Irish ISP Admits To Sending Out Hundreds Of 'First Strike' Notices To Innocent Account Holders

from the yup,-this-system-works-so-well dept

With the UN report condemning three strikes, we've seen a few governments suggest a bit more caution about such laws, but over in Ireland things are getting strange. You may recall a few years back the Irish ISP Eircom got sued for not implementing a three strikes plan. While it first fought back, it eventually caved and agreed to implement a three strikes plan. There was apparently some back room dealing as well, in which Eircom wanted the recording industry to go after other ISPs as well, which has happened. In a trial testing the legitimacy of Eircom's three strikes laws, a judge ruled entirely the flip side of the UN report, claiming that kicking people off the internet was fine because it was actually copyright that was a human right, not internet access.

Of course, one of the problems with a three strikes provision is the fact that it's based purely on accusations, rather than convictions. And that's pretty ridiculous when the data used for the accusations is notoriously inaccurate. But, it gets even worse when an ISP like Eircom apparently sent hundreds of "first strike" notices to people who were entirely innocent, blaming it on a glitch (found via Torrentfreak). It's now leading to an investigation by the Irish Data Protection Commissioner. Eircom has tried to brush it off due to a technical error having to do with daylight savings time (seriously?!?), but it highlights the larger problems with these kinds of schemes. And those problems mean that the Data Protection Commissioner is looking at the entire three strikes plan to see if it's legit:

The significance of this case goes well beyond simple technical failings however, as the complaint to the Data Protection Commissioner has triggered a wider investigation of the legality of the entire three strikes system. According to the Sunday Times, "the DPC said it was investigating the complaint 'including whether the subject matter gives rise to any questions as to the proportionality of the graduated response system operated by Eircom and the music industry'."

This is unsurprising. When the Eircom / music industry three strikes settlement was being agreed, the Data Protection Commissioner identified significant data protection problems with it. These problems remain, notwithstanding the deeply flawed High Court judgement which permitted the parties to operate the system - a judgement which, for example, decided on the question of whether or not IP addresses are personal data without once considering the views of the Article 29 Working Party. The Data Protection Commissioner was not convinced by that judgement (it was problematic at least in part because the Commissioner was not represented - the only parties before the court had a vested interest in the system being implemented). However, until a concrete complaint arose no further action could be taken.

The complaint in this case has now triggered that action, and it seems likely that the Commissioner will reach a decision reflecting his previous views that using IP addresses to cut off customers' internet connections is disproportionate and does not constitute "fair use" of personal information. If so, the Commissioner has the power and indeed the duty to issue an enforcement notice which would prevent Eircom from using personal data for this purpose - an outcome which would derail the three strikes system unless Eircom successfully challenges that notice before the courts, or unless the music industry were to succeed in its campaign to secure legislation introducing three strikes into Irish law.

Filed Under: innocent, ireland, three strikes

Irish Hotel The Latest To Sue Google Over Autocomplete Suggestions

from the just-replace-'receivership'-with-'asinine-lawsuit' dept

Another day, another auto suggest lawsuit for Google. There's apparently no shortage of people, places and things being defamed by an innocent algorithm. Last year, the French courts found against Google's proprietary "Suggest" in several cases. In January of 2010, the Centre National Prive de Formation a Distance (CNFDI) was appalled that "Google" would suggest the word "scam" be linked to its initials. This was also the case with Direct Energie, (another) French company, who also felt that "scam" should not be algorithmically appended to searches for its business. Later in the year, the French courts did what they do best: blame Google for its users' actions, finding it guilty of libel for somehow linking the words "rapist," "satanist" and "convicted" to searches pertaining to a certain convicted sex offender.

Then France invited Google to take its suggested (by its users) search terms and stop suggesting them when users searched for music or movies. The courts lost this one, but Google went ahead and kept on censoring, most likely seeing this as the path of least resistance, especially when it came to the famous French Resistance (Post-Internet Edition).

And it's not just France. An Italian man sued Google (and won) because searches for his name came with bonus features like "con man" and "fraud."

Of course, all of this is old news. In fact, people have been suing Google for its suggestions (none of which are its own) since the dawn of time (ca. 2006), when ServrCheck sued the search engine giant for its willingness to tack on "keygen" and "crack" to searches for its software.

