UK's Anti-File-Sharing Bill Could "Breach Human Rights"

Grumbleduke writes "The UK Parliament's Joint Committee on Human Rights has recently reported on the controversial Digital Economy Bill, which seeks to restrict the connections of anyone accused of infringing copyright using the Internet. According to the BBC, the committee noted the lack of details in the Bill as it stands, asking for 'further information' from the government on several issues. They also raised concerns that some punishments under the bill could be 'applied in a disproportionate manner' and said that the powers the bill granted to the Secretary of State (i.e. Lord Mandelson) were 'overly broad.' These echo the concerns raised in recent months by the Open Rights Group, a consortium of web companies including Facebook, Google, Yahoo, and eBay, as well as the UK's Pirate Party. The Bill is currently being scrutinized by the House of Lords, and if it passes there, will likely be forced through the Commons quickly, despite the opposition from the public, industry and members of parliament. The committee's full report can be found on the parliament website."

Comments

Priorities

[Chris Lawrence]

I can't believe governments are spending so much time and effort going after file sharing. The types of punishment being proposed are also completely out of proportion. Why not spend this much effort going after other widespread crimes such as rape and human trafficking? Also, shouldn't the government be spending a lot more time worrying about environmental damage and climate change? Our futures are at stake, yet the biggest problem seems to be people exchanging bits on the Internet.

Re:Priorities

[wjh31]

those who share alot of files may be more likely to leave their computers on over-night or have a 'torrent box' that is left on all the time. Therefore by reducing the incidence of file sharing, infinitesimaly small reductions in energy consumption can be made. File sharing is also only one step away from human sharing, or human trafficking as you name it. These people must be stopped before the inevitable evolution to worse crimes.

Re:Priorities

[Grumbleduke]

I can't believe governments are spending so much time and effort going after file sharing. The types of punishment being proposed are also completely out of proportion. Why not spend this much effort going after other widespread crimes such as rape and human trafficking? Also, shouldn't the government be spending a lot more time worrying about environmental damage and climate change? Our futures are at stake, yet the biggest problem seems to be people exchanging bits on the Internet.

What is also particularly impressive about this legislation is that it is entitled the "Digital Economy Bill" and followed on from the Digital Britain report. The original idea behind this process was to put into place any laws that would help boost the UK's digital sectors and make sure the country was at least 'up to date' with the rest of the western world if not ahead. However, rather than pushing for high-speed broadband, establishing tax incentives for tech firms or anything else that might actually help the UK economy, we have this badly-written piece of legislation.

The Bill itself contains 44 main clauses of legislation, of which the first 17 are just about online copyright infringement. The government didn't even attempt to hide their (controversial and most likely pointless) anti-file sharing policies behind anything that might help the economy. While there is a section in the middle about TV and radio broadcasting rights (i.e. the government wants to push digital radio so it can sell off the rest of the radio spectrum), it then returns to Video Game censorship/classification (essentially out-sourcing it to PEGI) which adds an extra burden on video game producers.

Then there is a fun section where the government helpfully demonstrates that it doesn't care at all about the "artist" or "content creator" (neither of which appear anywhere in the draft text). Clause 42 effectively creates a public licensing body for orphan work - which itself is quite a good idea (although a better way to make orphan works more available might be to reduce the duration of copyright) - but then they tag on an extra section that allows the body to

to grant copyright licences in respect of works in which copyright is not owned by the body or a person on whose behalf the body acts. - Clause 42, 116B, (1)

It seems that it is OK to take powers away from artists provided it is some large organisation (such as the RIAA-controlled PRS) that is benefiting (the PRS kept a "small administration/commission fee" of £67m in 2007 or about 12% of their revenue) rather than the general public.

This Bill works out as a bad deal for internet users, content creators and even radio station operators. The bulk of the bill concerns adding further restrictions and costs on the digital sector; rather than helping the UK's "Digital Economy" this Bill seems to be doing all it can to hinder it. I guess that's what we should expect from an out-of-touch government and parliament full of politicians who care more about winning votes rather than doing the country any good.

Re:Priorities

[pjt33]

I'm sure it has absolutely nothing to do with Lord Mandelson having dinner with David Geffen of Dreamworks, and I certainly wouldn't dream of suggesting that a politician whose first resignation was due to lying about business dealings might not be telling the whole truth when he denied discussing it with Geffen.