Church Site Blocked By Mobile Networks, Classified Under 'Alcohol'

from the demon-drink dept

Against a background of the UK government teetering on the brink of imposing an opt-out Web filter "for the children", here's yet another example of how automatic categorization of sites for blacklists gets it wrong, as recounted by the UK's Open Rights Group (ORG):

someone used blocked.org.uk to tell us about another church (St. Mark's in Southampton) that is blocked -- this time on [the mobile operator] Vodafone. We have confirmed that it is also blocked by Orange. The site is blocked on O2's highest blocking setting, but not on their 'default safety' service.

Using O2's very handy 'URL checker', we have established that they classify the site as 'alcohol'. It is likely that this is the category that has led to its blocking on other networks, but this is not confirmed.

So why might a church be classed alongside sinful purveyors of alcoholic beverages? ORG has a suspicion:

It is likely that the reason for this categorisation is the use of the word 'wine' on the church's website. The church is part of the 'New Wine Network of Churches'. Their website explains that this means they "have the aim of 'Equipping Churches to see Jesus' Kingdom Grow'". Their use of the word 'wine' is not related to selling or the use of alcohol.

Although it seems that the site has now been unblocked, that's only because it was "manually reviewed". As ORG points out:

It's yet another example of how internet filters make simple and costly mistakes which often result in 'over-blocking.' Our report from May this year collected more examples of this. Since then we have seen political parties, technology news websites, and more recently a number of maternity health sites all blocked by mobile networks. It can be tricky and slow to get sites removed from block lists (although mobile networks say this is improving).

That last point is important. No system is perfect, and errors will always be made. But what matters is how quickly the mistakes are corrected. Unfortunately, the evidence so far is that not only are such automated filters unreliable when it comes to evaluating sites, but the correction mechanisms are pretty awful too -- a worrying combination.

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Filed Under: church, filtering, free speech, uk
Companies: o2

UK Court Wants To Limit Copyright Trolling... But Not Enough To Stop It Entirely

from the some-good-some-bad dept

Earlier this week there was a long and detailed ruling out of the UK's High Court of Justice, looking into the practice of copyright trolling (suing a bunch of alleged infringers based mainly on IP address info, where the real purpose is to send threatening letters to get people to pay up) and finding it questionable -- but still agreeing to force an ISP to hand over some user account information. These kinds of lawsuits certainly feel like a form of legalized extortion, and, over in the UK, ACS:Law and Davenport Lyons each ran into legal troubles for the scheme. A perfect ruling here could have completely slapped down the practice, but instead, it appears the court went for a more nuanced route.

The judge here tries to slice a ruling down the middle -- rejecting large parts of this lawsuit for effectively trying to create a "court sanctioned... sale of the Intended Defendants' privacy and data protection rights to the highest bidder," which the court finds questionable. It also goes into a discussion about copyright trolling, or, as it calls it, "speculative invoicing."

However, at the same time, the judge does require ISP giant O2 to hand over data on a bunch of people accused of file sharing to Golden Eye Ltd -- but does so with some caveats. While there were many associated cases that all got rejected, the court did pick one, Ben Dover Productions, which it allows to move forward with O2 being required to release a lot of customer data. However, apparently somewhat fearful that such info would be abused to send out shakedown letters, the court wants to "supervise" any "pre-action correspondence" that the companies send. After admitting that this is not "normal," the court says that the situations with ACS:Law and MediaCAT show "why this is an appropriate course to take."

the court needs to consider the impact of the letter of claim upon ordinary consumers who may not have access to specialised legal advice, who may be innocent of what is alleged against them and who may be embarrassed and/or distressed by being alleged to have been involved in filesharing involving pornography.

From there, the court actually goes on to critique the "draft letter" -- noting that the original letter Golden Eye wants to send is "objectionable in a number of respects," specifically in misleading recipients of the nature of the threat and their options. It also attacks the specific demand for £700, noting that the amount is "unsupportable." The reasoning here is quite interesting, with the final reason being the most telling. The judge slams Golden Eye for admitting that it chose £700 because "only a small proportion" of people they send the letter to will actually pay up. As the court notes:

This comes quite close to an admission that the figure of £700 has been selected so as to maximise the revenue obtained from the letters of claim, rather than as a realistic estimate of the damages recoverable by the relevant Claimant from each Intended Defendant.

The judge also points out that each defendant may be a different situation, and some may not have infringed at all. Having a blanket settlement fee simply is not appropriate, and clearly is not an accurate representation of damages. Additionally, the court notes numerous other problems with the nature of the shakedown letter:

First, the reference to the Code of Practice is inappropriate both for the reasons given by HHJ Birss QC and because it was not designed for letters to ordinary consumers.

Secondly, the draft letter does not make it clear that the fact that an order for disclosure has been made does not mean that the court has considered the merits of allegation of infringement against the Intended Defendant.

Thirdly, the draft letter asserts under the heading "Infringing Acts" that the Intended Defendant is liable for infringement. Although the last paragraph under that heading implicitly acknowledges the possibility that the Intended Defendant may not be the person who was responsible for the infringing acts, this acknowledgement is not sufficiently explicit. Furthermore, the reference under the heading "Proposed Settlement" to "inaction, by permitting a third party to use your internet connection" undermines the effect of the implicit acknowledgement. As HHJ Birss QC has explained, nothing less than authorisation suffices for infringement, at least in the context of a claim for damages.

Fourthly, the second paragraph under the heading "Legal Consequences" is too one-sided in that it sets out the consequences to the Intended Defendant of a successful claim without acknowledging the consequences to the relevant Claimant of an unsuccessful one. Fifthly, the reference to "other intellectual property" under the heading "Proposed Settlement" is unjustified. There is no evidence that any other intellectual property rights of the Claimants have been infringed.

