Swedish Pirate Party Threatened for Hosting the Pirate Bay

New submitter BetterThanCaesar writes "The Swedish Pirate Party and their ISP Serious Tubes have received a letter from 'The Rights Alliance' (formerly Antipiratbyrån, The Swedish Anti-Piracy Bureau), demanding they cease supplying Internet access to The Pirate Bay. Referring to the final sentence on the four Pirate Bay profiles, they threaten with legal action if access is not removed by February 26. On her blog, party leader Anna Troberg calls the letter 'extortion,' pointing out that (translated from Swedish) '[i]t is not illegal to provide The Pirate Bay with Internet access. There is no list of illegal sites that ISPs cannot provide access to.' (google translation to English)." The letter sent (in Swedish). Update: 02/20 14:58 GMT by U L : richie2000 notes that hosting isn't quite right; they're just routing traffic to TPB: "We're not hosting TPB, we're just routing traffic to them. Just like an ISP. Serious Tubes routes traffic to the Pirate Party, so they're even more removed. But, last night, Portlane, one of the ISPs that routes traffic to Serious Tubes, was pressured into cutting their transit to ST, even if they were just a provider to a provider to a provider to TPB."

Comments

Re:You see...

[Anonymous Coward]

Swedes have guns. Ranked 10th globally. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_of_guns_per_capita_by_country
But they've got something better than guns.
They have human rights.

Isn't that political censorship?

[Anonymous Coward]

Since the pirate party is a political party in Sweden with seats in the European Parliament.

Or did TPB AFK lie?

Re:Isn't that political censorship?

[91degrees]

I think that's the argument.

Actually it's not too bad an argument. The purpose here is not to infringe copyright - that's just a side effect - but to make a political statement. It's a protest against copyright, and the main thing they get out of it is political capital.

Small correction - not hosting

[richie2000]

We're not hosting TPB, we're just routing traffic to them. Just like an ISP. Serious Tubes routes traffic to the Pirate Party, so they're even more removed. But, last night, Portlane, one of the ISPs that routes traffic to Serious Tubes, was pressured into cutting their transit to ST, even if they were just a provider to a provider to a provider to TPB.

Re:Small correction - not hosting

[richie2000]

No, we're a party of civil rights.

We think it's wrong for private companies to spy on your Internet traffic and that copyright infringement should not render prison sentences. From this follows that it becomes impossible to enforce the copyright monopoly unless of course someone starts copying to sell - it's always much easier to follow the money. The obvious corollary to this is of course that it becomes legal to download songs and movies off the Internet. Like it already is in Spain, for example. And somehow, the Spanish movie industry flourishes. Coincidentally, a continued rise in file-sharing happens to correspond to increased sales of music and film in Sweden while movie theatres scored yet another record year. Obviously, they still get paid so your basic premise is flawed.

So, please tell me why we would give up our civil liberties because Hollywood wants to control how and when we watch movies?

Re:Small correction - not hosting

[mumblestheclown]

for as long as there has been law, a key tenet has been that intent matters. this is the difference between murder and and a regrettable accident.

your applying of a mechanistic rule "link, therefore guilty or innocent" is naive and excludes that intelligent people can judiciously come to a reasonable understanding of what the intent of any given action is.

and this is the problem on slashdot - you think that law and policy is a series of mechanistic rules - like computer code. but it's not and it shouldn't be for any number of good reasons, not the least of which is that it simply won't work.

but you know - mark me a 'troll' - go on - call any reasoned disagreement as 'flamebait.' i've been on slashdot long enough to know the drill.

Re:Small correction - not hosting

[bill_mcgonigle]

because in your theory he has no particular right to the fruits of such labor because it's bits on a disk instead of, say, a piece of hardware like your the expensive computers and smartphones middle-class users use to view the content, right?

Tell us about this computer of mine. Do I own the hard disk? If I own the hard disk, can I use it how I see fit? Can I arrange the bit patterns in any way that I want? If I own it, I surely can.

Now, then, it sounds like you'd like to use an armed gang to prevent me from arranging the bit pattern on my hard drive in a way that replicates a bit pattern that your bother came up with. In my country (the US), as an example, you'd like to use that armed gang to prevent 300 million people from using their property in that way, if they so choose.

You either have to make an argument that I don't own my hard drive but that your bother does own his bit pattern (that imaginary property is superior to real property, abrogating the entire basis for Western civilization) or you have to claim that you'll willing to take away the property rights of hundreds of millions of people to pad the business plan of one man. Because if real property rights don't exit, surely imaginary ones don't either.

Clearly it's wrong. Find a better business model (I suggest Creator Endorsed as a morally sound option) but whether you personally know of a sound business plan that will allow your brother to make money on that work or not doesn't justify taking away the property rights of millions or billions of people by force for his private benefit.

Re:You see...

