Are you a media pirate? Do you live in the United Kingdom?
If so, be prepared for the deluge
of warning letters that will soon be sent your way, followed by possible
sanctions – like internet monitoring, speed caps, and blacklisting – from your
ISP if you fail to comply.
Widespread opposition to France’s “three-strikes
and you’re out” approach to curbing internet piracy – which sees pirates
disconnected from the net for a year if caught three times – led UK record
labels to request a new kind of remedy, brokered between the country’s six top
ISPs and Ofcom, the UK telecommunications authority.
The deal manifests as a memorandum of understanding between the UK music industry
association BPI, and ISPs Carphone Warehouse, BT, Virgin Media, Orange,
Tiscali, and BSkyB. (A press release posted by at the BPI’s website indicates
that the MPAA signed on as well.) Under the MOU’s terms, “hundreds of
thousands” of strongly-worded letters will be sent out to suspected internet
pirates – giving them a chance to change their ways before more severe
punishments set in.
As for the punishments themselves, the specifics are still being worked out.
It does not appear that pirates will face legal trouble should they keep
getting caught; rather, many speculate that ISPs will degrade service for a set
period time – like the aforementioned speed caps – for repeat offenders. Ofcom
will facilitate these negotiations, but by and large the UK government promised
to stand aside – provided an agreement can be reached. If not, it stands ready
to enact additional legislation.
The BPI’s enforcement arm will handle the process of discovering music
pirates; ISPs will be tasked with forwarding letters from the BPI and
implementing sanctions when necessary. Many worried that ISPs would turn their
spying capacity – previously demonstrated in a variety of clandestine
advertising experiments – against customers; as luck would have it, this
will not be the case.
Critics have raised
a variety of concerns over the scheme. What happens when the offender is
the child in a household? What happens in cases of computers controlled by
hackers or botnets? What happens when the “pirate” is making fair use of the
copyright materials he downloads?
Their questions, thus far, remain unanswered amidst the MOU’s “vague”
wording.
“This MOU represents a significant step forward, in that all ISPs now
recognise their responsibility to help deal with illegal filesharing,” said BPI
Chief Executive Geoff Taylor. “Government has played an important role in
bringing all parties together to arrive at this point, but the work really
begins now. We look forward to creating the procedures necessary to
effectively tackle repeated unlawful filesharing with the other signatories and
Ofcom.”