Digital Economy Act: Illegal Kodi Streams Could Now Land Users In Prison For 10 Years (independent.co.uk)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Independent: The Digital Economy Act has passed into law, meaning people could now face ten-year prison sentences for illegally streaming copyrighted content. It covers a wide number of areas, including broadband speeds, access to online pornography and government data-sharing. However, amid the rising popularity of Kodi, an increase to the maximum prison term -- from two years to ten -- for people guilty of copyright infringement is particularly interesting. Anyone caught streaming TV shows, films and sports events illegally using websites, torrents and Kodi add-ons could technically face a decade behind bars. However, the new law will most likely target individuals and groups making a business out of selling illegal content, FACT CEO Kieron Sharp told the Mirror. The Independent also notes in a separate report that The Digital Economy Act could allow UK police to "remotely disable mobile phones, even before the user actually commits a crime." The Digital Economy Act "contains a section stating that officers will be able to place restrictions on handsets that they believe are being used by drug dealers," reports The Independent.

Comments

Leading the way to a police state

[OneHundredAndTen]

The UK is becoming a country of populism and a police state.

Re:Leading the way to a police state

[Maritz]

How dare there be a punishment for doing something illegal

Yep, thanks for summarising the situation for everybody. There are two and only two positions.

ONE: Nobody gets any punishment for doing something illegal.

TWO: Watching a copyrighted work on a stream without paying gets you ten years in prison.

You just announced you're an idiot, incapable of nuanced thought. Good going.

Re:Leading the way to a police state

[monkeyxpress]

How dare there be a punishment for doing something illegal

There was a punishment. 2 year losing your liberty for depriving a multi-billion dollar mega corp of some extra profit on a good that has no cost of production seems more than fair. 10 years is just ridiculous.

Laws need to be proportional otherwise you have a police state, where everyone lives in fear of making one mistake and ending up in the gulag for the rest of their lives. People are not robots. They make mistakes and wrong choices. Punishment should be aimed at rehabilitation not ejecting them from society. That is what a confident, prosperous and mature society would do.

Re:Leading the way to a police state

[JaredOfEuropa]

"a punishment", sure. But you know the legislators have gone off the rails when pirating a movie potentially carries a stiffer penalty than going into a store, threatening and physically harming the shopkeeper with a weapon, then making off with the physical DVD. (a quick google reveals UK sentencing guidelines of 7-12 years for a robbery with the highest category of harm and culpability)

Re:Leading the way to a police state

[Opportunist]

For 10 years prison, I could beat someone into a pulp with lasting, permanently disfiguring and crippling injury.

Come to think of it... where does the idiot that initiated this law live?

Re:Leading the way to a police state

[silentcoder]

Allow me to introduce you to one of the most fundamental principles of justice: the punishment should fit the crime.
Watching Game of Thrones from a dodgy website does not warrant a ten year jail sentence. It does not warrant any jail sentence at all. At most it warrants being forced to pay HBO damages equal to one months' subscription to their own streaming service (which is more than enough to bingewatch every episode of GoT they ever made - at a price THEY set).

Re:Leading the way to a police state

[GuB-42]

There is nuance, the maximum prison term has increased but it doesn't mean you will get 10 years for watching your favorite TV series on a illegal streaming website.
Judges are not complete morons, and when minor copyright cases go to judgment, the sentence typically ends up being a reasonable fine. In fact, most of them simply don't want to bother with such cases, they have better things to do. It doesn't stop lawyers from sending you scary letters though.
In fact, for small offenders, the film industry would rather decriminalize it so that it could be made into a much easier to enforce administrative fine, like a parking ticket.
The maximum sentence is for very large scale, financially motivated operations.

It is like the Chinese law that makes pollution a capital offense. They won't execute you because you didn't change your oil properly. But dumping industrial amounts of deadly chemicals in such a way that it ends up in drinking water is essentially mass murder, justifying the harshest punishment in the book.

Re:Leading the way to a police state

[Oswald McWeany]

How dare there be a punishment for doing something illegal

The problem is that this is a very harsh punishment for a crime that many people are guilty of. Making a figure up out of my arse, but 10 years for a crime that maybe 25% of the population are guilty of.

These kind of laws that snare a large portion of the population are good for police abuse.

"I suspect Mr Smith is guilty of killing his wife but I can't prove it Sarg."
"Well Constable, just check his internet history, see if he's been using a Kodi, we can send him to jail for that instead".

Or - Mr. Bloggs is challenging Mr. Grubbs for the local MP for a seat in parliament.. Mr. Grubbs greases a policeman's hand to check to see if his rival has streamed illegal TV content.

