Bono has accused ISPs of profiting from illegal filesharing and has suggested that ISPs curb copyright infringement in the same way they tackle child pornography.
The U2 frontman is seriously misguided. ISPs generate no additional revenue or profit from customers sharing files. In fact we incur some marginal cost due to the extra bandwidth required.
It is outrageous to equate the need to protect minors from the evils of child pornography with the need to protect copyright owners. As a society we have accepted that it is appropriate and proportionate to intrude on people’s Internet use by blocking access to sites that host child abuse images. To suggest that sharing a music file is every bit as evil as child abuse beggars belief.
Incredibly, if the Digital Economy Bill as it is currently framed becomes law, it will become legal to summarily disconnect someone for alleged copyright abuse but if you want to disconnect them for accessing child abuse images then you will have to get a court order first.
The French have now abandoned plans to disconnect alleged illegal filesharers without a court order. This is a major victory for human rights campaigners and we trust Lord Mandelson will take note.
Most people think that blocking access to sites that host child abuse images is a good thing. Conversely, less than 10 per cent of us think that disconnecting alleged filesharers without a court hearing is a good idea.
Bono obviously does not understand how simple it is to access copyright protected content without being detected. P2P filesharing can be spotted (albeit at great cost) but there are dozens of applications and tools out there which allow people to view content for free and no amount of snooping can detect it.
If you think Bono is wrong then you can sign our petition.
And if you can put your opposition to the Digital Economy Bill into song or verse, then enter our competition.
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Anonymous