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EU Court Says Hotspot Owners Aren't Liable For 3rd-Party Piracy
Mickeycaskill writes: A preliminary ruling from a European Court of Justice Advocate General has said it is not reasonable for owners of public Wi-Fi hotspots to be held liable for copyright infringement committed by users on these networks. Sony took legal action against a German business owner after a third party allegedly illegally downloaded music to which the record label owned the rights to on the basis the network should have been secured. However this view has been rejected by the Advocate General who says it is impossible for all public Wi-Fi to be secured. His recommendation will now be debated by European judges.
I realize that the law works differently for little people and all(though it's not as though Team Media have been shy about insisting that basically everyone who in some way facilitates internet use should have a responsibility to protect their precious 'content' for them, from ISPs to search engines); but I'm a trifle baffled by how it could even be a serious question whether somebody operating an internet-connected wifi AP is responsible for the actions of the users of that AP. More or less everyone accepts that ISPs, telcos, and the like can't possibly be held responsible for every last dumb or criminal thing that their customers do or we'd have to shut down basically everything; and isn't a public AP just a particularly small last-mile ISP with even less practical ability to keep tabs on its customers(since it may not have much info on them, compared to ISPs that know where you live or have your billing information; and is atypically likely to be operated as an amenity by technically unsophisticated proprietors of a coffee shop/hotel/etc. rather than by an ISP that may have clueless tier 1 reps; but can't stay in business without at least some hardcore NOC types in the background).
Yes, operating a hotspot for the benefit of your business off the cheapest 'home' internet plan may be a breach of your ISP's ToS; but that's a totally separate issue, to be taken up between you and them if they care so much, and not relevant to your culpability for what 3rd parties do on your hotspot.
It is not about child porn anyway, just about the content mafia.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
Darling, I'm not aware of what the Polish government is doing and I actually couldn't care less, however, an intelligent ruling on a piracy case doesn't magically erase or make up for all the bad things the EU has done and is doing: the TTIP, the Maastricht rules, the Fiscal Compact, the substantial failure of the single currency, the progressive erasure of the national identities and cultures, the inability to handle the refugee crisis, and, most importantly, blackmailing Greece and Portugal into accepting strangling bailouts (otherwise German and French banks go bust, and the single currency with them) while a controlled bankruptcy and exit from the eurozone would have probably been better for those countries (and not only for them).
That's why European people are massively voting for anti-EU politicians, not only in Poland but also in Italy, France, Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands, and now even Germany (which says it all, they are the only ones gaining from the existence of the EU...). And that's also why David Cameron in the UK was basically forced to promise a "Brexit" referendum in his electoral campaign, otherwise he wouldn't have been re-elected.
You know, most people have more serious and pressing problems than downloading the latest Star Wars for free. All that said, congrats to the EU court for this specific decision. When the EU won't exist anymore - and believe me, it won't take long for that, people's will cannot be ignored for too long - I hope those intelligent judges will be appointed to the national constitutional courts of their own countries.