500 euros, but these are now expected to be reduced to around 60 euros each, but with increases applied to repeat offenders.

The Government presented the new automated warning system as a better deal, since no one would be at risk of losing access to the Internet. However, at the time of the announcement this statement made little sense.

“They pretended it would be a better deal for internet users, but it wasn’t. No one had been convicted to a suspension of Internet access, and we all believed no one ever would. With the recent conviction they can now claim they are right, and defend their new legislation,” Guillaume Champeau of French news site Numerama told TorrentFreak in a comment.

“The timing is really the best one possible for the Government. But was the sentencing totally independent, or did it follow instructions that suited a political agenda?”

Despite having the first conviction in the bag, the Hadopi law will go down in history as a failed experiment. However, the announced changes are certainly no win for file-sharers as the automated system takes away judicial oversight, opening up the possibility of thousands of people being issued with fines every week.

Time will tell whether that’s going to happen.

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

To deal with this threat the French Publishers Association (SNE) announced several countermeasures this week. One of their key initiatives is ProtectionLivres.com, a new anti-piracy portal that will allow publishers to search for infringing content and send infringement notices to take unauthorized copies offline.

“SNE members will soon be able to use a French version of a service developed by English publishers. This portal provides access to a search engine through which publishers can find illegal content and send takedown requests,” they wrote in a press release.

The association explains that the new service will be especially useful to smaller publishing houses who don’t already have systems in place to protect their content. The French version is a copy of CopyrightInfringementPortal.com and will be launched on the ProtectionLivres.com domain in the weeks to come.

At least, that was the plan.

Unfortunately for the publishers, news of the new anti-piracy portal didn’t go unnoticed by the popular eBook release group “Team AlexandriZ.” These book pirates quickly found out that the domain mentioned in the press release wasn’t registered yet. So, Team AlexandriZ decided to buy it instead, redirecting it to the Defective By Design anti-DRM site.

Team AlexandriZ, who were sued by SNE and six book publishers last year, told TorrentFreak that they wanted to reverse the original message the domain was intended for.

“Protectionlivres.com was supposed to be a site where publishers can report pirated content, but it’s now a portal to fight against DRM. Because DRM is one of the causes of piracy, not its effect,” Team AlexandriZ says.

Thus far the plan has been quite successful. French press picked up the stunt, directing the attention for the anti-piracy initiative to the unfortunate mistake. The French Publishers Association quickly realized that they had no other option than to register a new domain name to host their portal.

The publishers group quickly issued a new press release (original here) replacing the ProtectionLivres.com domain with the new PortailProtectionLivres.com. There is no mention of the incident on their website but the (1) in the title of the press release says enough.

The above shows that similar to their natural adversaries, anti-piracy campaigns are like a hydra. They simply grow a new head and reappear under a new name. But not without having a laugh first.

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

Since the system only covers BitTorrent-like public transfers, streaming and direct download sites are an attractive option for Internet users wishing to avoid its clutches. But despite the Hadopi anti-piracy agency declaring last year that there had been “a clear downward trend in illegal P2P downloads” but no “massive transfer in forms of use to streaming technologies or direct downloads”, there is still interest in these mechanisms.

French news outlet PCInpact has directed TorrentFreak to a new report published by Hadopi which proposes draconian messages to force streaming and Direct Download (DDL) sites to comply with the law.

“Some Internet sites, streaming services and direct download sites are specialized in the massive exploitation of illegal content from which they make profits for their own benefit,” the Hadopi writes. “This report, showing the state of the ecosystem of illegal streaming and direct downloads, explores different ways to fight against the massive exploitation of illegal content.”

The report, put together by Mireille Imbert-Quaretta, President at the Commission for the Protection of Rights (Commission de Protection des Droits), covers a wide range of anti-piracy techniques, some well-trodden and others more fresh.

Hadopi has always claimed that “three strikes” is primarily an educational effort and in combating streaming and direct downloads the agency begins with the same approach. Internet users should be educated about the “dangers” of obtaining media via these mechanisms through warning messages sent by Hadopi.

Aiming to push the sites themselves towards YouTube-levels of copyright compliance, Hadopi would like them to implement content recognition and filtering technologies utilizing fingerprints supplied by rightsholders. These systems could be used to completely remove content or restrict user access based on location.

