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ThePirateBay comes down due to international pressure

Several days ago, under pressure from the MPAA and other media groups, the Swedish National Criminal Police (SNCP) raided datacenters housing ThePirateBay.org (TPB) servers. TPB is considered the largest BitTorrent aggregator for pirated software.  However, Swedish law does not prevent TPB from hosting the sort of material that it does. The SNCP seized servers belonging to ThePirateBay.org effectively shutting down the popular torrent tracking site.

The SNCP seized the servers as part of an investigation in to alleged copyright infringement being committed by ThePirateBay.org; however the investigators openly admit that they are unsure if a crime has been committed under Swedish law by TPB at this point.

The seizures seem to have been far reaching, impacting all servers hosted by PRQ and not just those belonging to TPB and customers of PRQ are crying foul over the SNCPs actions to seize their servers which were completely unrelated to TPB’s activities. Even though the servers were clearly marked and TPB was the target of the warrant, which someone has posted on Flickr.

The MPAA yesterday released a press release (PDF) praising the actions taken by Swedish authorities however it appears that the celebration may be short lived as TPB has reportedly already purchased replacement hardware and found hosting outside of Sweden and may be operational again in the next few days.

As of yesterday, a message on TPB front page claimed the following:

SITE DOWN - WILL BE UP AND FULLY FUNCTIONAL WITHIN A DAY OR TWO

Since the site was removed, a number of hack-related retaliations have sprung up, including a major denial of service attack that took down the official Swedish Police website.  Ars Technica has the scoop on several other retaliations.

Update 6/3/2006:  It appears that ThePirateBay.org is back online after its brief outage. The site has a new IP address which now resolves to 85.17.40.38. A quick whois on the IP indicates that the 85.x.x.x netblock is currently owned by leaseweb.com which is located in Amsterdam and no longer at 83.140.176.135, TPB's previous home.

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Welcome to days old news
By segagenesis on 6/2/2006 1:03:29 PM , Rating: 2
Before anyone picks the moral high horse argument, what they were doing was not illegal in Sweden. How they managed to louse up taking a few servers and getting all the customers at once down is beyond me... someone must have greased the cops palms and said "take whatever you see". I'd be pretty peeved if I was one of thier customers also.







RE: Welcome to days old news
By PandaBear on 6/2/2006 1:18:23 PM , Rating: 3
Yup, MPAA knows they can't touch TPB in Sweeden law so they bribe the police to give as much pain to their host (or their hosts' other customer) as they can, to force them to kick out TPB.

The golden rule: those with gold rule (via corruption).


RE: Welcome to days old news
By Nekrik on 6/2/2006 2:09:39 PM , Rating: 1
If it's not illegal in Sweden then the content should only be available in Sweden, if it can be accessed from somewhere else then the laws from Sweden are not the only ones to consider.


RE: Welcome to days old news
By Viditor on 6/2/2006 2:20:23 PM , Rating: 1
quote:
If it's not illegal in Sweden then the content should only be available in Sweden, if it can be accessed from somewhere else then the laws from Sweden are not the only ones to consider

By that logic, broadcasters in Texas should reduce their transmission gain so as not to reach Mexico...or they should license themselves with the Mexican Govt as well...


RE: Welcome to days old news
By Nekrik on 6/2/2006 2:30:54 PM , Rating: 2
If there was content a neighboring country didn't want its citizens to see it would be an issue.


RE: Welcome to days old news
By Viditor on 6/2/2006 2:33:01 PM , Rating: 3
quote:
If there was content a neighboring country didn't want its citizens to see it would be an issue

Happens every day and has been for many decades...it's called Voice of America.


RE: Welcome to days old news
By Viditor on 6/2/2006 2:37:58 PM , Rating: 2
You should also consider that most of the Internet content that China considers illegal but can't completely filter out originates from the US...


RE: Welcome to days old news
By AncientPC on 6/8/2006 7:57:23 PM , Rating: 2
Canada complains sometimes about how much their population watches US television programming.


RE: Welcome to days old news
By timmiser on 6/5/2006 6:08:15 PM , Rating: 2
I see that you're new to this Internet gig.


RE: Welcome to days old news
By Shining Arcanine on 6/3/06, Rating: -1
RE: Welcome to days old news
By segagenesis on 6/3/2006 7:53:49 PM , Rating: 2
Congratulations for being the second complete asshat of the day! Not only did you ignore all the articles and news stories about whats going on (and you say I'm ignorant?) but are completely off base. Perhaps you should not be posting yourself since your signal to noise ratio is in the single digits there...

