Wednesday, April 7th, 2021

Time	Event
9:18a	Sky Wins Injunction to Stop Reddit Moderator Sharing Pirated TV Shows Reddit is one of the largest sites on the Internet, playing host to thousands of communities dedicated to every conceivable topic. Most of these communities run along smoothly, causing no issues for their members, the site, or any entity further afield. However, when persistent copyright infringement raises its head, trouble can appear on the horizon. UK Broadcaster Sky Takes Action Against Reddit Moderator Sky TV is one of the largest broadcasters in the UK, home to channels including Sky One, Sky Arts, Sky Atlantic, Sky News, Sky Cinema and Sky Sports. To view the majority of Sky channels, special equipment and a subscription package are required. However, if watching individual TV show episodes from Sky is your thing, it’s perfectly possible to head over to Reddit and access links to free pirated copies posted to numerous TV-focused communities, some of which were moderated by a user known as ‘Cherzo’ (later ‘Cherzo1’) According to an action filed by Sky in a Scottish court, Cherzo1 was the moderator of three sub-Reddits – r/UKTVLAND, r/notapanelshow, and r/UKPanelShowsOnly – which together had more than 51,000 subscribers. Cherzo also had a YouTube channel with more than 95,000 subscribers. According to Sky, all of these platforms were used to infringe the company’s copyrights. “The means by which the defender is averred to have breached the pursuer’s copyright is by Cherzo1 encouraging readers of the Subreddits to post requests for links to UK television programs and thereafter by the provision of hyperlinks to a Google Drive containing a copy of the requested content,” Sky’s complaint reads. “Those hyperlinks, which are provided by Cherzo1, are visible and clickable by all readers, and clearly labeled to allow the user to identify the content that is being hyperlinked.” Sky says that Cherzo1 breached its rights in many TV shows including Gangs of London, Cop Squad, Thronecast, The Russell Howard Hour, Portrait Artist of The Year, and A League of Their Own. Sky Alleges ‘For Profit Piracy’ In evidence to support its action, Sky states that Cherzo1 was motivated by money, receiving payments from fans and followers via Patreon and directly into his PayPal account. “[Cherzo1] has over 111 ‘patrons’ being users who contribute money to him. The account offers five payment tiers ranging from £1 plus VAT per month to £17 plus VAT per month,” Sky informed the court. “The ‘About’ section on the Patreon account states as follows: ‘I have a YouTube channel and Reddit account that i use to post UK Panel Shows mostly, i need to have patreons to get computer equipment and online space to continue this, i would also like to get sources for recording shows to post, such as subscription to TV packages or IPTV Servers [sic]’.” According to Sky, Cherzo1 didn’t make a great effort to hide who he was. The broadcaster says it was able identify the Reddit moderator as Alex Cherrie from North Lanarkshire in Scotland by various means, including the name on his PayPal, Steam, and Facebook accounts. Additionally, Sky was able to match Alex Cherrie to a number of dormant Sky accounts which provided them with his physical and email addresses. Sky Demands an Injunction Against Cherzo1/Cherrie In order to curtail Cherzo1’s activities, Sky asked the court to hand down an ‘interdict ad interim‘, a term used in Scotland to describe an interim injunction. The broadcaster asked the court to order Cherzo1 to stop uploading copies of broadcasts, stop posting hyperlinks to shows on Reddit and anywhere else on the Internet, and forbid him from assisting any third party to do the same. A court will grant an interim interdict if it believes there is a prima facie case against the defendant. The court found that on first view and based on previous EU rulings, Sky’s copyrights had been breached and although proof of financial gain isn’t necessary to show infringement, it had been shown that Cherzo1/Cherrie had benefited financially. The court was also persuaded that Cherzo1/Cherrie had knowledge that his conduct was infringing. Sky had sent takedown requests to Reddit and the defendant subsequently published a notice informing users not to reference “Sky” in TV show requests. YouTube had responded to Sky’s complaints by closing Cherzo1/Cherrie’s account. Order Handed Down “The defender’s activities demonstrate infringement on a large scale,” Lady Wolffe wrote in her judgment handed down yesterday. “The defender has in excess of 51,000 users across the Subreddits and had 95,000 users on the YouTube Account. The number of users of the Subreddits continues to grow: between July and November 2020 there had been a 17% growth in numbers. “There could be no legitimate purpose in the defender’s activities on the two online platforms other than to benefit financially from his repeated copyright infringements. Infringement at this volume materially impairs the pursuer’s business model. “I find that, collectively, these factor support the balance of convenience and the grant of the interdict ad interim in the terms sought,” Lady Wolffe concluded. Anyone found breaching such an order could be subjected to a fine or even imprisonment. From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more. (Comment on this)
