Tag Archives: piracy

Court Bans Dutch Pirate Party From Providing Pirate Bay Proxys

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Despite recent rulings requiring ISPs to block access to The Pirate Bay, millions of internet users are finding ways to get around the restrictions. The Netherlands’ Pirate Party had been offering a proxy to let users gain access to the links hosted on The Pirate Bay without actually having to visit the site directly.

However, following a complaint lodged by the anti-piracy group Brein, a court in the Hague has ruled that The Pirate Party must cease publicising ways to circumvent blocks to The Pirate Bay. A subsequent court order has now instructed a further five ISPs to block access to the site in addition to two of the country’s biggest ISPs that were subject to a previous ruling.

The Dutch Pirate Party have responded to the ruling by posting on their homepage that the latest decision is ”a slap in the face for the free internet.” The statement continued: “More and more bits of the internet will have to be censored because they might be used to get access to ‘infringing’ sites, until eventually most of the internet will be unreachable.”

Meanwhile in the UK, despite the ruling on April 30th that ordered five ISPs to block access to The Pirate Bay, the UK’s Pirate Party still offers a proxy-based workaround enabling web users to procure links from there, allowing for the downloading of copyrighted material.

There has been no comment so far from the British Phonographic Industry (the organisation which pushed for legal action against The Pirate Bay in the UK) on whether or not it will be seeking a ruling similar to that gained by Brein.

Virgin Media Is First ISP To Block The Pirate Bay

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Virgin Media are the first UK ISP to enforce this week’s High Court ruling by blocking its users from accessing The Pirate Bay, a site that facilitates illegal sharing of copyrighted music and films.

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As of Wednesday, Virgin Media internet customers trying to access The Pirate Bay found that they were redirected to a page explaining that the site was “not available through Virgin Media“.

The Swedish-based site is the most popular of its kind, offering an index of thousands of copyrighted songs, TV shows and films to download by using the BitTorrent file sharing protocol. But it is now the second site to be banned by the High Court after Newzbin2 was embargoed last year in what was a landmark ruling.

After Monday’s ruling, a Virgin Media spokesman said the company felt obligated to react:

“As a responsible ISP, Virgin Media complies with court orders addressed to the company but strongly believes that changing consumer behaviour to tackle copyright infringement also needs compelling legal alternatives, such as our agreement with Spotify, to give consumers access to great content at the right price.”

But despite the legal decision, not all of the ISPs ordered to block access to The Pirate Bay have done so. Everything Everywhere, O2, Sky and TalkTalk are yet to act, while BT have said they will make a decision on whether or not to cut off access within a few weeks.

The Pirate Bay is well-known for being used almost exclusively to share copyrighted materials, but does that make this High Court ruling fair? There are certainly major concerns about the future of internet freedom, and once there is a legal precedent such as this case, it can become easier for other sites to be blocked. Do you feel that the decision to ask ISPs to block access is fair on them, or should the authorities simply take down the site?

We always like to hear your thoughts on these matters, so please feel free to leave a comment here, or talk to us on Twitter or on our Facebook page.