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Australia: VPN Users Aren't Breaching Copyright (abc.net.au)

Posted by EditorDavid on from the let's-block-another-one dept.

Slashdot reader Zanadou writes: The Australian Government Productivity Commission in a draft report recommended that Australian consumers should be able to legally circumvent geoblocking restrictions that have prevented them from using foreign online streaming services like Netflix, and that the Australian Government needs to send a clear message that it is not an infringement of copyright for consumers to be able evade geoblocking technology. Karen Chester, a commissioner with the Productivity Commission, told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation that geoblocking restrictions have the opposite effect of encouraging internet piracy. "Making copyright material more accessible and more competitively priced online, and not geoblocking, is the best antidote to copyright infringement."

In probably related news, Australia topped the list of countries who illegally downloaded the Game Of Thrones season six premiere, this week.
In January Netflix's chief product officer admitted that the company has no magic solution to subscribers who use VPNs to circumvent geoblocking.

31 of 117 comments (clear)

  1. Wonderful! by Nethead · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Does this mean I'll be able to watch MasterChef Australia and MKR in the US, without torrenting them like I do now? Maybe catch some extra videos from Ten's website?

    --
    -- I have a private email server in my basement.
    1. Re: Wonderful! by corychristison · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Agreed.

      My wife is a fan of a few different Aussie shows. We used to use Unblock-Us.com to access Netflix content in a bunch of regions, and Australia was one of them.

      We live in Canada. We honestly didn't even care much for access to the US library, as many users did. Between access to AU, UK, and IR we got the shows we wanted.

      Now its back to pirating because i haven't a clue where else to find some of them. Amazon doesn't carry the DVD's, no luck at local distributors. Outside of traveling to these places and trying to buy them and bring back home (which introduces even more problem, even ignoring the travel cost), I don't know where else to find them.

      I guess they don't want my money, so fuck 'em.

    2. Re: Wonderful! by Nethead · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Agreed. We don't find much US TV that is all that interesting to us. I would say about 70% of our watching is UK or AU and most of the other 30% is PBS. We're really sad that DocZone is off the air now, our favorite CA show (I miss Corner Gas too.) Replying to this I'm actually watching Selling Homes Australia. I think the only mainstream US show we watch is Deadliest Catch, but we live in a small native fishing village on the Salish Sea. Our ISP is run by the Tribes so I'm not really worried about a copyright notice.

      So we don't have cable, our one big screen is just a monitor for the old linux box that is our torrent host. We have Amazon Prime but to be honest, it just as easy to torrent the show and not worry about buffering.

      --
      -- I have a private email server in my basement.
    3. Re:Wonderful! by Solandri · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I think it's more a message to content producers to stop dropping the ball and start releasing your content in all markets, rather than hiding behind geo-blocking as a way to delay releasing it in markets where it's "inconvenient" or "doesn't fit with your profit-maximizing release schedule." If you want to implement different pricing in different markets, then sure go ahead. But don't stupidly withhold content from certain markets while the Internet is abuzz with talk about what happened in the latest episode, then come to the country's government complaining that people in that country are pirating the show.

      If those Australian show producers don't want to bother with separate releases in the U.S., then just allow people in the U.S. to subscribe to them online as if they were in Australia. Or if they are contracted with a U.S. affiliate to release those shows, then pressure those affiliates to release them in a timely manner. (And vice versa for shows from other countries in Australia of course.)

    4. Re:Wonderful! by tlhIngan · · Score: 3, Informative

      I think it's more a message to content producers to stop dropping the ball and start releasing your content in all markets, rather than hiding behind geo-blocking as a way to delay releasing it in markets where it's "inconvenient" or "doesn't fit with your profit-maximizing release schedule." If you want to implement different pricing in different markets, then sure go ahead. But don't stupidly withhold content from certain markets while the Internet is abuzz with talk about what happened in the latest episode, then come to the country's government complaining that people in that country are pirating the show.

      The reason content producers are doing it the way they are is simple. Money All the distributors are willing to pay $$$$$ for geographic distribution exclusivity. If they weren't granted it (say, to give Netflix the ability to show it too), then they'd only be willing to pay $, and Netflix pays $. So the math is obvious - with geographic limitations, you get $$$$$. With no geographic restrictions, you only get $$.

      It's no longer about timing or variable pricing - timing on a lot of shows can be 24 hours worldwide, and pricing is set locally - based again on the exclusivity.