However, the report goes much further by suggesting that if site operators refuse to sign filtering agreements with rightsholders and illicit content repeatedly appears, they could be subjected to a strikes-style system of their own.

“In the event that it would not be possible to reach an agreement because of the apparent unwillingness of the platform hosting the reported content [to comply with the law], the public authority may decide to correct the behavior of the platform through an alert procedure,” Numerama reports.

Suggested punishments for sites are varied, including reporting them to search engines for delisting. Google has already taken steps to remove French sites including AlloStreaming from its index in the past.

In addition, sites could be reported to a judge in order to begin a domain blocking process. Once blocked by IP and DNS, Hadopi wants to have the power to ensure that domains (and any subsequent mirrors) remain blocked. Outright domain seizures are also a possibility.

Also, in a move that mirrors more recent anti-piracy activity involving PayPal and certain credit cards, Hadopi wants to hit operators in the pocket by targeting the financial intermediaries of sites subjected to the copyright alerts procedure. This could include suspension or termination of payments but if financial partners refuse to cooperate, Hadopi suggests it could take the matter to court.

Finally, and adding momentum to initiatives underway in the United States, Hadopi wants to strangle advertising to sites subjected to the alerts procedure.

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

SNEP argued that when users enter the name of popular artists into the search box, Google often adds piracy related keywords including ‘torrent’, ‘RapidShare’ and ‘MegaUpload’.

According to the music group this means that Google is facilitating piracy, and it asked the court to order Google to censor the three search terms in question.

After SNEP lost the case in two lower courts, it took the matter to the Supreme Court which decided in favor of the music group last week. The Supreme Court ruled that keyword filters are an appropriate measure to curb online piracy.

While the Court recognizes that Google is not accountable for any of the infringements that take place on other websites, it says that Google does have a responsibility to make it more difficult for the public to “discover” unauthorized content.

By filtering these search terms, Google helps to prevent future infringements, the Court noted.

The Supreme Court based its verdict on Article 336-2 of the Intellectual Property code, a provision which allows courts to take almost any emergency measure to protect rightsholders. The same article is being relied on in a separate case brought by the French movie and TV industry in which ISPs and search engines are being asked to block several popular streaming sites.

Following its ruling the Supreme Court sent the case back to the Court of Appeal for a final decision.

For Google, fighting the French case is a matter of principle. The search engine has already been filtering “piracy-related” terms from its ‘Autocomplete‘ and ‘Instant‘ services for more than a year, worldwide. Google users searching for terms like “torrent” and “RapidShare” will notice that no suggestions or search results appear before they type in the full word.

While Google hasn’t removed any content from its search results, Google’s measures do indeed lead to fewer searches for the terms that are censored.

We assume that Google is nevertheless fighting the decision to keep control over what they choose to censor. If the case is decided against them, they can expect more requests for keywords to be added to the filter, or even entire websites.

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

The judge will then review the case and hand down any one of a range of penalties, from fines through to disconnecting the Internet connection of the infringer.

This week the Hadopi office for the first time released official data on the massive anti-piracy effort. The scope of the operation is mind-boggling, but whether it will result in the desired outcome is yet to be seen.

Despite millions of file-sharers being tracked, France has yet to witness its first disconnection.

The Hadopi agency revealed that since October last year the IP-addresses of 18 Million file-sharers were reported by their ‘hacked‘ tracking partner Trident Media Guard. Of this massive list a randomly selected sample of one million IP-addresses was sent to the Internet providers to obtain further information on the subscribers, and 900,000 identities were returned.

This mass discovery process resulted in 470,000 first warning emails, which equals little over 50,000 per month. The number of people who received a second warning is currently stuck at 20,000 and only 10 Internet subscribers received a third warning.

According to the Hadopi agency these 10 cases are currently being investigated by a judge. These alleged offenders risk a fine of 1500 euros and could lose their Internet connection temporarily. Thus far, however, no French file-sharers have been disconnected.

As the results of France’s controversial three-strikes anti-piracy law are revealed, many people doubt whether the costs involved with the massive operation are justified.

Last month a report from the UN’s Human Rights Council labeled Internet access a human right, arguing that Hadopi is a disproportionate law that should be repealed. This assessment was supported by Reporters Without Borders recently.

“Aside from its practical omissions and shortcomings, the Hadopi law directly violates the principles of the defence of free expression by making it possible to disconnect people from the Internet. Its adoption was one of Reporters Without Borders’ reasons for adding France to the list of ‘countries under surveillance’ in its latest ‘Enemies of the Internet’ report,” the organization writes.