US laws do not apply everywhere despite what you think, TPB was legal in Sweden. End of story. Typically those who dont have anything better to comment about these kind of stories resort to "the moral high horse argument" because they assume that whats legal in the US somehow magically applies elsewhere. Oh, those darn Swedish pirates they should all go to jail for being... pirates! Because I never pirate anything! Oh wait...

Morality: Nearly 90% of Swedes do not believe that using TPB or copying music is illegal. The raid was pretty unpopular with the general public and also raised question on why the police scream they are shorthanded but yet managed to pull 50 officers to sieze one or two servers. The servers were clearly marked and took ones not even related to TPB.

Legality: TBP contained no copyrighted material to begin with, of which is likely more legal than Google is. Have you checked lately how Google cache and image thumbnails could easily violate copyright in the US? Like how Allofmp3.com is legal in Russia, those who are in violation are those who access the site outside theier respective countries. Maybe they should have gone after those people instead of doing an illegal raid? Yes, the whole irony is that the raid was likely illegal in Sweden!

So, how much further should I make you look like a complete idiot? Please RTFA next time before you post a generalized riposte that had absolutely nothing to do with both the topic and what I posted about.


RE: Welcome to days old news
By mikeblas on 6/4/06, Rating: 0
RE: Welcome to days old news
By MrSmurf on 6/4/06, Rating: 0
RE: Welcome to days old news
By segagenesis on 6/4/2006 3:28:30 PM , Rating: 3
Wow you are incredibly stupid today. You cant mark posts once you have posted as part of the system, so obviously people think that those comments were worthless.

And repeat after me: It is not illegal in Sweden. It is not illegal in Sweden. It is not illegal in Sweden.

When you get it through your thick skull that US laws dont apply in other countries you might actually sound intelligent.


RE: Welcome to days old news
By Trisped on 6/6/2006 12:56:01 PM , Rating: 2
Strange, if you provide a service to a resident of another country, and if the country you live in declares that service to be legal, but the country where you provide it to delcares not legal, wouldn't that make you a criminal in the other country?

Of course, then comes the question, how do you prevent your content from being distributed to countries where it is not legal?


RE: Welcome to days old news
By Trisped on 6/6/2006 1:17:00 PM , Rating: 2
Of course, it would put the illegal activity with the person that used the services where they were illegal, not the provider. So then you would have to find the criminal, which would work very easily if you could convince the service provider to provide information on anyone accessing content from your country. If they don't provide this info, you just block access to their servers from the internet. But, if you do that, how do you prevent them from using one of those proxy/mirror sites (I forget the actual name) where you can use their servers to forward the data to you? I guess the real issue would be finding a way to prevent everyone but the high end crackers from copying your data (which isn't possible) or find a way to make distribution of the media free to the consumer (or practically free).
You know, the movie and music industry complain about loss of profits, but how many more of these movies would they actually sell if their was no piracy? This seems to be an example of technology changing, but rich companies not keeping up. By law of "survival of the fittest" they must adapt or be destroyed.


National Law or Worldwide Law, which is it?
By Xavian on 6/2/2006 4:00:55 PM , Rating: 4
It has been said in this Thread and in other Threads that:

'it may be legal in Sweden, but because its illegal in other countries, the US should go in and arrest them'

Because there are laws in other countries that the US breaks on a daily basis, are those countries allowed to go in and arrest those people too? NO they are not.

The US has to decided weither it simply enforces its own laws in its own country OR all countries enforce their own laws in all countries.

National Law or Global Law, personally Global Law would result in chaos, so the US should simply enforce its own borders and stay the hell out of other countries business. :P




RE: National Law or Worldwide Law, which is it?
By kaoken on 6/2/2006 11:23:38 PM , Rating: 1
You are oversimplifying this case. This case is more like drug dealers smugling in illegal drugs, and the government want to go after the source of drugs. If you ask me, the government has full right to stop them. On a side note, we are living in a world where might is right here.


RE: National Law or Worldwide Law, which is it?
By Viditor on 6/3/2006 12:47:42 AM , Rating: 4
quote:
This case is more like drug dealers smugling in illegal drugs, and the government want to go after the source of drugs

I couldn't disagree more...drug dealers pose a physical threat to US citizens. This is more like protectionism of a marketplace for corporate America...
quote:
On a side note, we are living in a world where might is right here

Sadly, I have to agree with you here. Since Bush began his doctrine of preemptive strikes, it has become very scary for me (as a US citizen) to travel and live overseas...too many groups have decided to adopt his policy and since they can't attack the military directly, they attack easier targets (like me!). All the others are just sick of it and hates everyone involved, and being an American traveler I'm the closest thing to Bush that they can vent their frustration on...sigh...