      I'm sure Netflix COULD try to pay for worldwide distribution, but then you'd be basically paying $100/month for Netflix - because someone has to max up the difference in the money that the content producers will get going exclusive versus not.

      Remember, you're paying for a right to a virtual monopoly, so you're going to pay a lot of money. If you're going to have to compete, you're not going to pay a lot of money. That's where the difference in the money is.

      Now, more t hings like this could help reduce the payments - because those distributors will lean on the providers and tell them that unless they enforce the blocks, they're not going to pay so much anymore for the programming. Then it's a back and forth -- will the loss of money from that distributor be made up by offering other companies the right to distribute non-exclusively?

    5. Re:Wonderful! by bloodhawk · · Score: 2

      I actually thought we geoblocked that shit for the wealthfare of the rest of the world. I honestly don't know how anyone can stand to watch that shit.

  2. Re:Australia is breaching international treaty by fustakrakich · · Score: 4, Interesting

    That's okay. Treaties, like governments, should never last more than a generation anyway. Otherwise you enslave your kids to your bad deals.

    --
    “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
  3. Finally by sir1963nz · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I can buy and import any (legal) physical product: Books, CDs, DVDs, Clothes, Shoes, Cars, computers, software, etc etc etc etc. Just because its a digital file rather than a physical item they want different rules ?, Why ? The ONLY reason for this is to reduce competition and increase prices. If I pay for it, I am entitled to it, legally.

    1. Re:Finally by rtb61 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      To be fair, you just don't need to be able to pay for it, those selling it to you need to be able to legally do so ;). Free market principles of course demand all need to be able to access the market upon an equal market, otherwise the market is not free but cartel based, specifically designed to enrich the core cartel operators by excluding the majority from equal access to the market. So in Australia people do not want to pay for shitty foxtel with commercials, seriously what the fuck, pay to watch commercials, just to watch one series with the story busted up with rubbish commercials.

      Personally I just wait till the end of the season so I can binge watch. Make it available for sale and I will buy it, be dicks and block sale for years and well, I'll still watch it and fuck foxtel, corrupt shit heads.

      --
      Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
    2. Re:Finally by Harlequin80 · · Score: 2

      GST, the only relevant tax, is only due on products with a value of over AU$1000. Consumers generally, there are exceptions, don't face state specific taxes in Australia so imports are processed for tax liability at the national border. I have imported multiple things that have exceeded that threshold, I receive notification from Customs that they are holding it pending payment of the GST liability. I pay it and they on ship it.

    3. Re:Finally by sir1963nz · · Score: 2

      Well I am in NZ, but yes, when required to do so I have paid all of the taxes asked of me. However, taxes are NOT the issue here, it is being stopped from importing digital files that is the problem, oh and being told I am a criminal (pirate) when I have in fact legally paid for the item, and if required paid taxes on it. The laws/rules are designed to inhibit/kill competition by reducing the number of sources to ONE local source, and with them being to dictate terms and conditions. I buy in stuff from China, Singapore,USA,UK,Taiwan, etc etc regularly for my/my family consumption, something I am legally allowed to do. When companies won't export, I have freight forwarding addresses that I can use, one of them is even run by a NZ government department, the NZ Postal service, or I have friends who will buy and ship to me. Customs declarations are on the items. ALL of the big brands are available to me if I wish, for me to buy and import. No copyright/patent/brand name protection applies, I buy it, I import it.

  4. A Book by PPH · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I traveled overseas a few years back. On my trip, I bought a book. On the copyright notice page it states that this book is only authorized for sale in the country I was visiting. I then flew back to the USA (where this particular edition is not available) with my book. Have I broken a law or violated a copyright?

    As I see it, Australian citizens are simply purchasing material at a point of sale within the USA (the VPN's point of presence) and then they are using private means to move the material to their home. I flew. They used a VPN.

    --
    Have gnu, will travel.
    1. Re:A Book by drinkypoo · · Score: 2

      Only if you purchase lots of copies, import them and then try to sell in the US.

      You have no idea what you are on about.

      Those notices have no legal weight. They are a notice and a clue for anyone trying to track down sales which constitute a breach of contract. The publisher sells the books to the distributor with the understanding that they will be sold in a specific market. If those books are being sold elsewhere, then you know about it because of the custom cover and you can try to track down the distributor.