In addition to the human rights issues it is also highly questionable how significant the claimed deterrent effect of the disconnection threat is.

A recent survey by ZDNet.fr found that just 4% of file-sharers polled said they have stopped sourcing music from illegal services for fear of detection. Instead, many BitTorrent users simply turn to proxies and VPNs to conceal their identities.

Thus far, however, the French Government is determined to continue its war against piracy. Effective or not, the Hadopi office will continue to track down millions of French file-sharers each month in the hope that the tide turns in their favor.

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

One site which utilized Canadian hosting was the French site Liberty Land (LL). Listed among France’s top 200 sites, Liberty Land carried estimated 30,000 links to albums and 100,000 links to movies and TV shows. This material was not hosted by the site, but made available from services such as MegaUpload and RapidShare.

However, despite the perceived legality of mere links – even when coupled with friendly Canadian hosting – in May 2010 rightsholder groups SACEM and ALPA filed a complaint against Liberty Land with the French authorities.

Last week, police described the subsequent investigation as “difficult” due to a combination of Canadian hosting and measures put in place by the site’s operators to remain anonymous. Nevertheless, an operation against Liberty Land went ahead.

According to a report, its alleged operators have now been arrested. It is being suggested that an investigation into one of the site’s major link uploaders led police to the men.

Jean-Philippe Vidal, the chief police officer leading the operation, said three men aged between 25 and 30 were arrested in Marseille, near Le Havre and in the Paris suburb of Montreuil.

Some reports are indicating the trio generated up to $285,300 in revenue from banner advertising on the site, an accusation which has led to them being charged with organised counterfeiting.

The men have been released pending a trial, where they face a possible five years in jail and fines of up to $700,000.

Liberty Land is currently down and there are no indications it is set to return.

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

Now aged 25, Valade was the owner of ed2K link site Emule Paradise, which at the time was one of the most popular sites of its type. Indeed, the claims from the movie company plaintiffs including Association of Film Producers, the National Federation of Film Distributors, the Association of Independent Producers, Universal, Galatée Films and Pathé Rennare, are that the site attracted around 300,000 visitors every day.

From this traffic, say the plaintiffs, Valade generated a sizeable advertising income. During the two year period in question it’s claimed he had revenues of more than 416,000 euros which were placed in bank accounts in Belize and Cyprus. Five other defendants including the Future Net (Net Avenir) advertising agency will appear alongside Valade at the trial.

Valade, now aged 25, is accused of facilitating the illegal distribution of 7,113 copyright movies, some of which were pre-release, between 2005 and 2006. He is also accused of the illegal copying of 19 films which were found on his computer following his December 2006 arrest.

It is by no means certain that Valade will lose his case. A similar case brought by 20th Century Fox, Columbia, Disney, Paramount, Universal and Warner against link site see-link.net failed last year after the plaintiffs presented no evidence to show that even a single infringement had taken place due to the site’s links.

“The underlying question is, can Vallade be held liable for links that are Uniform Resource Identifiers (URI), and not Uniform Resource Locators (URL),” Guillaume Champeau of file-sharing news site Numerama told TorrentFreak this afternoon.

“That is, if there is no evidence that the referenced content was actually shared when the .ed2K files were created, can you say it is infringement? Even if the content is shared, is it second degree infringement?”

In addition, one of the core arguments of the plaintiffs is that eMule Paradise offered the eMule file-sharing software for download – complete with how-to guides – alongside links to infringing downloads.

“[The plaintiffs] say that given ‘the context’ of eMule Paradise, with lots of links enabling the downloading of infringing content, the act of offering eMule for download is criminal,” Guillaume explains.

“Since the DADVSI law passed in 2006, it is forbidden in France to ‘knowingly and by any form, publish, make available or communicate to the public a device clearly intended for making available copyrighted works and material without authorization’.”

If found guilty Valade faces a 3 year jail sentence, fines of up to 300,000 euros and damages payouts potentially running to millions of euros.

Update: According to Guillaume, the trial has been postponed.

“The defense lawyers have shown flaws in the order of reference, and the court agreed that the case had to go back to the investigation judge. When the flaws are fixed, a new date for the trial will be decided. It should take months, if not years.”

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