Slashdot Mirror
India Threatens 3-Year Jail Sentences For Viewing Blocked Torrents (intoday.in)
"It is official now. The punishment for rape is actually less..." writes an anonymous Slashdot reader, who adds that "Some users think that this is all the fault of Bollywood/Hollywood movie studios. They are abusing power, court and money..." India Today reports:
The Indian government, with the help of internet service providers, and presumably under directives of court, has banned thousands of websites and URLs in the last five odd years. But until now if you somehow visited these "blocked URLs" all was fine. However, now if you try to visit such URLs and view the information, you may get a three-year jail sentence as well as invite a fine...
This is just for viewing a torrent file, or downloading a file from a host that may have been banned in India, or even for viewing an image on a file host like Imagebam. You don't have to download a torrent file, and then the actual videos or other files, which might have copyright. Just accessing information under a blocked URL will land you in jail and leave your bank account poorer.
While it's not clear how this will be enforced, visiting a blocked URL in India now leads to a warning that "Viewing, downloading, exhibiting or duplicating an illicit copy of the contents under this URL is punishable as an offence under the laws of India, including but not limited to under Sections 63, 63-A, 65 and 65-A of the Copyright Act, 1957 which prescribe imprisonment for 3 years and also fine of up to Rs. 3,00,000..."
This is just for viewing a torrent file, or downloading a file from a host that may have been banned in India, or even for viewing an image on a file host like Imagebam. You don't have to download a torrent file, and then the actual videos or other files, which might have copyright. Just accessing information under a blocked URL will land you in jail and leave your bank account poorer.
While it's not clear how this will be enforced, visiting a blocked URL in India now leads to a warning that "Viewing, downloading, exhibiting or duplicating an illicit copy of the contents under this URL is punishable as an offence under the laws of India, including but not limited to under Sections 63, 63-A, 65 and 65-A of the Copyright Act, 1957 which prescribe imprisonment for 3 years and also fine of up to Rs. 3,00,000..."
You know what they say: download a Michael Jackson song, get 10 years in jail, kill Michael Jackson get 4.
All this is pointless hyperventilating by people who understand little about India.
India is one the LEAST punitive countries in the world. It does not believe that putting people in the prison is a solution for anything – even for things most of us would agree that people should be put into prison for.
India’s incarceration rate is 33 (one of the lowest in the world) per 100,000
US incarceration rate is 698 (highest incarceration rate in the world, if you ignore Seychelles) per 100,000
Have you ever heard of anyone put in prison in India for downloading a file? The law has been around since 1957. I am not even sure if for-profit bootleggers who sell media in India have been in prison for more than a few weeks. This is just some tech-ignorant government bureaucrat getting carried away. If a 0.01% of Indians tweet about it, the warning will be edited to something realistic. This has been the pattern about most India alarmist articles on Slashdot.