      Once you buy something, it is yours. You can resell it to anyone you want, under any terms which are normally legal. That includes reselling it in any country which your country doesn't have under some kind of applicable embargo. You can even make modifications to a copyrighted work, and then redistribute it, so long as you give the buyer all the pieces.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    2. Re:A Book by Pseudonym · · Score: 2

      Only if you purchase lots of copies, import them and then try to sell in the US.

      Wrong.

      --
      sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f(q{sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f});
  5. Re:Australia is breaching international treaty by geekpowa · · Score: 4, Insightful

    What treaty precisely hmmm? Australia is a soverign nation and we will make our own gorram civil laws thankyou very much. We have strong consumer protection laws, unlike the dsytopian hellhole where I assume you reside. One such law is the restrictive trade practices act. Restrictions on who trades with who are not permitted and it has far reaching implications in terms of preventing monopolistic and predatory retail practices. For example it prevents restricting franchisee holders from being compelled to source from a restricted list of 3rd parties. Geolocking is arguably a violation of this law and I would personally hope that this law will generally override any attempts to justify such practices under guise of copyright, though I imagine that is for lawyers and judges to sort out on a case by case basis.

  6. Parallell importation by sg_oneill · · Score: 4, Interesting

    This has most likely been legal regardless always. Back in the 90s we had a big drama over government laws introduced guaranteeing "parallell importation". The concept being that the consumer (and retailer) was guaranteed the right to bypass local importers and import their own stuff if they can get a better deal. This was particularly targetted at the music industry where CD distribution monopolies had kept album prices at around the $30 mark which in the 1990s was pretty damn exorbitant. The music industry had a fit about it, right down to big public scare campaigns about how it would ~somehow~ make music more expensive and cause australian musicians to go bankerupt because pirates would make cds in indoneisa or china and sell them cheap here legally. Which of course was nonsense since none of this authorized piracy. The laws also meant CD players where required to be multi region.

    Later the laws where used to prohibit sony and microsoft going after modchippers , and enforced DVD multi-region requirements. This all was going great until the conserative Howard government came in and I think, but I cant prove, they told the ACCC to stop enforcing the parallell import laws. And we got DMCA style laws for copyright which actually reversed many of the freedoms of parallell import.

    None the less, they ARE still on the book, so I guess this rulings most important result is clarifying that technological measures to circumvent geoblocking do not violate copyright laws.

    --
    Excuse the Unicode crap in my posts. That's an apostrophe, and slashdot is busted.
    1. Re:Parallell importation by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      Parallel Imports (I once worked for eBay Australia) was a laughable thing.

      We were told, point blank, to ignore all parallel import takedowns because they were overreach. You'd get companies like Microsoft and Adobe going after EVERY person selling their product in Australia that wasn't an authorized Adobe/Microsoft dealer for Australia. So the end-game here was that US legitimate companies would geoblock selling to Australia by removing the shipping options to Australia and instead the Australians would buy from the third party unauthorized seller who marked up the software 30$ and sold worldwide from the US. Legally they could do this. But you'd later see Parallel import takedowns IF the listing was on eBay Australia because the companies didn't want this happening.

      In the end, companies wanting to take down non-counterfeit products were sending notices saying the products were counterfeit. Which was not only false, but would not survive a lawsuit. This is a slippery slope for taking down actual counterfeit products (eg from Asian markets other than Japan) because it proves the company sending the notices are lying. So every notice gets scrutinized more than it needs to.

      Asshole selling Adobe CS for 30$, definite pirate. Different guy selling it for 1200USD (the price at the time in the US) and ships to Australia... not a pirate.

      On the flip side of this.

      Australians love their pirate film and video games. Every single day hundreds of DVD-R copies of video games, DVD-R copies of movies make it on to eBay and they last about 4 hours before they're taken down. Up until Blueray became popular enough to supplant most casual dvd piracy sales, these were the easiest listings to pull down. People would put up a game console (eg an Xbox 360) and include 100 copied games. It was absolutely obvious in every instance. While it may have been legal to sell a "mod chipped" device in Australia, it was against eBay policy to list one, and that was often their first mistake. The second mistake was including any games. The Nintendo DS and "R4" devices were another popular piracy device, but these were a little harder to pull down. The DS didn't require modification, but if any copier devices were mentioned or in the photos, they were pulled down.

