UK Police Launch Campaign To Shut Down Torrent Sites

An anonymous reader writes "City of London Police inform TorrentFreak that they have begun targeting sites that provide access to unauthorized content for 'criminal gain.' The initiative is part of a collaboration with Hollywood studios represented by FACT and the major recording labels of the BPI. In letters being sent out now, police accuse site operators of committing offenses under the Serious Crime Act. The National Fraud Intelligence Bureau further warns that the crimes carry a jail sentence of 10 years."

Comments

What are they trying to achieve?

[fekmist]

Seriously, this will in no way keep people who pirate from pirating some more. If anything it just wastes tax money and time. What could they possibly try to be achieving by doing this?

Re:What are they trying to achieve?

[cheater512]

When police put overt effort in to enforcing a specific law then you have to ask the question why?
They should be enforcing all laws equally, not picking on some and neglecting others.

Re:What are they trying to achieve?

[TubeSteak]

The [British Recorded Music Industry] say that an [National Fraud Intelligence Bureau] officer was previously embedded with their anti-piracy unit.

âoeThis appointment is the first secondment by NFIB into private industry, enabling City of London Police to develop a greater understanding of the illegal distribution and sale of music online by organised crime gangs,â the music group reveals.

They seem to be equating torrent sites with organized crime.

For some reason I'm skeptical of that categorization.

Re:What are they trying to achieve?

[hairyfeet]

And the bitch is its really not that hard, but they are so God damned greedy they will turn down money because it isn't "iMoney" and end up fucking themselves.

A good example of what I mean is Steam. back in the days before Steam everybody I knew had a shitload of pirated games, now nobody i know pirates games, why? Steam made it so damned cheap and easy to get any game they want that they just don't bother, simple as that. between the sales, the extras like chat and matchmaking, it just got to the point it really wasn't worth dealing with the bullshit when the alternative is "push button" simple.

There is NO damned reason why I shouldn't be able to go to a one stop website and get any movie or show I want, no reason at all except they are so damned greedy they will happily fuck themselves out of the money. I mean why in the fuck can i go to fricking Walmart and find huge piles of movies in giant bins for under $5, but if I want the same damned movie on my netbook they want the same price as a new release AND I have to have an always on Internet connection which fucks the whole damned reason for putting a movie on my damned netbook in the first place!

This is why I have ZERO sympathy for these movie douchebags, none at all, because its their own damned fault. time and time again we have seen that black markets occur because a population is not being served by a regular market,either they can't get what they want at all or the price is too damned high or in this case? BOTH. The pirated version of a movie is in every metric better than the legal product by leaps and bounds! NO unskippable ad horseshit for crap i don't give a rat's ass about, NO always online bullshit like with the digital versions, NO stupid worthless DRM that keeps more than half of the devices i own from even playing their shit NONE of that exists with the pirate version...yet I'm supposed to feel bad because people are bypassing your horseshit?

People pirate because your prices are too damned high and you tie too much bullshit into your product PERIOD. I mean here it is 20 fucking 13 and I can't even just buy a fricking .avi or .mp4 of a 25 fricking year old movie to play on my devices? Why the hell can't I pay 25c a pop for old shows in a format that will play on everything, when i can fricking buy MP3s that play anywhere huh? We aren't even talking new releases, shit that is so damned old it can be had in the Fred's 4 movies for $5 sets, like the old Chuck Norris stuff, but IF you can even find it online they are gonna charge full price AND have it locked with DRM like its a screener for Iron man 3...give me a break!

So you Brits need to go have a royal shitfit as its YOUR tax dollars they are wasting, both in the cost of the investigations AND in the cost of housing these "dangerous criminals" and for what? So you can prop up a failed business model of a bunch of rich old douchebags? Fuck them and the horse they rode in on, get with the times or die you old bastards.

Re:What are they trying to achieve?

[XcepticZP]

The simple fact that they are using taxpayer money on silly victim-less crimes like this instead of more serious ones such as rape/murder. That fact says that they are "putting overt effort into enforcing one law and neglecting others".

