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UK Man Faces Prison For Circumventing UK's Pirate Site Blockade (torrentfreak.com)

Posted by timothy on from the please-change-first-name-to-Jhzubuzzoff dept.

An anonymous reader writes with news from TorrenFreak that a Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit in the UK has charged a man for operating proxy sites and services that let fellow Internet users in the UK bypass local pirate site blockades. In a first of its kind prosecution, the Bakersfield resident is charged with several fraud offenses and one count of converting and/or transferring criminal property. During the summer of 2014, City of London Police arrested the then 20-year-old Callum Haywood of Bakersfield for his involvement with several proxy sites and services. Haywood was interrogated at a police station and later released on bail. He agreed to voluntarily hand over several domain names, but the police meanwhile continued working on the case. I wonder if the same logic applies to customers of the shrinking number of VPNs that can be used to bypass other kinds of country-level controls.

28 of 130 comments (clear)

  1. Hmm by liqu1d · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Wonder how much taxpayers money was wasted on this effort.

    1. Re:Hmm by wbr1 · · Score: 5, Insightful
      This is the world now. It is a form of corporate welfare. Issues that should be civil and handled by the corporation's at their cost are legislated into criminal issues where the taxpayers bear the cost burden. Privatize the profits, socialize the expenses.

      Of course this does not even touch upon whether it is ethical to jail people for these types of offenses. Hint, it isn't.

      --
      Silence is a state of mime.
    2. Re:Hmm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      No where near as much as the police expended on this investigation. They moved hell and high water to help those rich cunts. Next time some prick steals your car, or bicycle, or even breaks into your home: just note how fucking useless the cops are. They simply don't give a shit. Fucking traitors to the working class.

    3. Re:Hmm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      No, but the media companies should start pirating their own content since pirates clearly have higher revenues than they do according to them.

    4. Re:Hmm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      Well, it is worth noting this is the City of London Police, that is the "square mile" police force and so not the regular London Metropolitan police. These chumps have deliberately profiled themselves as lapdogs of big entertainment, not surprising since the City of London itself is entirely corporate with corporations for voters and so on, so it may well not directly be taxpayer money they're burning.

      Even so, it's not the taxpayer money that's the problem here. The pernicious venom of censorship is.

    5. Re:Hmm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      Not as much as you might suppose. The "City of London" Police force is not the general police force for the City of London (Odd I know) it is literally only responsible of the area inside the "Square mile" that is a bought-and-paid for feudal fiefdom inside the rest of the UK democracy. The "police" there pretty much serve corporate interests only. Thankfully very few people actually live inside the square mile not their influence is much less than you'd expect. It is a very strange legacy of out past that is now very difficult for us to rid ourselves of, because of corporate backing.

      But it doesn't represent London proper nor the rest of the UK

    6. Re:Hmm by infolation · · Score: 5, Interesting
      Then let's set aside 'ethical' issues, and look at it, step-by-step, from a legal perspective, since that is how the police view it. I'm not a lawyer, but UK law is written in fairly plain english:

      There is no law in the UK that stops people accessing The Pirate Bay. There is a court injunction, obtain by a consortium of media companies.

      The injunction tells UK ISPs they must block access to specific websites (URLS) under a 'section 97'

      That refers to section 97 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

      The High Court (in Scotland, the Court of Session) shall have power to grant an injunction against a service provider, where that service provider has actual knowledge of another person using their service to infringe copyright.

      The service providers listed in that injunction were Sky, Everything Everywhere, TalkTalk, O2, Virgin Media and BT

      This has also been an issue with other Pirate Bay proxy sites, for example the BFI attempted to get the Pirate Party's Pirate Bay proxy shut down, unsuccessfully.

      Amongst all these laws and injunctions, I don't see mention of anything that would refer to Callum Haywood's site, except the unsuccessful BFI attempt, since that's the only one that concerns a proxy. His site isn't one that's listed in the injunction but, even if it was, the UK ISPs listed should already be blocking it at a network level in the same way they block the original Pirate Bay.

    7. Re:Hmm by jabuzz · · Score: 4, Informative

      Except circumventing a court order or helping someone else do so is an offence in itself, contempt of court I believe.

    8. Re:Hmm by serviscope_minor · · Score: 4, Informative

      Not as much as you might suppose. The "City of London" Police force is not the general police force for the City of London (Odd I know) it is literally only responsible of the area inside the "Square mile"

      The square mile is the City of London. Greater London area is an agglomeration of a large number of towns, cities, boroughs and other miscellenia such as City of London, City of Westminster, and bits stolen from the surrounding counties, such as Kingston which is the county town of Surrey despite being in Greater London.

      What everyone thinks of as London is Greater London.

