EU Court: ISPs Can't Be Forced To Monitor All Traffic

mmcuh writes "Back in 2004, Belgian copyright group Sabam managed to get a court order forcing the ISP Scarlet to filter out filesharing traffic. Scarlet took the case to a national appeals court, which in turn asked the European Court of Justice for an opinion. The opinion was delivered today: 'EU law precludes an injunction made against an internet service provider requiring it to install a system for filtering all electronic communications passing via its services which applies indiscriminately to all its customers, as a preventive measure, exclusively at its expense and for an unlimited period. [...] It is true that the protection of the right to intellectual property is enshrined in the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU. There is, however, nothing whatsoever in the wording of the Charter or in the Court's case law to suggest that that right is inviolable and must for that reason be absolutely protected.'" An anonymous reader adds a link to the ruling itself, but notes "The ruling is not quite as broad as I would have liked, since it only pertains to filtering 'which applies indiscriminately to all its customers; exclusively at its expense; and for an unlimited period.'"

Comments

Re:So organized crime got into the EU Charter??

[Grumbleduke]

There is no such thing as "intellectual property". It's an oxymoron. It's nonsense. Let alone a "right to...". That's like saying "a right to live north of north pole". THAT DOESN'T EXIST, YOU IDIOTS!
It is a lie, spread by organized crime, namely the media reproduction and artist extortion Mafia*, to vaguely justify their nasty protection racket.

Wrong, it's a legal concept. I agree that it's a stupid (and grossly misleading) phrase, but it has a fairly specific legal meaning (referring to certain sets of intangible property rights, based around creations of intellect, or something).

And as for there being a "right to..." ... well, rights are things created by law - there's nothing stopping governments from creating a "right to live north of the north pole", it would just be very hard to uphold.