Sweden introduces IPRED

skelliser

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7978853.stm

Piracy law cuts internet traffic
Fiber-optic cables
Sweden's new anti piracy laws are based on an EU directive

Internet traffic in Sweden fell by 33% as the country's new anti-piracy law came into effect, reports suggest.

Sweden's new policy - the Local IPRED law - allows copyright holders to force internet service providers (ISP) to reveal details of users sharing files.

According to figures released by the government statistics agency - Statistics Sweden - 8% of the entire population use peer-to-peer sharing.

Popular BitTorrent sharing site, The Pirate Bay, is also based in Sweden.

The new law, which is based on the European Union's Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Directive (IPRED), allows copyright holders to obtain a court order forcing ISPs to provide the IP addresses identifying which computers have been sharing copyrighted material.

Figures from Netnod, a Swedish firm that measures internet traffic in and out of the country, suggest traffic fell from an average of 120Gbps to 80Gbps on the day the new law came into effect.

Traffic lite

Speaking to the BBC, Christian Engstrom, vice-chairman of the Swedish Pirate Party - said the drop in traffic was a direct result of the new law, but that it would only be a temporary fall.

We have to change peoples perception on file sharing
Kjell Bohlund
Swedish Publishers' Association

"Today, there is a very drastic reduction in internet traffic. But experience from other countries suggests that while file-sharing drops on the day a law is passed, it starts climbing again.

"One of the reasons is that it takes people a few weeks to figure out how to change their security settings so that can share files anonymously," he added.

Mr Engstrom acknowledged that the new legislation would scare a number off file-sharing, and that the odds of getting caught had increased, but said that the risks to illegal file-sharers were still quite low.

"We estimate there are two million file-sharing [computers] in Sweden, so even if they prosecuted a 1000 people to make an example of them, for an individual user it is still a very small risk."

Prolific sharer

However, for some, that risk is already a reality.

A number of book publishers in Sweden have applied to the courts, on the day the law came out, forcing an ISP to disclose the details of one file-sharer who, the publishers claim, has more than 3,000 audio books on his server.

Speaking to the BBC, Kjell Bohlund - chair of the Swedish Publishers' Association - said that until the new law was passed, they were virtually powerless to act.

"Before 1 April, the only thing we could do about illegal file sharing was to refer it to the police, who were very reluctant to take it on.
Gottfrid Svartholm Varg, partially obscured, and Peter Sunde
The Pirate Bay founders have denied the charges

"Now we can go get the courts to force ISPs to disclose the user information of an IP address.

"In two weeks time, we will know exactly who owns that IP. We can then do nothing, ask him to stop, or sue him for damages. We won't do this for small offenders, this is just for the big fish," he added.

Other companies are watching the case with interest, to determine what the court deems to be sufficient proof.

One action which began before the new legislation was the prosecution of four men accused of promoting copyright infringement via the hugely popular BitTorrent sharing site, The Pirate Bay.

The Pirate Bay hosts thousands of links to so-called torrent files, which allow for movies, TV programmes and applications to be shared online.

A verdict is expected later this month.

Public perception

Mr Engstrom said the new law was "a disaster", not just for file sharers, but for Sweden as a whole.

"Dealing with illegal file-sharing is a job for the police. It is their job to enforce the law.

"Now we have given private corporations the legal right to go after our civilians. That's not how Western democracies work," he said.

Mr Bohlund acknowledged that cracking down on illegal file-sharing was not a long term solution.

"In a study, 80% of people thought we shouldn't go after file-sharers.

"But ask them how they feel about taking money out of the pockets of musicians, authors or artists and that number falls by a significant amount," he said.

"Ultimately we have to change peoples perception on file-sharing."

Anyone who downloads moer than 10-15GB a month is cleary downloading illegal stuff (be it movies, tv shows, music, whatever). I really doubt they'll get rid of Illegal downloading any time soon. I wish these companies that have a big problem with piracy (ie: music companies) would shut up crying and moaning about the net, and instead spent twenty minutes trying to work out how to use it to their advantage.

Just a bunch of greedy bastards.

dwayneburke

Deleted User wrote: »

Anyone who downloads moer than 10-15GB a month is cleary downloading illegal stuff (be it movies, tv shows, music, whatever). I really doubt they'll get rid of Illegal downloading any time soon. I wish these companies that have a big problem with piracy (ie: music companies) would shut up crying and moaning about the net, and instead spent twenty minutes trying to work out how to use it to their advantage.

Just a bunch of greedy bastards.

I agree with you about music companies shutting up and try and turn it to their advantage....it seems the area missing out on lost opportunities etc.

On the issue of using 10-15 GB a month and all surplus is illegal activity, i strongly disagree. This works out at approx 500 MB a day. Try sharing this between 3 or 4 users in a house who are constantly on youtube/downloading patches, trial software/ RTE Streaming of GAA etc etc and you will use this 15 GB up almost instantly.

rogue-entity

It goes even further than that..
IPRED shifts the burden of proof onto the accused, they become guilty unless proven innocent, it is up to them to prove that they have not broken the law i.e. downloaded the material they are accused of.
IPRED doesnt just override the data protection act.. assuming Sweden had something like that. It includes a provision allowing the copyright holders to assist the police investigation.
IPRED allows the copyright holders to sieze the accused's hard drives.
IPRED is so vague that there is plenty of scale for abuse.

JohnC.

Deleted User wrote: »

Anyone who downloads moer than 10-15GB a month is cleary downloading illegal stuff (be it movies, tv shows, music, whatever).

Have a look at Playstation Network and Xbox Live where you can buy and download games up to 10GB each and rent multi-GB movies. Not to mention many other legal digital distribution channels, like Steam and EA run. That 10-15GB starts to look small. Many in the games industry see digital distribution as the future, with more stuff downloaded rather than bought on disc. Digital movie rental is also growing in markets that aren't this "digital hub" we live in.

watty

iPlayer, Sky Anytime, etc various legal P2P can easily eat 200Gbyte a month.

AlmightyCushion

My steam folder is nearly 20GBs. That was downloaded on my new pc all in the one month. Microsoft dreamspark gives students a buttload of free software they can download and use legally. These ISOs are pretty big. When microsoft released the windows 7 beta I downloaded both the 32bit and the 64bit, this totaled about 8 or 9GBs. I'll be doing the same when the release candidate comes out.

That along with a whole host of other stuff will easily get you over the 10-15GB mark.