By xsilver on 6/3/2006 7:36:35 AM , Rating: 1
lol
what about a little somthing called the kyoto protocol?
the US the stuffing up the world's environment

I hereby seize your car/computer/electrical appliances in the name of the LAW!!!


RE: National Law or Worldwide Law, which is it?
By Xavian on 6/3/2006 11:43:03 AM , Rating: 2
So, that means that the US can perform operations upon foreign soil against the countries governments wishes? (US Marines go to columbia to stop the drug makers)

No i dont think so. Such things are illegal under international law.


RE: National Law or Worldwide Law, which is it?
By kaoken on 6/3/2006 4:41:33 PM , Rating: 2
When a forein gorvernment does not comply, either the US will get the world leaders the pressure them, or it is an act of war, IE: Iraq


RE: National Law or Worldwide Law, which is it?
By bob661 on 6/3/2006 5:37:28 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
or it is an act of war
Only problem is the government could not sell going to war over piracy. It would have to be under the guise of something more sinister, ie, that country would also have to be commiting some atrocity. Not to mention, we don't invade allies.


By kaoken on 6/3/2006 7:11:13 PM , Rating: 2
Lol when people start to disagree anything can happen. Don't matter if it's family; it's just human nature.


Tip of the iceberg
By crystal clear on 6/3/2006 6:50:54 AM , Rating: 2
This is just the tip of the iceberg compared to others around the world.
China holds the number 1 spot then Russia at 2-these two hold the world record for pirate sites/piracy.e.g.
Allofmp3.com
The only way to stop piracy of music/movies/software is through the World Trade Organiztion (WTO).
By the way all those Viruses come from RUSSIA with love.
Russia & China have in the past & in the future will play the role of spoilers.
Add to the above HACKERS.
Everything criminal starts from these 2 countries.




RE: Tip of the iceberg
By hwhacker on 6/3/2006 6:56:04 AM , Rating: 2
I mean this with the upmost amount of respect, I promise you:

It seems some people STILL don't get it, although I know most do. To reitterate: TPB, or any other torrent search engine for that matter, is NOT HOSTING PIRATED SOFTWARE.

They are a search engine for bittorrent trackers, which contain the peer sharing information (seeds,etc) for a certain file, which could be anything. The files are communicated between individuals, starting with the initial seed that creates the tracker, and the actual files are not located on their server. This is how bittorrent is different from P2P's like Kazaa where are clients connect to a centralized server.

That is, if I understand correctly. I may have it slightly off, but that's my jist of it.

Amsterdam, Sweden, Russia etc do not currently have laws on the books for this type of layout making the host of the tracker liable, and TPB (and others) use this to their current advantage. Any file, legal or non-legal could be pointed to which have people sharing, but they are not hosting the file themselves, therefore not violating any certain laws in their country. For that matter, even torrent sites in the US and Canada (such as Isohunt) allow this format to thrive legally...as long as they remove links to trackers for copywrited content when served with the ol' cease and desist once it's been shown that it's available via a tracker on their site. The MPAA/RIAA are still suing them all anyway, but the sites have a VERY reasonable arguement.

In reality, and I know it sounds sleezy...It's not their fault. It's the people who decide to upload the tracker and host the initial and continuing file. Once they "learn about it", they take it down. Kind of like YouTube. Well, a lot like Youtube...Yet noone seems to be suing them yet.

TPB exploits the loophole of not addressing this tech yet in Sweden.

Make sense...Kinda? I know it's sorta-complicated.


RE: Tip of the iceberg
By hwhacker on 6/3/2006 7:13:58 AM , Rating: 2
Ok, perhaps youtube is bad example...since the files are on their servers...but the point remains that sites that allow uploading are not to blame. It's the individuals who upload/download the content.

Hopefully, or unhopefully...depending on your point of view, this type of format of sharing can remain legal, as long as laws are made to put responsibility where it is deserved and the sites somehow find a way to police themselves in a way the RIAA/MPAA can handle (constant employee's of such organizations policing them and cooperating with the sites?) I dunno.

TPB is currently getting away with it though, and as it stands currently, rightly so. It's not the MPAA, RIAA, or USG's job to police the world. Hopefully they understand that some day...Or some one will make them learn.

