Swiss Officials Tell Anti-Piracy Company Its Tactics Are Illegal

from the sneaky,-sneaky dept

Tue, Jan 29th 2008 10:18am — Mike Masnick

There have been some claims that the recording industry's investigative techniques may be illegal. While court cases alleging these techniques are illegal are still pending in the US, in Europe there seems to be a lot more support for the idea. In the Netherlands, for example, a court ruled that having ISPs hand over IP addresses to the recording industry would be a violation of privacy laws. Given last week's discussion on whether or not IP addresses should be considered private, this seems relevant.

However, over in Switzerland, the story is even more complicated, as Swiss officials have specifically told an "anti-piracy" company to stop some of its tactics. Specifically, in order to get around laws that say you can only obtain IP addresses from ISPs in a criminal, rather than civil lawsuit, the company gets Swiss officials to file criminal charges, gets the IP address, files a civil suit with it, and then drops the criminal case. Whether or not you think getting IP addresses is a violation of privacy, it seems clear that this company has gone well beyond the spirit of the law in getting them and using them in civil suits.

Filed Under: antipiracy, privacy, switzerland

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Anonymous Coward, 29 Jan 2008 @ 10:41am

Although a different industry, this exact thing is happening in the financial services industry.

Due to anti-money laundering laws here in the US, institutions are required to report transactions over a certain dollar amount (usually $10K) and file SAR reports. If a US account transfers money to a Swiss account, that still has to be reported. Of course, that violates Swiss privacy laws.

So, the company either violates Swiss law or US law. How do you work that one out?
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Vincent Clement, 29 Jan 2008 @ 10:44am

Anti-laundering laws are hilarious. Just more government intrusion. And we blindly go along with it, in the name of safety and security.
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Liquid, 29 Jan 2008 @ 11:21am

WOOT go Europe
This is exactly why I am falling more, and more in love with Europe. They seem to like their people alot more then red neck hibblies, and money grubbing Americans that not only run our government but damn near all of our major business sectors.

GO SWISS! ! ! love your knives and watches....
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Cixelsid, 29 Jan 2008 @ 2:24pm

Re:
Yeah, you know why there so careful about the violation of privacy laws, right? Its all that jew gold they still got locked away in their vaults.
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Cixelsid, 29 Jan 2008 @ 2:28pm

Re: WOOT go Europe
Yeah, except if you go north about 400 or so kms you're in Germany - you wanna guess which European country is the US entertainment industry's bitch?

Now guess where I'm living - its not all roses here, buddy.
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Anonymous Coward, 29 Jan 2008 @ 11:00pm

Re:
If a US account transfers money to a Swiss account, that still has to be reported. Of course, that violates Swiss privacy laws.

It seems to me then that it might be illegal for the Swiss bank to report receipt of the funds to the US govt but not for the US bank to report that it sent the funds. Swiss laws apply on Swiss soil and US laws apply on US soil.
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