      But yes, the City of London is weird. From an administrative point of view, it's older than England, never mind the UK. It's current charter dates from 1067 (England dates from 930 or so), but that recognises its previous charter which is sadly lost to history as it woud have happened well inside the Dark Ages. Since it was already there, the laws got crafted around it.

      --
      SJW n. One who posts facts.
    9. Re:Hmm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Was his service for the ISPs or the citizens?
      Was the court order for the ISPs or the citizens?

      If the court order did not mention him, he was not circumventing the court order.
      If the answers to the above questions don't match, he wasn't helping someone else circumvent the court order.

    10. Re:Hmm by pla · · Score: 4, Interesting

      This didn't circumvent the court order. The order didn't apply to Joe Sixpack, it applied to a specific list of ISPs and ordered them to take a specific set of actions.

      In no way does running a proxy interfere with the ability of BT to block an official list of UKIP... er, I mean, piracy sites.

    11. Re:Hmm by MitchDev · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Revoke copyright after 5 years

    12. Re:Hmm by ConfusedVorlon · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Unlike the USA, I don't think there would be any legal problem with that.
      In UK law, the GCHQ data is legal (or at least - you'd have a hard time proving otherwise)
      If GCHQ provided data to the police, then that's just a source giving a tip-off to the police.

      We don't have any equivalent of the fourth amendment, and the 'fruit of the poisonous tree' doctrine is not nearly so strong here if it applies at all.

      Having said that - it seems perfectly plausible that they police got a tip-off from someone other than GCHQ. Perhaps somebody who wanted the £20k reward - and who quite properly is not being named.

      IANAL

      --
      VLC Remote for iPhone and Android
    13. Re:Hmm by gstoddart · · Score: 3

      Issues that should be civil and handled by the corporation's at their cost are legislated into criminal issues where the taxpayers bear the cost burden. Privatize the profits, socialize the expenses.

      Absolutely true.

      Notice how neatly they've maneuvered the DHS and ICE into policing copyright?

      Notice how they've paid the US to force this into "trade" negotiations, and effectively write new laws for other countries?

      America is absolutely leading the charge in the globalization of corporate welfare to ensure that corporations have more rights than people. And they've taken the public stance that them being on the payroll of corporations is somehow going to be better for us all ... I have no idea if they believe this or not, or they're just laughing as they take money from corporate interests to sell out ours.

      Welcome to the global oligarchy, because they now enjoy many legal rights you and I no longer have .... like having the police protect us from abuse of the law.

      The police now exist to enforce the will of their corporate overlords. Holy fuck, you can't even make this shit up.

      But, make no mistake about it, the will of the corporations carries far more weight than any rights we think we're supposed to have, and the system is now stacked against us. And that was bought and sold in the open by lobbyists.

      Where the fuck is Reg the Blank when you need him?

      --
      Lost at C:>. Found at C.
    14. Re: Hmm by KGIII · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Back in the 1980s, I was in my second enlistment to get more money for college. They sent me off to learn to drive small and medium sized vehicles - even some training on larger stuff. Anyhow, one of my instructors made a comment that has stuck with me all these years.

      "As the fucking commies get more freedom, we get less. It's like it's seeking an equilibrium. Like we're going to meet in the center someday. I wonder if it's intentional."

      I won't speculate as to the latter but it does seem to have some merit. Also, I'm pretty sure that's 100% verbatim.

      --
      "So long and thanks for all the fish."
    15. Re:Hmm by KGIII · · Score: 2

      It's also important to realize the differences between legal systems. If you're unfamiliar with how the courts work in the UK then, at least traditionally, unless a plain text reading of the law suggests this AND the magistrate(?) agrees that the defendant was the target - they may well not even go very far into the proceedings. They write some zany laws and let the courts interpret them - lots and lots of leeway. If you're from the US, it's not a damned thing like what we've got. Australia and, I think, Canada are similar. There's a name for it but I'll be damned if I can remember it at this point.

      --
      "So long and thanks for all the fish."
    16. Re:Hmm by Progman3K · · Score: 2

      You forgot apostrophe's on:

      The plural of apostrophe is "apostrophes", not "apostrophe's".

      Back to trolling-school for you?

      --
      I don't know the meaning of the word 'don't' - J
    17. Re: Hmm by Type44Q · · Score: 2

      There's a name for it but I'll be damned if I can remember it at this point.

      Common Law (as opposed to Civil Law)

  2. Really not legal by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I will find it hard if they find him guilty under the charges, but with DUMB judges who believe the cattrap the plod talk about I suspect he will do down. The thing is that UK BLOCKING is not legal. Their is not UK law derived from Parliment that create the law, hell not ALL ISPs are are even covered by the court order to block site as it only the few biggest one which have to block. So this guy is being led to slaughter for a crime that does not exist and in now legal law, hell it would have to be EVERY UK ISP to be forced to block to get any where near it

  3. Strike him centurian! very roughly! by GeekWithAKnife · · Score: 2


    ...and throw him to the floor sir? -oh yes.