Aww, new tech. Ain't it a B? The water's always so murky in the beginning.


RE: Tip of the iceberg
By crystal clear on 6/3/2006 9:49:26 AM , Rating: 2
I focus my attention more on 2 countries rather than on bittorrent.
I wonder if you have travelled to these countries on business trips like I did/do.
Piracy/hacking is a way of life.
Clones of original hardware are the bestsellers.
If you track down the authors of viruses,you land up in Russia.
Thats where something has to be done.


RE: Tip of the iceberg
By crystal clear on 6/3/2006 10:19:52 AM , Rating: 2
" Cyber vandals have attacked the website of the Swedish police, forcing it to shut down."

courtesey-BBC news.


RE: Tip of the iceberg
By akugami on 6/3/2006 2:14:30 PM , Rating: 3
Everything criminal DOES NOT start from China and Russia. What you are saying is just plain bias. There are plenty of criminal enterprises started in the USA as well as other countries. Heck, the RIAA itself engages in questionable activities from a legal standpoint such as telling people what to say on the jury stand. Yet the RIAA is backed by many powerful (ie: rich) companies so the US government does jack about it. There are US government agencies that engage in illegal activities. So before anyone in the US talks about Russia and China, you better make sure your own house is in good order.

I live in the US so don't take this as crap from a foreigner who doesn't know what he's talking about.


RE: Tip of the iceberg
By Xavian on 6/4/2006 6:46:10 AM , Rating: 2
indeed, let he who is without Sin cast the first stone :)


Sooner or later they will go to jail
By cornfedone on 6/3/06, Rating: 0
By Chiisuchianu on 6/3/2006 11:11:31 AM , Rating: 2
just because something is a crime in the usa doesnt mean its a crime everywhere else.


RE: Sooner or later they will go to jail
By Duwelon on 6/3/2006 11:17:11 AM , Rating: 2
One thing's for sure, the MPAA/RIAA are not going to surrender their war on piracy because the pirates want them to. Lots of money is at risk and a lot of smart people are being screwed with.


By NT78stonewobble on 6/4/2006 7:06:01 AM , Rating: 2
What smart guys???

It's not like its the formula for cold fusion thats being copied around.

It's crappy pop/rock/heavy/classical or "god" forbid it country thats being copied around.

Or crappy movies...

Or crappy games...

All in all its the bad stuff thats being copied. Anything worth its money will get paid for :)...


By Xavian on 6/3/2006 11:44:42 AM , Rating: 2
seeing as TPB is back up and requesting compensation for the mis-informed raid, i'd say they are far from going to jail at this time.


By segagenesis on 6/3/2006 2:09:16 PM , Rating: 2
But of course you are idiotic enough to not even read any articles and realize that this is not illegal in the country they are in. They are comitting exactly 0 crimes, in fact the police probably did more illegal seizing servers unrelated to TPB.So maybe we should take a look at what you do and start arresting you for stuff you do thats legal but we just decided its illegal for arguments sake. Congrats on making the biggest asshat comment of the day.


yeah.
By Soviet Robot on 6/3/2006 1:48:37 PM , Rating: 1
I have a feeling it's another stunt.
How would they get their servers and content back so easily?




RE: yeah.
By radams on 6/3/2006 2:25:35 PM , Rating: 2
Yeah. It's a stunt. That's why the Beeb has reported on it. The swedish police are in on the stunt. They've set up new servers in a new country with backups. It isn't that difficult .


RE: yeah.
By Spadge on 6/4/2006 10:59:19 AM , Rating: 2
Servers can be got anywhere. The data used was from a backup taken about half an hour before the raid or so. All they had to do was get some servers somewhere else, in this case Holland, and restore the backup onto the new server, then repoint the DNS and voila, back online with very little data lost.

I wonder if the MPAA have issued a new press release yet. Something along the lines of "Oh, bugger! Looks like all we did was slow it down for a couple of days. Damn these pesky Europeans and their civil liberties!"


RE: yeah.
By flugenhiber on 6/4/2006 11:51:42 AM , Rating: 2
They also had a fundraiser of sorts a short while ago (a month?) It was explicitly to raise funds for new servers to expand their data center. I think they just did.


meanies
By poohbear on 6/2/2006 1:36:11 PM , Rating: 2
those MPAA fellas sure dont play nice. its not like there are'nt a dozen other bittorrent sites u can't go to.:/




RE: meanies
By Homerboy on 6/2/2006 1:41:15 PM , Rating: 2
uhh yeah. Why would they place nice? And sure there are a dozen other BT sites, but why wouldn't you go for the biggest?