But let's face it... They aren't really putting overt effort. They're just focusing on what they think is low-hanging fruit, like traffic offenses.

wow

[Redmancometh]

Yeah giving them the same sentence as a rapist. That seems reasonable. This shit should be a civil matter not criminal.

Improper use of police powers and public funds

[Camael]

I am still uncomfortable with the fact that this action is yet another example where the police, who are publicly funded and granted extensive powers in pursuit of their public duty, are essentially (mis)using their powers to protect the private property rights of a select few, i.e. copyright owners.

Copyright owners who, incidentally, are rich enough to pursue their own civil action against alleged pirates. Then again, making the public pay is better for their bottom line.

Re:Improper use of police powers and public funds

[MouseAT]

Not in the City of London borough it doesn't. Hit Wikipedia, check out the City of London area. Make sure you check out the section on Elections.

In short, the area has very few (under 10,000) actual residents. It's right in the centre of London. It's almost all businesses. It's the only borough in the UK where businesses representatives can vote in local elections, and the business reps outnumber the residents by a massive margin. It's a borough that's run in the interests of businesses, not in the interests of residents. It's why this is happening there - the Police in other areas of the country have other things to worry about.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_London

City of London - Corporate Haven

[hedgemage]

Once you understand that this is being done by the City of London then it should be clear that this is not the actions of a municipal authority based on a desire to protect citizens, but rather a government of a tiny yet separate legal entity within what we usually call London. This tiny legal appendix (the City of London) is home to only about 10,000 people, but is actually a state within a state owned and operated by large multinational corporations and so its governance reflects what is good for business. Not good for the public, not good for England or Britain, but good for keeping money rolling in.
watch this and you'll understand why this is nothing more than monied interests trying to protect their own. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrObZ_HZZUc

Re:City of London is a private police force

[mrbester]

Linking is not (yet) illegal in UK, no matter what these tosspots say. Also, they are misrepresenting themselves as those in a position of authority. So, in response, I suggest the reply given in Arkell v. Pressdram.

Re:So what now?

[AmiMoJo]

Copyright infringement is only criminal if done on a commercial scale. In other words you have to be making a significant profit from it.

That's how the BPI tricked the police into raiding the owner of Oink's Pink Palace. They claimed he was charging for access and raking in the cash, but it was shown in court that he only accepted donations to cover the cost of running the site. The case collapsed, wasting vast sums of public money and police time but at least the BPI got some free publicity.

Re:define "serious"

[IamTheRealMike]

Such data is gathered by the YouGov surveys, which happen very regularly. Here's the latest report. Unsurprisingly given the sort of policies associated with the coalition government, the approval rating of Parliament splits strongly down party lines. Overall the government is unpopular with a 25% approval rating, 61% disapproval and 14% don't know. However this average disguises the fact that amongst conservative voters approval is 75% and amongst Labour voters approval is only 5%.

These sorts of figures are what you might expect from the UK. The situation is not comparable to the USA where the approval rating of Congress reflects a more deep rooted feeling that corruption is rampant and all the parties are fundamentally the same. This can be seen in the fact that disapproval of Congress is almost identical regardless of voting intention. The problems in the UK reflect a strong north/south division every bit as strong as the city/rural division in the USA, where the richer and more conservative south tends to approval of austerity due to a less systematic dependence on welfare and public sector jobs. The post-industrial north is dominated by Labour voters who never made the transition to the service/knowledge economy and where quality of life is highly dependent on government spending.

I don't have time to find more precise stats, but I suspect if you examined UK voters beliefs more closely, people would not feel that democracy itself was particularly broken. Especially not over something as trivial as piracy - only in places like Slashdot and amongst the people who read it does piracy become some kind of moral imperative. Everyone else I know treats it as a naughty pleasure. They know they're breaking the law and won't get caught, but they don't have any desire to make a big moral campaign of it.