Home » UK ISP News Archive » Article Tag: Internet Law (465 Posts)

Articles for Category Tag - Internet Law

Study Finds Mass UK ISP Piracy Website Blocking Pushes Users to Go Legal

5th June, 2015 (3 Comments)

A new research paper from a three man team, which was based out of Carnegie Mellon University and Wellesley College in the USA, has found that forcing broadband ISPs to block individual piracy websites (e.g. The Pirate Bay) had little impact. But blocking a mass of 19 websites in one go did appear to drive UK Internet users towards legal alternatives.

UK ISP Website Piracy Block List Adds Rojadirecta, LiveTV and Drakulastream

1st June, 2015 (5 Comments)

The Premier League and FA have succeeded in having the UK High Court force all of the markets largest broadband ISPs (e.g. BT, Virgin Media, Sky Broadband, TalkTalk and EE) into imposing blocks against three additional sports streaming websites that are known to infringe copyright (Rojadirecta, LiveTV and Drakulastream).

UN Warns UK – Internet Encryption and Privacy Must be Protected

29th May, 2015 (7 Comments)

The United Nations special rapporteur for protecting and promoting freedom of opinion and expression, David Kaye, has published a new report that warns the United Kingdom and other countries against adopting measures into law that would add a backdoor for Internet encryption, which it said risked “weakening everyone’s online security“.

Big UK Internet Providers Forced to Block 7 Pirate eBook Websites

27th May, 2015 (0 Comments)

The United Kingdom’s five largest broadband ISPs, including BT, Virgin Media, Sky Broadband, TalkTalk and EE, have been ordered by the High Court to expand their mandatory website blocking (censorship) measures to include seven websites that facilitate the distribution of pirated eBooks (copyright infringement).

2015 Queen’s Speech Touts Revival of Tough UK Internet Snooping Laws

27th May, 2015 (8 Comments)

The annual Queens Speech (State Opening of Parliament), in which a man with a big black rod bangs on a door and a poor old lady with a heavy head ornament gets to speak unexcitedly about forthcoming Government policy, has unsurprisingly confirmed that stricter UK Internet snooping laws are on the way.. again.

Crimestoppers and BT to Continue Fight Against UK Copper Cable Theft

21st May, 2015 (4 Comments)

Criminals who cause misery to many thousands of people every year by pulling vast amounts of BT’s vital copper telecoms and broadband cable out of the ground (Metal Theft) may be displeased to learn that the operator has agreed to continue its work with the independent crime-fighting charity Crimestoppers.

BT Take Ofcom’s FTTC Margin Squeeze Test to Competition Authority

20th May, 2015 (2 Comments)

Telecoms giant BT has formally tabled an appeal with the Competition Appeals Tribunal (CAT) against Ofcom’s new “margin squeeze” test, which is designed to keep the operators FTTC “fibre broadband” prices under control by forcing them to “maintain a sufficient margin between [their] wholesale and retail superfast broadband charges“.

UK High Court Forces ISPs to Block Websites Hosting Popcorn Time App

28th April, 2015 (2 Comments)

The High Court has approved a new injunction that forces all of the major broadband ISPs (BT, Virgin Media, Sky Broadband, EE and TalkTalk) into blocking their customers from being able to view several websites that host a BitTorrent-fuelled video streaming app called Popcorn Time, plus a few other piracy sites.

IFPI Claims 20 Percent of Fixed Line Internet Users are Music Pirates

16th April, 2015 (6 Comments)

The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) has published its annual Digital Music Report 2015, which slams online content platforms like YouTube for not sharing enough of their revenues and claims that 20% of fixed-line Internet users regularly access services that offer pirated music.

Ex-UK Copyright MP Calls for ISPs to Proactively Tackle Internet Piracy

31st March, 2015 (3 Comments)

The former Intellectual Property Adviser to the Prime Minister, Mike Weatherley MP, has published a new paper that calls for a dramatic change to the current EU Safe Harbour provisions (this removes ISPs, in certain circumstances, from liability for the illegal activity of their customers), which would weaken some of its protections and force ISPs to act more like an Internet police force.

UK High Court Adds 17 Internet Piracy Websites to the Block Lists of Big ISPs

25th March, 2015 (10 Comments)

The High Court in London has once again used Section 97A of the United Kingdom’s Copyright, Designs and Patents Act (CDPA) to force major broadband ISPs into blocking their customers from being able to access 17 predominantly MP3 download sites, which were found to be facilitating Internet copyright infringement (piracy).

Solicitor Offers FREE Defence for Victims of UK Internet Piracy Letters

20th March, 2015 (7 Comments)

Michael Coyle of London-based law firm Lawdit Solicitors, which has a lot of experience defending broadband users in the United Kingdom against copyright trolls, has offered to help support those who receive bullying “speculative invoice” letters from Rights Holders that demand money in order to settle alleged Internet piracy abuses.

UK ISP Internet Piracy Website Blocks Expand to Proxy Server Link Sites

11th March, 2015 (9 Comments)

The practice of using the courts to force broadband ISPs into blocking websites that facilitate copyright infringement (piracy), which in recent years has appeared to descend into an endless game of Whack a Mole, has been expanded to include sites that merely link to a list of proxy servers for piracy sites.

ISP Sky Broadband to Share UK Customer Details with Movie Piracy Lawyers

10th March, 2015 (8 Comments)

Customers of Sky Broadband, specifically those who are alleged to have last year shared unlawful copies of the movie ‘The Company You Keep‘ (TCYK) over public BitTorrent file sharing (P2P) networks, could soon be hit by letters demanding compensation from copyright lawyers.

UK Tribunal Rules GCHQ and NSA Mass Internet Surveillance Sharing Unlawful

6th February, 2015 (6 Comments)

The United Kingdom’s Investigatory Powers Tribunal (IPT), which is a court that was setup in 2000 to investigate and determine complaints of unlawful use of covert techniques by public authorities, has ruled that the mass Internet surveillance approach used by Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) was unlawful.

Homes Cut-off as Thief Steals 200m of Copper Broadband Cable in Cardiff

2nd February, 2015 (7 Comments)

Have you seen the man pictured? The South Wales Police are appealing for information after some 200 metres worth of copper telecoms cable was stolen from near St Fagans Road on the western side of Cardiff (Wales). The incident has unfortunately left an unspecified number of local homes and businesses without a working broadband or phone service.

UPDATE Lords in 2nd Attempt to Sneak UK Internet Snooping Law into Bill

31st January, 2015 (11 Comments)

The former Metropolitan Police Chief, Lord Blair, with support from Lord Carlisle, Lord King and Lord West, has once again attempted to sneak a controversial new Internet Snooping law into the Counter-Terrorism and Security Bill (CTSB) after initially withdrawing it last Monday.