RE: meanies
By mindless1 on 6/3/2006 2:42:33 PM , Rating: 2
Because that's not what they did. One has to BREAK LAWS first, and there isn't even indication that they had. To seize other customers' servers is simply absurd, I hope a few lose their jobs over this. It's a bit like cops driving by the house of someone they don't like, seizing all their possessions just in case there might be something illegal, and also seizing your home because you live next door.


So Very True
By Kilim on 6/3/2006 5:02:35 AM , Rating: 2
Scene: Nappster HQ. Enter Bender, Leela and Zoidberg.]

Bender: Who's in charge of this dump?

Jeff Jervis: [standing up] That'd be me. If you're an investor you can dump your money in the hole there.

Bender: Listen, you fat Internet nerd.

Jeff Jervis: Listening.

Bender: Your company promotes wrong love! If you don't shut down right now the only thing wired about you will be your jaw!

Jeff Jervis: Y-You can't shut us down. The Internet is about the free exchange and sale of other people's ideas. We've done nothing wrong.

[Lucy Liu shouts from behind a door marked "Authorized Personnel Only".]

Liu: (shouting; from room) Help! I'm being held prisoner!

Zoidberg: Someone in trouble is!

Jeff Jervis: No, stay out! There's a ... guy going for the Tetris world record in there!




RE: So Very True
By creathir on 6/3/2006 8:14:47 AM , Rating: 2
Nothing like adding a joke, taken out of context totally, from a show that was cancelled several years ago.
- Creathir


RE: So Very True
By Kilim on 6/4/2006 1:08:35 AM , Rating: 2
Listen Internet Nerd, lol.


Amsterdam...
By InternetGeek on 6/3/2006 5:26:58 AM , Rating: 2
Isn't it illegal to pirate software in amsterdam?.





RE: Amsterdam...
By jmke on 6/3/2006 6:36:24 AM , Rating: 2
no, only in Rotterdam.


RE: Amsterdam...
By codeThug on 6/3/2006 7:16:29 PM , Rating: 2
damn...


Hoax???
By bribud on 6/3/06, Rating: 0
RE: Hoax???
By Xavian on 6/3/2006 11:46:26 AM , Rating: 2
Friday 3rd June [b]2005[/b] this was last year, simply because the guys who run TPB wanted to inject a little humour into the updating of the website.

This has no bearing on the raid which occured a few days ago.


RE: Hoax???
By Xavian on 6/3/2006 11:47:08 AM , Rating: 2
blah gimme BB tags dailytech! :P


RE: Hoax???
By cochy on 6/3/2006 3:15:21 PM , Rating: 2
Did you people even read the article? If it was a hoax then why did the MPAA release this:

http://www.mpaa.org/press_releases/2006_05_31.pdf


But... but... it's SWEDEN!
By Weaselsmasher on 6/3/2006 5:15:03 PM , Rating: 1
So now, the next time someone tells you how you have sooooo many more personal freedoms and protections in Europe than in The Country Everyone Blames Everything Everything Everything On...

( insert the sound of bubbles being burst )




RE: But... but... it's SWEDEN!
By Xavian on 6/3/2006 9:06:40 PM , Rating: 4
TPB is back online, infact TPB owners are seeking compensation for an illegal/mis-informed raid, the police found nothing on the servers or premises that is consistuted as illegal in sweden, please save your american patriotism for another article.


By NT78stonewobble on 6/4/2006 7:10:37 AM , Rating: 1
jadda jadda jadda jadda...

So ure gonna throw the bone bout my personal freedom getting decreased because I can't buy a gun here in Denmark???

I can live with that... The chance of me being shot is around what? 1 or 2 to 5.000.000??


haha
By Oxonium on 6/4/2006 5:59:07 PM , Rating: 2
I love the new logo at TPB. It has Hollywood shooting cannonballs across the sails of the TPB logo. As a scientist, I'm all for protecting intellectual property, but I have a really hard time sympathizing with the MPAA/RIAA. They seem more hellbent on preserving their obsolete content distribution model and profits than adapting to new technology. In the long run they will fail. They are fighting against forces far beyond their control.

I'll fully admit that I've downloaded movies, music, and software. If I like what I see/hear, I buy it. If I don't like it, I don't buy it. If there's only one or two songs worthwhile on an album, I'll hop on iTunes and buy them. I think many people would follow such a system if they could afford it. The rub is that under such a system, there is no need for the MPAA or RIAA.