With all that history behind it, there should be no surprised noises or raised eyebrows from anyone regarding this latest bit of news. Now it's an Irish hotel's turn to step up to the Complaint Box and file a grievance. This suit brings an all-new term to the "Google Suggest Hall O' Libelous Shame": "receivership." Apparently, people searching for information on the Ballymascanion Hotel are finding "receivership" high up on the Autocomplete list. Now, it's not the people that have an issue with this. After all, the "people" are the ones who put it there. Rather, it's the hotel itself that's upset about being linked to something as tawdry as "receivership," but rather than issue a press release or update its Facebook page or whatever, it's decided to drag Google and its terrible Suggestions into the courtroom.

Now, it's been said before at Techdirt (and several other places) that this isn't Google's doing. The suggestions that show up in the search field are based on what people are actually searching for. But obviously you can't hold everyone liable for unintentionally disparaging your business while trying to ensure their money doesn't end up in the pockets of "con men," "scammers" and "frauds." Google really shouldn't be expected to tweak its algorithm to fit each individual user, much less be forced into laundering someone or something's unsavory reputation by deleting terms the users don't care for. But as long as the courts keep siding with the "victims," "victims" will keep dragging Google into court for something it isn't doing.

Filed Under: automcomplete, defamation, ireland
Companies: ballymascanion hotel, google

How Putting James Joyce's Ulysses Into The Public Domain Will Breathe New Life Into Joyce's Work

from the the-public-domain-is-important dept

We've been hearing copyright maximalists lately talking nonsense about how bad the public domain is, despite plenty of evidence to the contrary. So it may be interesting to see that, over in Ireland, people are expecting a newfound excitement for the works of James Joyce after Ulysses goes into the public domain there next year (though, not in the US). The Joyce estate has been infamously stingy in terms of letting anyone make use of Ulysses. Perhaps the most notable effort by grandson Stephen Joyce was to block all public readings of Ulysses, especially at the various "Bloomsday" celebrations, based on the book, which are supposed to be a celebration of Joyce's life, but which have been notoriously limited by the estate, other than a single reading on Bloomsday which happens (of course) at the "James Joyce Centre." So many Joyce fans are really quite excited about no longer having any such restrictions next year, and are looking forward to being able to properly celebrate Bloomsday. The end result, of course, will be renewed life breathed into Joyce's work. What a shame that his own estate has restricted the use of the work for so long.

Filed Under: bloomsday, copyright, ireland, james joyce, public domain, ulysses

Ireland Looks To Add Fair Use To Copyright Law... And This Is Seen As Radical?

from the fair-use-is-radical? dept

Following on the UK's recent review of copyright laws, supposedly to look at ways to add things like US-style fair use exceptions, it looks like Ireland may be considering something similar. The Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, Richard Bruton, announced that he's heard from enough businesses that copyright is holding back some innovative businesses models, and one suggestion he's interested in would be to see fair use in Irish copyright law:

Some companies have indicated that the current copyright legislation does not cater well for the digital environment and actually creates barriers to innovation and to the establishment of new business models. Moving towards a US-style 'fair use' doctrine is one suggestion that has been made.

I am determined to respond to these suggestions in a comprehensive and timely manner. It is not wise to make changes to this extremely complex area of legislation without first considering the issues in detail.

Therefore, I have commenced a time-limited review of the law in the area to be conducted by three industry experts. The review will include a full consultation process with all relevant stakeholders, and the entire process will be complete within six months.

This is positioned in the article as being "radical." Yeah, that kind of shows you the state of copyright laws these days: when a cautious review of copyright laws to see if a minor exception that is already known to be successful in the US might possibly under certain conditions makes sense, it's described as "radical reform."

Of course, what's really surprising about this is that, following a recent court ruling in Ireland that said that ISPs couldn't be forced to terminate accounts of people accused of copyright infringement, the industry had been pushing in the other direction.

Of course, I fully expect that this will lead to a similar attack on fair use in Ireland to what we've seen in the UK lately. Remember, the UK publishers claimed that fair use strangles innovation and others claimed that fair use is bad because it leads to lawsuits. Both arguments are laughable, but seem to have been effective in the UK, so expect to see the same thing in Ireland.

Filed Under: copyright, fair use, ireland

Irish Gov't Trying To Sneak Through Massive Copyright Law Changes Via Questionable Legal Process

from the this-won't-look-good dept

Looks like the lobbyists have gotten to another government. Conor Lalor points us to the news that the Irish government is using a really questionable process to rush through massive copyright law changes today. As you may recall, last fall, a court recognized that Irish copyright law didn't mandate three strikes. This is perfectly sensible. Three strikes is a really dangerous concept that involves limiting basic due process, and turning ISPs into copyright cops for an entertainment industry that refuses to adapt.