  7. Re: Australia is breaching international treaty by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Youre just jealous you cant live there, instead of whatever squalid shithole you come from, just like 99% of the planet.

    Fucking peasant. Get back in the factory and make me another frying pan.

  8. Re: Australia is breaching international treaty by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    G'Day, Australia here. I never claimed that I'd recognise region blocking as a component of copyright law - and my local laws are already quite clear on that fact. So long as my citizens are accessing the content in a manner that's legal in the region it was released, then that's fine with me.

    Speaking as a nation of course, I don't have a lot of patience for anyone who refuses to sell something here, then complains about my citizens buying that content somewhere else. I've even less patience for anyone who tries to stop my citizens buying their product, then complains about it being stolen!

    Sincerely Yours,
      The Sovereign Nation of Australia

  9. Netflix doesn't need a magic bullet. by westlake · · Score: 2

    In January Netflix's chief product officer admitted that the company has no magic solution to subscribers who use VPNs to circumvent geoblocking.

    The population of Australia is 23 million. The number of Netflix subscribers in Australia is about 1 million. Respectable. But from the studios point of view these are not big numbers and a leak here and there isn't going to matter very much.

    They are big numbers to Presto and Stan, Netflix's rivals in Australia --- which means that for Netflix the Australian VPN is win-win.

    It undercuts its regional rivals, before they can become too strong, at very little cost to its own bottom line and without damaging its relations with the studios.

  10. DMCA by martin-boundary · · Score: 2
    I don't think that what the Australian Government thinks matters here. Any customer who circumvents a protection method, no matter how stupid the method is, commits a crime under the DMCA. That's an American Law, and it applies to Aussies who do business in the US, even if technically their PCs are operating in Australia.

    It's a stupid law, it needs to be repealed, etc. etc. But Australians are doing it wrong if they argue they're morally or legally right in Australia. The only thing that matters is what happens in the US.

    That said, the beauty of breaking the law from within a foreign country is that it's a lot harder for the wronged company to get relief. Especially if the foreign government disagrees with the US. By hurting American companies economically, the trickle down effect *may* be that the stupid law will get revisited. So rock on Aussies ;-)

    1. Re:DMCA by Harlequin80 · · Score: 2

      How exactly are we committing a crime in the US? I am in Australia. Netflix are providing access to me in Australia. I am making a trade with an Australian credit card and I am making the purchase in Australian dollars for an Australian account. All that is happening is that I connect to a VPN and Netflix provides me with different content. That they provide me with different content is their choice, not mine.

      I frankly don't give a fuck what the DMCA states. Or in fact any other law on US books. I am not covered by them and I am not doing business under them.

    2. Re:DMCA by martin-boundary · · Score: 2
      Sure you are committing a crime. It's exactly the same principle as when you stand inside the USA near the Mexican border. You spy a Mexican trying to enter the country illegally, and you shoot him while he's on the other side. You've committed murder, even if technically all you did was shoot a gun in the air on US soil, even if technically you've been in the US during all this time, and even if nobody died or got injured inside the US. It's not true that the Mexican was simply killed in his country by a bullet that just appeared and randomly hit the guy in the head. It is true that this was murder.

      If you like, one could say that your purpose in using a VPN to access Netflix was to explicitly and fraudulently bypass the trivially stupid digital rights protection measure consisting of checking if the client requests are originating from some subset of the Australian IP address range. You bypassed a braindead digital rights protection measure knowing full well that Netflix didn't want you to do so, and that makes you a baaad person who should probably go to jail the next time you step foot in the US, mmkay?

    3. Re:DMCA by martin-boundary · · Score: 2
      Geoblocking is clearly a method for protecting digital distribution rights. Netflix pays money to receive limited rights to show movies to some of its customers, but not all, ie not Australians in Australia.

      Due to the DMCA, in America, any method, no matter how flimsy, to protect the content from being seen by Australians in Australia is good enough. So because the method (aka geoblocking) now exists, the bad guys (aka Australians living in Australia) have been prevented and all is good in the world. But wait, some of the evil Australians living in Australia are going out of their way to bypass a perfectly fine method that is stopping the bad guys from accessing the content. Those evil Australians living in Australia are breaking the American Law against breaking perfectly fine methods for stopping bad guys from seeing content (aka geoblocking). They are doing this knowing full well that they are not supposed to do it, since they have to sign up for special evil helping VPNs and pay good money to those VPN providers. Those evil Australians are breaking the Law (aka DMCA) in America.