5:07p	Rojadirecta Wins Lawsuit Against News Agency Over Inaccurate Anti-Piracy Reporting Rojadirecta is one of the oldest and most popular linking sites for sports streaming events. The site, which is operated by the Spanish company Puerto 80 Projects, has been around for over a decade and has built a dedicated user base. At the same time, it has had to fight some legal battles too. Copyright holders have repeatedly accused Rojadirecta of facilitating piracy because users share links to unauthorized broadcasts. This has landed the site in court on more than one occasion. While most sites don’t put up a fight, Rojadirecta does. This fighting spirit has paid off in the past. Among other victories, Rojadirecta managed to get its domain name back from the US Government after it was seized by the Department of Justice. In recent years, however, there have been setbacks too. Danish Blocking News Last June, Rojadirecta lost its appeal against a Danish site-blocking injunction. The High Court upheld a lower court’s decision in favor of Spanish football league ‘La Liga’ and anti-piracy group Rights Alliance, requiring local ISP Telenor to prevent users from accessing the stream-linking site. Rojadirecta was disappointed with the outcome but didn’t see it as a major problem. The Danish audience is relatively small and the site remains freely accessible elsewhere. That said, Rojadirecta did take offense to how the news was circulated by La Liga and Rights Alliance. Both organizations initially said that a High Court “judgment” ruled that “Rojadirecta is illegal.” This was picked up by several news sites including Spain’s largest news agency Europa Press, which offers a wire service to other publications. According to the linking site, however, these conclusions are factually incorrect. The order wasn’t issued after a trial and there was no “judgment.” It was merely an order that affirmed a precautionary measure, without concluding that Rojadirecta itself was illegal. ‘Fake News’ After just having lost a legal battle the inaccurate reports felt like an undeserved blow, so the site asked its legal team to take action. “The information made public by both the Rights Alliance and LaLiga about the proceeding was wrong to a point that needed to be handled by our lawyers,” a Rojadirecta spokesperson tells TorrentFreak. Shortly after the news broke the lawyers reached out to several sites that published the news, requesting it to be corrected. This worked relatively well. Several Spanish and Danish news sites updated their articles and even Rights Alliance altered its claims partially. However, others were more reluctant. When Rojadirecta’s lawyers reached out to the Europa Press, the news agency refused to rectify its reporting, because it considered La Liga to be a “reliable source.” Rojadirecta Sues News Agency Rojadirecta clearly disagreed and decided to take the press agency to court. During the proceeding, Rojadirecta provided a certified translation of the Danish order, which clearly conflicted with reporting of the news agency. For example, the Danish Supreme Court wasn’t involved in the matter, as Europa Press wrote. Neither was there a “trial” or “judgment” concluding the Rojadirecta was operating illegally. After hearing both sides, the Spanish court ruled in favor of Rojadirecta’s parent company Puerto 80 Projects. The court ordered Europa Press to issue a full retraction explaining that Rojadirecta was blocked due to links shared by its users. Retraction This retraction, which is published here, also had to be linked from the homepage and sent to all news outlets that received the incorrect report. Finally, the news agency must also pay the legal costs of the proceeding. It should be noted that not all reports on this matter have been corrected. In fact, the original and incorrect Europe Press report is still online. Similarly, the Rights Alliance’s report still mentions that the High Court deemed Rojadirecta to be an illegal site. Rojadirecta will be pleased to have won this legal battle but at this time the preliminary blocking of the site by Danish Internet providers remains in force. However, we recently learned that the site is trying to get it lifted. From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more. (Comment on this)

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