However, the Irish government has responded to that legal ruing by trying to sneak three strikes into the law with no notice and no public discussion. Apparently, the current government is in its "final days," and the current group of politicians is pushing to get this done before the government changes over. Of course, a huge change to copyright law is supposed to involve public discussion and debate and a real vote. But that's not happening here. I don't fully understand the way the Irish government works, but this sure sounds like trying to sneak a massive copyright law change through a backdoor loophole:

The legislation is expected to be sanctioned by the present Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Innovation Mary Hanafin TD before Friday.

A statutory instrument is secondary legislation -- only the Oireachtas can pass primary legislation -- and as such is the only way changes can be made to legislation in such a tight timeframe.

Considering how controversial three strikes is, it's rather stunning that elected official in Ireland would sneak through such an anti-consumer change. It's also going to massively damage the view of Ireland as a "tech hub," since this sort of law is simply a transfer payment type of law, passing off one industry's failures to adapt on the tech industry. The article also quotes an Irish law expert who notes how this move seems to violate basic procedural rules for establishing new laws in Ireland:

Internet law expert TJ McIntyre says the legislation is premature in light of the Taoiseach promising a review of Irish copyright for the digital age. He said it is also premature in terms of a case taking place in the European Court of Justice between Belgian publishers group SABAM V Tiscali (Scarlet).

"What's happening in Europe is similar litigation over the obligation of ISPs to conduct filtering and the question is what does European law require regarding injunctions against ISPs?

"To my mind, you can't legislate in Ireland until we've seen the judgment from Europe.

"There are also procedural issues -- normally, if you legislate you have to have completed a regulatory impact assessment beforehand, as well as a public consultation. Also, if there's a breach found in a law then it would be normal to discuss it with the European Commission," McIntyre said.

Of course, when it comes to the entertainment industry, they never seem to care about actually following the rules in order to get their favored legislation passed. In the meantime, could those who usually chime in supporting everything the entertainment industry has to say explain what's wrong with actually going through the normal process to put a law like this in place? Is the industry really so afraid of allowing public debate on this issue that they have to sneak it through backdoor loopholes?

Filed Under: copyright, ireland, three strikes

Paul McGuinness Thinks Recognizing Due Process Is Bad For Ireland's Reputation?

from the really-now? dept

Ah, Paul McGuiness. U2's manager, who seems to be very, very confused in always blaming everyone else for not making him even wealthier, has apparently responded to the news we recently wrote about, concerning an Irish court recognizing that ISPs have no legal obligation to kick file sharers off the internet on a three strikes regime. Now, this should be common sense based on the fact that there is no "three strikes" law in Ireland. The record labels were trying to force ISPs to implement three strikes by just claiming it was legally required, but without any actual basis in the law. Even if you support three strikes laws, you have to admit that the law needs to actually have that provision before ISPs are required to obey the demands of the record labels to kick people offline. You would think it's hard to argue against that.

But, this is Paul McGuinness we're talking about.

Zeropaid points us to McGuiness's response to the legal ruling, where he basically goes off the deep end, in suggesting that this rather straightforward reading of the law somehow harms Ireland's reputation:

"This is extremely bad for the international reputation of Ireland as a jurisdiction with appropriate legal protection for all kinds of Intellectual Property and copyright generally."

How so? Seriously. I'm wondering how anyone in their right mind could possibly believe that a court saying "gee the law doesn't say that, so it's not required" harms Ireland's reputation. He then insists that Ireland needs to pass a three strikes law to "fix" this awful ruling:

"The government must now as a matter of urgency, do its job properly and implement the required EU legislation without further delay."

Um, except this is flat-out wrong. There is no "required EU legislation" that mandates three strikes. In fact, after serious debates in which members of the EU Parliament initially rejected three strikes rules, they eventually reached a compromise that allows three strikes under some very specific conditions, which are clearly not met by the attempts to automatically enforce three strikes in Ireland. I mean, at this point, McGuiness is flat-out making stuff up. It makes you wonder why anyone takes him seriously.