Sixthly, I consider that requiring a response within 14 days is unreasonable given that the Intended Defendants are consumers and that there is no urgency in the matter. 28 days would be reasonable.

Lastly, the threat to make "an application to your ISP to slow down or terminate your internet connection" is unjustified. Counsel for the Claimants accepted that the word "application" was inappropriate, and said that "request" would better convey what was intended. I do not agree that a threat even of that nature is justified in a letter of this kind, however.

All in all, it's good to see the court recognize how such copyright trolling can and is abused, and try to limit that. It's too bad that it still comes down on the side of having O2 give up a bunch of user information, still knowing that this is likely how it's going to be used. However, at least it's trying to minimize the abuse.

Filed Under: copyright, speculative invoicing, trolling, uk
Companies: acs:law, ben dover productions, golden eye, o2

ACS:Law Keeps Sending Out More Threat Letters -- Condemned By Politicians, ISPs And General Common Sense

from the not-bullying? dept

Just as Davenport Lyons lawyers are being sent for disciplinary action over the firm's practice of sending large numbers of "pay up or we sue" pre-settlement letters, ACS:Law, the shady firm that effectively spun out of Davenport Lyons to do the same thing is ramping up its efforts. This isn't a huge surprise. Late last year, the firm said it was preparing to send out 30,000 letters, despite numerous studies showing that these letters regularly target innocent people, but scare many people into just paying to avoid a lawsuit.

The practice is being condemned widely. UK politicians have called it a scam. Even (believe it or not) the record labels are criticizing the practice, saying that it's not productive (most of the firms that use ACS:Law/Davenport Lyons/DigiProtect tend to be porn studios and small software providers). The latest is that O2, the UK ISP is condemning these letters as being pure bullying for money.

What's amusing is how ACS:Law tries to defend itself:

"Neither we nor our clients threaten or bully anyone. We send out letters of claim to account holders of internet connections where those internet connections have been identified as being utilised for illegal file-sharing of our clients' copyrighted works.... Our letter makes an enquiry in that regard and invites the recipient of our letter to respond to this evidence. In addition they are invited to enter into a compromise to avoid litigation,"

This is disingenuous in almost every possible way. Sending a legal letter saying that you've been caught breaking the law, and likely will be taken to court (even though ACS:Law almost never seems to actually follow through on that threat), is absolutely a threat. And notice how he calls it "an enquiry," which is again misleading. It's an accusation, and a typical shakedown offer. It's not a "compromise," and it's not an afterthought as presented in the quote above. It's the key point of the letter, and the entirety of the business model put forth by the companies involved, who describe it as a way to "profit" from people sharing their content.

In responding to the fact that even the record labels (via BPI) have condemned these letters, the guy from ACS:Law responds with more ridiculousness:

"I think the BPI is letting its members down. I think they are scared of alienating their customers. My clients don't have the same fear. They take the view that the people they target aren't their customers because they are stealing from them."

Of course, if they were "stealing" from his clients, then it's a criminal, not a civil, matter, and as he must know, the proper response is to go to the police. Not demand they pay up via some sort of shakedown letter.

Finally, the guy from ACS:Law basically admits that he's the one getting rich off of this, noting that he gets more money from this than the copyright holders:

"After my expenses the copyright owner is the largest single beneficiary."

Nice little trick there with the "after my expenses." This is a classic shakedown with a weak attempt at giving it legitimacy by using copyright law as a cover.

Filed Under: copyright, threat letters, uk
Companies: acs:law, o2

European Court Notes That Using A Competitor's Trademark In An Ad Is Not Trademark Infringement

from the moron-in-a-hurry-goes-to-europe dept

We've said it probably 100 times, but trademark was never designed to be about "ownership." Rather, it's always been about consumer protection from fraud: making sure that you didn't buy one product, believing it was made by someone else. Yet, unfortunately, trademark is often lumped into the category of "intellectual property" with patents and copyright, and that falsely leads people to believe that trademarks are about ownership and, with it, full control over the mark. That leads to some really questionable situations, where companies overreach in trying to block others from using their mark. Luckily, some courts are pushing back on this. Steven Hoy writes in to let us know that a European court has ruled that there's absolutely nothing wrong with a company using a competitor's trademark in an advertisement for comparative purposes, just so long as there's no confusion on the part of the customer. This is exactly the way it should be. Hopefully, we'll start seeing European courts use the good old "moron in a hurry" test more frequently. After all, that "moron in a hurry" trademark test was a European invention in the first place.

Filed Under: competition, confusion, moron in a hurry, trademark, uk
Companies: hutchison 3g, o2

Why Offer 3G Service At All If You Limit Speeds To Less Than 2.5G?

from the please-'splain-it-to-us-tech-nerds dept

You have to hand it to those UK mobile operators and their disdain for their own customers' wishes. Remember how a top exec at 3 UK once declared that customers were "nuts" if they wanted to be able to access the full internet from their mobile phones (rather than the extremely limited selection of content chosen and gated by 3 UK). Eventually 3 realized that it was wrong and its customers weren't nuts, but it would appear that 3's competitor O2 is equally anti-customer. Apparently, the company has recently put a cap on its downstream 3G speeds at 128k. This is for their 3G service -- you know, the one that mobile operators had promised would bring "broadband" speeds wirelessly. Even worse, it appears that this 128k is even slower than its 2.5G EDGE network. As for how the company feels about its customers -- it may not have called them "nuts" but it came close. PR folks from the company accidentally called a reporter while talking about how to "position" this story, claiming that it was only "techie nerds" who cared about this sort of thing. I imagine that O2 may discover that it has a lot more "techie nerds" as customers than it thought -- and they'll look for opportunities to support other providers.

Filed Under: 3g, speed cap, uk
Companies: 3 uk, o2