EU Court Tells ISPs They Don't Have To Hand Over Downloader Names

from the privacy-and-such dept

We were just noting how Europe seemed to recognize that having ISPs simply hand over the IP addresses of individuals could be a violation of privacy, and along comes the EU's top court to confirm that stance. The European Court of Justice has come down with a decision stating that entertainment industry companies cannot force ISPs to hand over IP addresses, though local governments could put in place rules that would compel them to do so. It seems rather interesting that just as the entertainment industry is pushing for increased ISP liability, the courts are recognizing the sorts of privacy issues this raises. It makes you wonder how the courts will feel when the entertainment industry tells ISPs they need to monitor every file transferred to make sure it contains no unauthorized material.
Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: downloads, eu, europe, file sharing, privacy


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  • identicon
    Rose M. Welch, 29 Jan 2008 @ 3:44pm

    This is really dumb. Neither the government (of the US, dunno about anywhere else) or ISPs have a responsibility to help you retain ownership of your property.

    If I steal a car, bring it to my rental property to store it, and then sell or give away the stolen property, can the owner of the vehicle sure my landlord for not monitering the rental property 24/7 and making sure that the vehicle I brought home was mine and that ther person taking it was authorized by the owner of the stolen property to do so? I don't think so... Just thinking about that scenario makes my head hurt.

    In America, your rights are only honoured in the breach. This means that you cannot make the gov't or an ISP try to protect your property for you, much less do it free of charge. Dumbasses.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    African in the West, 30 Jan 2008 @ 10:44am

    Believe me Rose M Welch the EU protect their citzens identities much more thoroughly than America.

    I don't want to go into enlightening you about the nitty gritty but Microsoft might be an example of how money not privacy matter to the Europeans.

    I am an African living in Europe with family in America and I can tell you one thing about the word security is not worth the paper its written unless you matter to certain minority of American population.

    In Europe they think for the masses not the minority with no delusional American Dream.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Moe Syzlak, 30 Jan 2008 @ 7:03pm

    Eh

    This is just nasty rich people wanting to get even more rich by invading the privacy of citizens.

    I don't understand why us American have not slapped sense into the politicians as of yet. It seems as though the EU is getting some American treatment also.

    link to this | view in chronology ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.