Filed Under: due process, ireland, paul mcguinness, three strikes

Record Labels Fail In Attempt To Force Three Strikes On Ireland

from the struck-out dept

Ireland has been sort of a testbed for the recording industry's attempt to force ISPs to implement a three strikes law, despite a lack of legislation making it mandatory. Back in 2008, a bunch of labels sued Eircom, the largest Irish ISP for not magically stopping file sharing. While Eircom fought it for a bit, it finally "settled" by agreeing to implement a three strikes policy. Then things got a little strange. After Eircom agreed, the record labels sent notices to other Irish ISPs insisting that they, too, were obligated to put in place three strikes rules, because Eircom had done so. At that point, it was rumored that part of the Eircom settlement was that the labels would try to force other ISPs to also implement three strikes and, in exchange, Eircom would not publicly argue against any attempts by the labels to get three strikes into Irish law.

Thankfully, the other ISPs recognized they were under no such legal obligation, and fought back. Earlier this year, a judge ruled that Eircom's decision to implement three strikes did not violate privacy laws, but today the Irish High Court ruled in favor of one of the Irish ISPs, UPC, in saying that it had no legal obligation to implement three strikes. Unfortunately, the judge did trot out debunked claims that file sharing was some how destroying the industry, even as more and more evidence has shown the exact opposite. Still, it's nice to see that the labels are unable to force such rules on ISPs, especially outside of the legislative process.

Filed Under: ireland, three strikes
Companies: eircom, upc

The Irish Red Cross Sues Google To Silence Anonymous Blogger, Amplifying That Blogger's Message

from the and-that-backfired dept

Claire Ryan wrote in to let us know about the bizarre situation in Ireland, where the Irish Red Cross has sued Google in an attempt to identify and silence an anonymous blogger who has been very critical of the organization. It's worth noting, by the way, that Google is apparently one of the Red Cross' largest donors. Apparently, the Irish Red Cross is specifically upset that the blogger claimed that $150,000 that the Irish Red Cross collected for the Asian tsunami appeal was not actually used for that. Instead, the blogger claims, it was held in a bank for years, and the money was only moved after there was an audit which discovered the account.

Of course, it sounds like nearly everything about the Irish Red Cross' decision to go legal is backfiring. This story, which wasn't getting much attention, is now getting a ton of attention -- and it's not looking good for the Irish Red Cross. Apparently, because of the publicity over the Irish Red Cross' decision to sue Google, The Sunday Times ran a front page article about the $150,000.

In other words, by suing to try to silence the blogger over this particular issue, the issue itself has become front page news. But what's not clear is why the IRC is still going after this blogger. Now that the news is everywhere, what good does it do to try to silence this guy? Will they sue The Sunday Times next?

Filed Under: anonymity, defamation, ireland, red cross
Companies: google, irish red cross

As Google Hands Over Collected WiFi Data In Germany, France And Spain, Ireland Tells Google To Destroy It

from the mixed-messages dept

We recently covered how the data that Google collected via its Street View WiFi efforts was caught in this weird legal limbo, between privacy laws, data retention laws and rules about destroying evidence. However, it looks like that's getting settled... but in very different ways in different countries. Somehow, Google has worked out a way to hand over the data in Germany, France and Spain... but over in Ireland, Google has been ordered to destroy the data. Not quite sure how this squares with the privacy laws in Germany, France and Spain... but hopefully we'll find out that the data collected by this system was mostly meaningless and we can get over the hype surrounding this whole thing.

Filed Under: data collection, data retention, europe, france, germany, ireland, privacy, spain, wifi
Companies: google

Irish Collection Society Wants Music Bloggers To Pay Up To Promote Music

from the foot,-gun,-aim dept

After recently covering how an Irish performance rights society wanted to charge hotels for public performance fees because people could listen to music in their rooms, comes the news (sent in by eoinmonty) that a different Irish music organization, the Irish Music Rights Organisation (IMRO), is demanding popular music blogs throughout Ireland pay up to keep promoting music -- even when that music is sent to the bloggers by the record labels and musicians directly for the sake of promotion. They apparently have already hit up some of the most popular Irish music blogs, even though some of them make no money at all (have no ads) and are done purely for the love of the music.

The issue, of course, is that IMRO covers the songwriting/composition rights -- like ASCAP or BMI in the US -- rather than the performance/recording rights. So, in IMRO's short-sighted view, it doesn't even matter if the musicians and labels want the music playing for free on those blogs, it has to collect for the songwriters. Apparently, no one has stopped to realize that in demanding hundreds of pounds from some popular hobbyist sites that those sites will likely go away, and the songwriters will get significantly less exposure for their music.

Filed Under: ireland, music bloggers, songwriters
Companies: imro