[richie2000]

We used to have human rights. Now we just have...

Well, quite a lot of snow. And reality shows on TV. And snow. Yeah, that's about it.

Re:You see...

[mumblestheclown]

No fascism in somalia! Be sure to send us a postcard.

This will be very interesting.

[TheP4st]

In the letter references are made to 2 court rulings made in a lower court and used to claim that the ISP is committing an illegal act, if I recall correctly both these cases were appealed to the Swedish equivalent of the Supreme Court but never got that far.

With a bit of luck The Pirate Party stand their ground and this will reach the Supreme Court and finally a precedent will be set as should have been done years ago when the TPB founders were at trial.

In my belief the reason that it never reached the Supreme Court is that any ruling based on Swedish law would have ruled in favor of TPB, so the Swedish Supreme Court took the easy way out by not taking up the case. As by taking up the case the Supreme Court would have been faced with:

1. Setting a precedent that would not go down well with the political powers by ruling according to the spirit of the law. Remember that the US did threaten with embargo in order to strongarm Sweden into acting in the interests of the MAFIAA. So there were a lot of political interests in the outcome of the TPB case.

Or

2. Reach a ruling that is in contradiction to the law as written. Being the Supreme Court this is not really a appealing option so the path of least resistance were chosen. Screw over a bunch of cocky nerds by not granting their appeal.

Re:You see...

[Anonymous Coward]

To be fair, it needs to be an option of last resort when you're faced with total financial obliteration for doing something that, while completely legal, an entity with large sums of money dislikes. The reasons that Colt's revolver was labeled "the great equalizer" are still evident today, even if we find the implications unpalatable. The modern legal system in most developed countries generally favors the clown with the deepest pockets, and can be a life-ruining experience for the average citizen; in those instances, "just shoot the fucker" may be the only recourse available to said citizen, and even the possibility of that can have far-reaching effects on the willingness of those with deep pockets to pursue matters to the point of financial ruin.

translation

[ehlo]

Here's my translation of the letter they sent them. Anything in []'s are my own additions.

Participation in copyright infringement

The Rights Alliance represent among others Noble Entertainment, Nordic Film and SF [Swedish Film], companies which hold the copyright to many Swedish movies that without permission are made available to the public through the Pirate Bay. The Pirate Party and Serious Tubes provide internet access to the Pirate Bay.

In February 2012 the Supreme Court decided to not allow an appeal in the so called Pirate Bay case. Through that decision it was established that not only those who administrate an illegal file sharing service but also those that provide internet access to such an illegal service make themselves guilty of a crime. Despite the fact that the Court has made this clear you continue to do so [provide the internet access]. Since all legal avenues have been exhausted, the only thing left for us to do is request that you cease providing internet access to the Pirate Bay

Through this letter you are formally informed that infringement of rights that are protected by copy right law are occurring through the Pirate Bay and that you participate in these infringements by providing internet access to the Pirate Bay.

Copyright law provides that an injunction can be imposed on those that participate in copyright infringement, fines being the consequence of non-compliance. Liability for damages for any harm caused is also established. These rules apply to among others juridical persons [companies], including non-profit/charitable organisations like the Pirate Bay and Serious Tubes, their board of directors and other associates.

According to copy right law, participating in copyright infringement is extensive. Four people have been handed prison terms and significant damages for participation in copyright infringement for, inter alia [among other things], participation in the running of and the supply of broadband internet/internet access to the Pirate Bay. Furthermore, Svea Hovratt [the Court of Appeal, inferior only to the Supreme Court] have forbidden two companies with threats of fines of 500000 SEK (US$ 80000; £52000) from in the first case supplying internet access to Pirate Bay and in the second case from providing internet access to a tracker that was used for illegal file sharing (Svea Hovratt Case No. Ö 7131-09, Case No. Ö 8873-09 and Case No. Ö 10146-09. Furthermore, Stockholm District Court established by judgment of the 16th of October 2012 the injunctions established by Svea Hovratt in Svea Hovratt Case No’s Ö 7131-09 and 8873-09 (Stockholm District Court Case No. T 7540-09 and Case No. T 11712-09.

With this as a background the copyright holders that we represent request that the Pirate Party and Serious Tubes immediately cease supplying internet access to the Pirate Bay. If notification of having done so has not been received by latest the 26th of February 2013 the Rights Alliance will pursue legal action against you without further communications.

If you would like more information you are welcome to contact us.

Kind regards,

Sara Lindback
The Rights Alliance.

-------

They're using scare tactics. They are referring to cases and trying to make it look like those cases have established that what they are doing is illegal by analogy, but I seriously doubt any Court would entertain that notion and I would expect that they would try any case fully on its merits. I think that becomes even more apparent when they threaten to go after the board of directors personally and threaten that they can be held liable for damages for the copyright infringement in personam [out of their own pockets].