RE: haha
By Suomynona on 6/5/2006 10:18:14 AM , Rating: 2
As a scientist you should be all for sharing intellectual property.

"If I have seen farther than others, it is because I was standing on the shoulders of giants." -- Isaac Newton.


RE: haha
By eppenoire on 6/5/2006 4:32:38 PM , Rating: 2
As a scientist he should be more concerned about protecting intellectual property than anyone else. How do you think scientists make money, a daily paycheck? Sure there are plenty of labtechs out there who scrape a pretty good living together, but there are also those who make a living by obtaining Patents. I am all for bombasting big corporations who abuse copyright law because they unwilling to adopt new technology. But, don't lump patent law in with copyright law. Sure, there are law firms who abuse patent law. However for many, patents are the only way we can protect our ideas from being stolen by big corporations.

As for your quote, you might want to read up a bit about Newton. He was by far the most brilliant mind in the last thousands years. However, he was also extremely paranoid and gaurded about revealing what he knew.


Unsure?
By Slaimus on 6/3/2006 11:14:09 AM , Rating: 2
[q]investigators openly admit that they are unsure if a crime has been committed under Swedish law by TPB at this point[/q]

Which judge issued the warrant when they are not even sure a crime has been committed? Don't you need evidence that a crime has been committed to get a warrant for seizure?




RE: Unsure?
By Chiisuchianu on 6/3/2006 11:30:30 AM , Rating: 2
not when you have corporate scum who could get you fired with their connections/money busting your balls


.
By Sunbird on 6/2/2006 1:24:03 PM , Rating: 2
Yarrr! :(




MPAA
By DigitalFreak on 6/2/2006 1:48:55 PM , Rating: 2
I believe that Osama Binladin is hiding out at the MPAA headquarters. Send in the troops and open fire!




:/
By Xonoahbin on 6/2/2006 3:51:26 PM , Rating: 2
"Since the site was removed, a number of hack-related retalations have sprung up,"

I do believe the correct term is retaliation.




Avast, ye!
By Spadge on 6/3/2006 9:08:55 AM , Rating: 2
Having followed this story since it was news three days ago, and having read a lot of comments by a lot of people on several websites and forums, I come to one conclusion:

Crime makes you stupid.




By Chiisuchianu on 6/3/2006 9:59:46 AM , Rating: 2
to me, it sounds like mentally disabled people are at the forefront of the mpaa and riaa. seriously, what did this accomplish? more awareness of TPB and other torrent sites, nothing more and nothing less. taking down sites and being jack asses about it only brings controversy and controversy brings publicity, publicity brings awareness, therefore doubling their fake statistic of 6 billion lost due to piracy

when will the madness end? im glad to see people retaliated.




Errata
By Viditor on 6/2/2006 2:22:02 PM , Rating: 1
Looks like a little Dyslexia in the first paragraph...TPB not TBP.

/picking nits




TPB
By Googer on 6/2/06, Rating: -1
RE: TPB
By Googer on 6/2/06, Rating: 0
RE: TPB
By Googer on 6/3/06, Rating: -1
I'm amazed...
By stmok on 6/4/06, Rating: -1
RE: I'm amazed...
By InternetGeek on 6/4/2006 10:04:48 AM , Rating: 2
What RIAA/MPIAA can do is ask US-based ISPs to restrict access to TPB because its contents break US law. That case might go well if they have some precedent that states that they cannot go abroad (sweden in this particular case) to protect their property.





RE: I'm amazed...
By phil126 on 6/4/2006 10:09:30 AM , Rating: 2
In the USA it is against the law for an ISP to block IP addresses from the general public. It goes into the whole blocking content from the public. Now Sweden or Holland could block all incoming traffic to the website. I do not know if they have rules against it.


RE: I'm amazed...
By PrinceGaz on 6/5/2006 8:21:56 PM , Rating: 2
So you would support censorship of websites that break some law in your country? If you support the blocking of sites that index files on P2P networks because it is illegal where you live, I assume you also support China's blocking of sites which break their laws about what it acceptable.

Once the government starts blocking any sites for whatever reason, you have started on a slippery-slope down to the sort of control China exerts. It wouldn't stop with blocking sites that can be seen as promoting copyright infringement, not when there are millions of websites promoting views that are at odds with Republican policies.

You might not mind the blocking of P2P indexing sites, or several other types of site that would be first on the hitlist, but sooner or later they'd want to block something you support and it would be too late to do anything about it because all the sites which would have supported you have already been blocked.


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