    --
    A 'singular oddity' is an event that cannot be explained and only happens when you are alone.
  4. Same in North Korea and China by Mostly+a+lurker · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Using proxies to bypass government mandated restrictions on Internet use is illegal in some other authoritarian countries. Why should be UK be any different?

    1. Re:Same in North Korea and China by AmiMoJo · · Score: 4, Informative

      This isn't a government mandated block. A private company took the largest ISPs to court and got an injunction requiring them to block a long list of web sites. Smaller ISPs are unaffected.

      The correct course of action would for that company to now ask for an injunction against this guy, asking the court to make him stop providing proxies to bypass the other blocks. Instead, they got their private police force, the City of London Police, to treat him as a criminal. If you were not aware, the City of London is a small area in London that is basically run by corporations. Corporations get to vote on their elected officials, and the City of London Police basically work for them.

      This is extreme abuse of power by the City of London Police.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    2. Re: Same in North Korea and China by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      In China I can download all the copyright stuff I want. Then I go back to Hong Kong (or just put on my VPN) to access the censored stuff. But by doing so I can no longer access some pirate Chinese site that only accept China IP address.

      Each country has different standards of acceptable and not. It's hard to say one is better than other, like blocking political stuffs is worse than blocking copyright violations. All are bad, and we as citizens of whatever country we come from have to oppose censorship, no matter the content.

    3. Re:Same in North Korea and China by tlhIngan · · Score: 2

      This isn't a government mandated block. A private company took the largest ISPs to court and got an injunction requiring them to block a long list of web sites. Smaller ISPs are unaffected.

      The correct course of action would for that company to now ask for an injunction against this guy, asking the court to make him stop providing proxies to bypass the other blocks. Instead, they got their private police force, the City of London Police, to treat him as a criminal. If you were not aware, the City of London is a small area in London that is basically run by corporations. Corporations get to vote on their elected officials, and the City of London Police basically work for them.

      This is extreme abuse of power by the City of London Police.

      City of London != London.

      The City of London is a small area dominated by business. Historically, it IS London, founded by time immemorial (no one knows when it was founded), and basically existed when England was formed, so the monarchy never could really control them. There is basically an uneasy tension - the City of London agreed to certain terms in order to get certain benefits but they pretty much have autonomy. Later monarchies didn't like this, and they created Westminster to be the power center. Westminster expanded and expanded, encompassing London, to become what we know today as London (Greater London), while the original London is known as the City of London. I'm pretty sure the original intent was to basically have the whole area called Westminster and thus getting rid of London, but history.

      And because of the way things were, the City of London has around 30,000 residents, but over 2M people actually work there This results in companies actually having voting rights and control over the governance.

      Even today, the City of London is really an autonomous entity inside of England.

      Here's some nice YouTube videos showing how messed up it all is. It goes through the history, and the really, really, screwed up governance structure.

      https://www.youtube.com/playli...

  5. Re:This is intolerable by jabuzz · · Score: 2

    This is the UK not the USA. There is *ZERO* I repeat *ZERO* chance that he will in jail for decades. The maximum sentence in the UK for any copyright offence is 10 years and/or an "unlimited" fine. Further to get the maximum sentence would require you to be profiting financially from the copyright infringement. Also note in the UK damages are limited to *actual* losses.

  6. Re:This is intolerable by Neil_Brown · · Score: 2

    The maximum sentence in the UK for any copyright offence is 10 years

    It is worth bearing in mind that the charges in question do not appear to be charges under copyright law. They are, apparently:

    one count of converting and/or transferring criminal property and six counts of possession of an article for use in fraud

    Converting criminal property falls under s327 Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, and has a maximum prison sentence of 14 years.

    Possession of an article for use in fraud is covered by s6 Fraud Act 2006, which carries up to 5 years imprisonment.

  7. Re:Reassuring by Christian+Smith · · Score: 3, Informative

    I'm glad to know that given all the cuts on the police force that Osborne is talking about, the humming a tune in the shower police unit remains well-staffed. Right along the lines of the "Big Society" trumpeted by Cameron.

    After all, who cares about assault, burglary, etc ? Good luck having the police respond to a call reporting assault. Good citizens should band together and defend against those, the police is too busy with much more serious crimes. Like not paying for the right to hum a tune in the shower.

    Last time I was assaulted in the street, the next police officer I flagged down was more concerned that I happened to be inadvertently spitting blood in his face.

  8. Bakersfield ? by nukenerd · · Score: 2

    I'd never heard of Bakersfield, and Googling brings up somewhere in California. Yet TFA refers to a UK man, and he is going on trial in Nottingham (UK). Can someone explain?