from the overkill? dept
A former ISP for The Pirate Bay, Black Internet, was told by a Swedish court that it had to stop hosting the site a while back. The Pirate Bay quickly switched to a different provider, but Black Internet went to court to challenge the legality of being told whom it can and cannot host. It appears that the Swedish appeals court ruling on the matter went beyond just telling Black Internet that it can't host The Pirate Bay,
it also told the ISP that it must block all of its customers from reaching the site, even though the site is no longer hosted by Black Internet. It seems like yet another attempt by courts trying to play whac-a-mole in an incredibly ineffective manner that is likely to do more damage than good. Completely blocking people from reaching a site, even if they have legitimate reasons for reaching it, doesn't help anyone. Those who are interested in infringing on copyrights will still figure out plenty of ways to do so. They'll route around the blocks or go to other sites. So what does this do other than create an inconvenience and set a bad precedent for any ISP? Update: Thanks to folks in the comments for pointing out the update, where the court is claiming that Black Internet misinterpreted the decision, which says that Black is prohibited from providing "internet access" and there's a bit of a debate over what "internet access" means. It appears that Black interpreted that to mean "access" while the judge meant just hosting.
Filed Under: blocking, hosting, sweden
Companies: black internet, the pirate bay
