Another shot has been fired in the battle of the UK Digital Economy Act, with the High Court in London hearing an MPA request for an injunction to force BT (British Telecom, the UK’s largest internet service provider) to block access to the Newzbin2 website which, the association says, promotes piracy by hosting illegal copies of popular movies. Last year in the UK, the MPA took action to force Newzbin to remove material because of copyright infringement. The site subsequently went into administration and its assets were bought by new owners who subsequently started the new version of the site.
[caption id=“attachment_3017” align=“alignleft” width=“341” caption=“BT is the UK's largest internet service provider”]
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“Newzbin has no regard for UK law and it is unacceptable that it continues to infringe copyright on a massive and commercial scale when it has been ordered to stop by the High Court,” said Chris Marcich, European president of the MPA, in a statement. “We have explored every route to get Newzbin to take down the infringing material and are left with no option but to challenge this in the courts.”
According to UK newspaper The Guardian, the MPA is using section 97A of the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, which provides for possible injunctions against internet intermediaries. It has been used to force ISPs to block sites involved in distributing pirated content in Denmark and there are cases pending in Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium. Although the Digital Economy Act require ISPs to help rights holders identify users who may have downloaded content illegally, it does not give legal powers to pursue alleged pirates.
“We can confirm that we will be appearing in court, following an application for an injunction by members of the MPA. We have no further comment to make at this stage,” said BT in a statement, while the Internet Service Providers Association has said it would not comment until the court had made its decision.
Bloggers and tweeters have been making the point that, without this action, millions of people would never have heard of Newsbin2.
