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Thursday, October 9th, 2014
| Time | Event |
| 9:42a | Finland Wants to Kill Crowdsourced Copyright Law
The changes, which allow citizens to put forward legislative proposals for Parliament to vote on, came at a time when restrictive copyright was already under the spotlight. As a result the citizen-drafted ‘Common Sense for Copyright’ initiative quickly gathered momentum. It was hoped that the proposals would influence updates to copyright law being prepared by Finland’s Ministry of Education and Culture. The draft, the brainchild of the Open Ministry nonprofit, calls for reduced penalties for copyright infringement and current penalties to be applied only in cases of a commercial scale. Fair Use provisions would also be expanded, alongside exemptions for those wishing to backup purchased media and time-shift commercial content. In July 2013 the initiative made history after reaching the required 50,000 signatures. It was submitted to Parliament in November 2013 but now the future of the proposal is in serious doubt. Much to the disappointment of its backers, the Finnish Parliament’s Education and Culture Committee is recommending that Common Sense For Copyright should be rejected. European Digital Rights (EDRi), a group which defends civil rights in the information society, reports that the Committee concluded its handling of the initiative yesterday as expected. “In its report, the Committee notes that the initiative suggests several ambitious amendments, but that it considers it impossible to propose, based on the initiative, even partial changes to the existing copyright law,” EDRi notes. “The report states that the initiative includes internal contradictions and that many of the amendments it suggests are too significantly incompatible with the current legislation.” As late as last week, Electronic Frontier Finland (Effi), the Finnish Pirate Party and the Open Ministry submitted complaints to the Chancellor of Justice over the way the Education and Culture Committee has been handling changes to copyright law. The complaints allege that drafting has been carried out in secret, contrary to the Committee’s obligations under the Finnish Freedom of Information Act. Furthermore, the criteria to be applied in web-blocking cases had not been made available. Parliament is expected to vote on the citizens’ initiative next week but after the Education and Culture Committee’s recommendations the odds are stacked against it. Any rejection of the key points will come as a big disappointment to the 50,000+ citizens who supported the initiative. Many had signed following widespread outrage provoked by a police raid on the home of a then 9-year-old girl whose Winnie the Pooh laptop was confiscated after an allegation of file-sharing. The case was later settled for 300 euros. Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services. |
| 2:06p | Court Lifts Overbroad “Piracy” Blockade of Mega and Other Sites
The broad anti-piracy measures were requested by small independent Italian movie distributor Eyemoon Pictures. The company complained that the sites in question distributed two films, “The Congress” and “Fruitvale Station,” before they were released in Italian cinemas. Several sites affected by the blockade decided to appeal the order, and not without success. Fulvio Sarzana, who acts as lawyer for several of the accused sites including Mega, told TorrentFreak that the sites in question can now be accessed again. The lawyer took up the case with the local Prosecutor, and pointed out that the blockades are overbroad. Instead of blocking access to a single file it makes entire sites unreachable. In addition, Sarzana noted that the measures are not needed as the file-hosting sites have strict takedown policies in place which allow copyright holders to remove infringing content. The Prosecutor was receptive to these arguments and after a settlement agreement with several of the affected services was reached last month, local ISPs were ordered to lift the blockades. “For Mega we negotiated a court settlement with the Office of the Prosecutor of Rome, which recognized the legitimacy of Mega’s activities and ordered the removal of the blockade. The same is the case for other hosting services,” Sarzana tells TorrentFreak. For another site, which prefers not to be named, it was necessary to take the case to the Appeals Court. In common with a similar case earlier this year, the Court held that the blocking order was indeed too broad. As a result this blockade was also lifted. “The Court held that the ISP blockade of the website was disproportionate because the copyright infringement occurs on individual pages. The entire website can therefore not be blocked for copyright reasons,” Sarzana notes. The lawyer expects that the Appeals Court ruling will have implications for the Communications Regulatory Authority (AGCOM), which currently has the power to block allegedly infringing sites without a court order. Considering the recent Appeals Court decision, this procedure may be unconstitutional. This possibility has also been raised by several consumer groups who have asked the court to review AGCOM’s legitimacy. Last week the Court of Rome referred these complaints to the Constitutional Court. Here it will be examined whether the current procedure violates right to freedom of expression and free speech, among other things. To be continued. Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services. |
| 8:05p | Popcorn Time Stops Working After Domain Suspension
There are several successful forks of the application available online, but this afternoon one of the most used versions suddenly stopped working. Without prior warning the Time4Popcorn.eu fork had its domain name suspended by the EURid registry. TorrentFreak contacted the developers who confirmed that they have indeed lost control of the domain. According to an email sent by EURid and seen by TorrentFreak, the registry explains that the domain name has been suspended on suspicion that it was registered using inaccurate contact details. “Upon verification of the contact data for your .eu domain name, we have reason to believe that your contact data is inaccurate,” EURid writes, asking the Popcorn Time team to show proof of identity.  As a result Popcorn Time’s website is no longer loading. However, what’s even worse for those who use the fork is that the application itself also stopped working as it requires the domain to load the user interface. The developers quickly switched the site over to time4popcorn.com, but it will take some time to update the application. “At the moment the desktop and iPhone versions aren’t working but in a few hours we’ll update the desktop version to the new domain and it should update automatically for most and will work,” the Time4Popcorn team tells us. “If for some reason some users didn’t get the automatic update, they’ll be able to re-download the app from time4popcorn.com,” they add. The issues with EURid show that the domain name is a weak link. This is problematic, especially for an application that claims it “will never be taken down.” The developers realize this and are working to resolve the vulnerability. “From the next update, beta 5.0, this kind of scenario will be nearly impossible. This incident of the service being shut down like this will be very unlikely to happen,” the team notes. One of the questions that remains is why EURid believes that the contact information is inaccurate. Is this the result of a routine check, or were they tipped off by an entertainment industry group? The latter doesn’t seem unlikely. The Time4Popcorn team doesn’t appear to be worried though, and plans to continue improving their application as soon as the issue is resolved. “This is a small kick to the balls at the moment, but we’ll come out of this much stronger and way better,” they say. Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services. |
In 2012, Finland introduced a modification to its national constitution which allowed the public to provide input into the kind of laws being put in place.
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