      I suspect that an Australian DMCA equivalent lawsuit would have to be brought by Netflix to users in Australia, which would be interesting, ridiculous, and outright daft on the part of Netflix.

  11. Re: Australia is breaching international treaty by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Bingo

    It's not piracy if the person is watching US Netflix from Australia. It IS piracy if the video is an unauthorized distribution downloaded from BitTorrent.

    To frame this, you have to pay 10$/mo for the VPN on top of the 8$/mo for Netflix. So the Aussies are already paying for this geoblocking bullshit. It may become standard fare that everyone outside the US buys into a VPN just to circumvent restrictive content policies in their home countries, not just trying to access US content.

    For example, Germany and Australia have rules prohibiting certain kinds of violent content, so that content will just not be available.

    But this is OLD, and I mean VERY OLD news. People have been doing greymarket TV for decades. They used to do it with the analog satellite dish systems. If you weren't in the US, but were in the signal range (Eg Canada, Mexico, Greenland and Iceland) you could buy a US descrambler and someone you know in the US pays the bill, and you pay them.

    Exact same idea.

  12. Read the whole report! by ajdlinux · · Score: 5, Informative

    Quite apart from the geoblocking issue - there's a whole tonne of interesting recommendations in the draft report.

    For those who aren't familiar, the Productivity Commission is a major Australian Government advisory body/think tank that conducts public inquiries into matters of economic policy. The Government requested a broad report into the economic effectiveness of the intellectual property system.

    This report is a draft - the Commission is presently taking public submissions that will be considered for the final report later this year.

    Highlights from the findings and recommendations:

    • 70 years after death is far too long a term for copyright - it would be more appropriate to limit copyright to 15-25 years after creation (noting that this has implications for international copyright treaties)
    • Repeal Australia's "parallel import" restrictions on books
    • Replace Australia's present "fair dealing" exemptions with a US-style "fair use" clause which would be much broader in scope
    • Ban software patents and business method patents
    • Reform pharmaceutical patents in various ways
    • Government should adopt an Open Access policy for publicly funded research

    All of which seems in line with what I consider sensible policy reform. Of course, whether the Government will consider any of these recommendations at all is a completely different question...

  13. Re:Australia is breaching international treaty by Dunbal · · Score: 4, Interesting

    A geographical restriction is a contract matter between a content publisher and a distributor. It has nothing to do with law, and everything to do with "rights agreements". A consumer, however, cannot be bound by a contract between two third parties. If I make a contract with my friend stating that you can no longer drive your car and try to enforce it in court I will be laughed out of the courthouse. Consumers are paying for the content - no copyright infringement is happening. An artist doesn't get to say when or where you're allowed to hear his music or play his CD.

    --
    Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
  14. Re:Australia is breaching international treaty by dryeo · · Score: 2

    That's not really true as some treaties deserve to last more then a generation. Should we scrap the treaty that keeps the Great Lakes a non-militarized zone? What about the peace treaty with England that recognized the newly independent country of the USA.
    Trade deals, which often aren't even treaties, should always have a reasonable out, eg for NAFTA I believe a participant can leave with 6 months notice and most trade deals and sometimes other treaties are like that, 6 months to a years notice and you can legally leave the treaty while following the treaty.

    --
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
  15. Re:Australia is breaching international treaty by Calydor · · Score: 2

    Treaties should only last a generation. Then when they're about to expire they can be revisited and renegotiated.

    --
    -=This sig has nothing to do with my comment. Move along now=-
  16. Game of Thrones nonsense by smileytshirt · · Score: 5, Informative

    This is a complete media beat up about Australians pirating GOT more than any country. The source of the information https://torrentfreak.com/game-... quoted its statistics after collecting only HALF A DAY'S worth of data - ie. while Australia was awake and the rest of the English speaking world asleep. The exact same controversy happened last year, with the exact same source and statistical integrity.

    --
    www.shortman.com.au - top shorted stocks on the ASX
  17. Re:Australia is breaching international treaty by fustakrakich · · Score: 2

    Think of it as having to renew your marriage vows every 20-25 years or so.

    And international borders, they are prison walls, they should have been abolished with the end of World War 2. They only serve the stratification interests of business. All the nationalist/religious ideology is to motivate your army to work for cheap, but even those ISIS guys don't work for free.

    --
    “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”