UK to crack down on illegal downloaders

[faceless]

I don't see how this could possibly be enforced, but I'm sure that if it is that the majority of ISPs will lose out substantially.

[Kezza]

I agree with the "post office" analogy. I hope that the Internet Service Providers Association dispute that their privacy arguments are "bogus."

[Mandy]

Unfortunately this can be relatively easily enforced, e.g. by looking at the server logs of the torrent sites, YouTube, Humyo etc.

Could this lead to an information apartheid which exasperates class divide ? Without internet access, you are even more cut off from the
rest of society and destroys your ability for self improvement.

[faceless]

I meant that it's unenforcable if people use simple encryption like a password-protected rar and then rename the file. Nothing except analysis of individual files by a human would break that, and it's just not practical.

Have you signed up to humyo? Cos you know, the suggestion to members here that they are at risk isn't welcome at all.

[Mandy]

Faceless, I was not taking any swipe at anyone here. The same issue applies to all sharing sites, including YouTube. [I amended original posting to reflect that]

As someone wrote on another forum that non mainstream sites will also be targetted :
"How long do you think it would take the established requirement for a flagging 'download site IP address list' to include iffy moslem sites? 1ns? 2ns?"


This is another reason why the legislation needs to be stopped.

p.s. I agree about encryption -- see article below about PGPsoftware which, in the case mentioned, auto-encrypts after a period of time. Thus the files were unencrypted on 1st inspection, but on a future reboot, it auto-encrypted.

http://www.news.com/8301-13578_3-9834495-38.html

There are serious civil liberties issues here against government snooping.

[faceless]

I think it would likely create a similar situation to the Poll Tax, with many people refusing to observe the law. If I knew someone was being prosecuted over this I'd happily take part in a riot over it...

Also, it would require the copyright owners to produce lists of every single item that they own, and for the ISPs to check every single file against that list when each and every download starts. It's not practical.

[Mandy]

FYI, most uploads don't break copyright :
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/sfgate/detail?blogid=19&entry_id=23132

[faceless]

We don't have 'Fair-use' in Britain.

[luke]

i can't see this being very popular with isp's - they would loose loads of business if this was really enforced - i don't know anyone who uses the internet and doesn't download stuff

i doubt they'd be able to do it that well anyway - like faceless says, you can zip stuff up, encrypt it etc - theres no way they'd be able to track everything ... not that i download illegal stuff anyway ...

[Mandy]

One more reason they could find it hard to enforce is that a person can switch ISPs even after one is blocked. They could always have someone else take over the line/account.

[Skylace]

It's going to far to hard to enforce. What about blue tooth? cell phones? and countless other ways people get media now. This is simply a government group getting pressure in their pocket books to do something about a problem they have no clue on.
If the entertainment industry was just able to keep up with the times technology wise on distribution, this wouldn't be such an issue.

[Brown Sauce]

it's just another half assed attempt to keep those $$$ rolling in for products that are worth well below a tenth of the asking price. The internet has derailed the corporate entertainment gravy train, and about time too. Since the fifties we've been fleeced by these money grabbing gits.


"The entertainment industry says illegal file sharing costs it millions" - lol - they've got it the wrong way round again .. the internet saves millions ... bit like the smugglers saving the tax payer millions

Interesting about the PGP password stuff ...