A lot of authoritarian goverments use this kind of tactic. Soviets were famous for having lots of really brutal punishments for crimes that lots of people committed.

Studies have shown that increasing punishment does not prevent people breaking a law. Chance of being caught is the real motivator to prevent people breaking the law.

Look at Saudi Arabia and alcohol laws- real brutal punishment but lots of Europeans who are stationed there play Russian Roulette with alcohol consumption because they think they won't get caught.. It's the same with streaming- the ridiculous 10 year sentence is not going to prevent people because they think they're not going to get caught. All it's going to do is give people ridiculous sentence for a minor offence.

Re:Leading the way to a police state

[c]

There is nuance, the maximum prison term has increased but it doesn't mean you will get 10 years for watching your favorite TV series on a illegal streaming website.

No, you'll be threatened with 10 years watching your favorite TV series on a illegal streaming website when you're given the "opportunity" to settle/plea bargain, and if you don't think the threat of ridiculous penalties doesn't cause people (criminals or innocents) to agree to seemingly insane things then you need to get out of your cave a lot more often.

Re:Leading the way to a police state

[mrchaotica]

The first step is to criminalize enough normal, common behavior that everyone becomes a criminal. The second step is to selectively arrest dissidents and people with inconvenient ideas not for opposing the people in power, but for breaking the "legitimate" and "reasonable" laws.

For example, the United States has been a police state since at least the Nixon administration. Here's a quote from Nixon's former aide, John Ehrlichman, illustrating the point:

"You want to know what this [the passage of the Controlled Substances Act and the "War on Drugs"] was really all about? The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I'm saying? We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did."

Re:Leading the way to a police state

[Zemran]

Plea bargaining is illegal in the UK. If you were offered a lenient sentence for pleading guilty that means that you are not getting a fair trial. You are saying that people should be punished for claiming to be innocent. That sounds like a police state.

Re:Leading the way to a police state

[Aighearach]

Watching Game of Thrones from a dodgy website does not warrant a ten year jail sentence.

Considering the difference in both quality and efficiency between streaming and torrenting, I would support at least a 5 year sentence to an reeducation camp.

Re:Leading the way to a police state

[mrchaotica]

I was speaking generally about what it means to be a police state. But if you want to go back to the narrower topic at hand, that's fine too:

All they need to do is not illegally stream copyrighted content.

Oh it's that easy, eh? I'm not sure I agree.

First of all, consider the fact that pretty much everything on the Internet is copyrighted. That means -- technically -- this law applies even to web pages as much as it does audio or video.

Second, remember that this doesn't just criminalize knowingly uploading something without authorization, or even downloading it and knowingly keeping the local copy without authorization; it criminalizes mere "streaming." Consider the fact that in many cases, you have to "stream" something (i.e., download it to your temporary cache, without intending to save it permanently) -- such as a web page -- just to see what it is. You literally can't know if a particular act breaks the law until after you've done it!

Third, copyright infringement cannot be determined just by looking at the act of streaming itself the mere fact that a copyright on the content in question exists, but instead hinges entirely on whether you have permission from the copyright holder or not. In many cases, even seemingly-legitimate downloading could turn out to be copyright infringement. For example, even mainstream, legitimate sites like Youtube have infringing content uploaded to them all the time and there's pretty much no way for you as a third-party to know whether the uploader had permission from the copyright holder or not. Moreover, even if you're downloading/streaming from a site controlled by the copyright holder himself (which you would think should imply tacit permission), you might be violating something in the fine print of the ToS which revokes your permission and thus criminalizes you.

And sure, you might say -- like the copyright-maximalist quoted in the article does -- that "the new law will most likely target individuals and groups making a business out of selling illegal content." But the fact remains that this law could be used to nail pretty much anyone to the wall for a 10-year prison sentence, if the prosecutor was pissed off at them enough. And that's fundamentally unjust.

To illustrate my point: if you're in the UK, you are now a felon. Why? Because of the following:

I, mrchaotica, as the author and copyright holder of this Slashdot post, hereby declare that any access, streaming, or downloading of it by the person with username "91degrees" is unuthorized and thus copyright infringement.

Too bad you had to commit the crime to find out about it, huh?

Fortunately....

[__aaclcg7560]

Everyone on the Internet are law-abiding citizens. This shouldn't be a problem.

Glad they won't be in the EU for much longer

[TimothyHollins]

Brexit seems more and more like a positive thing for each day that passes. By the time May is done Australia will be sending its delinquents over there instead.

Re:Glad they won't be in the EU for much longer

[Maritz]

You mean like Rolf Harris?

Re:Glad they won't be in the EU for much longer

[monkeyxpress]

Brexit seems more and more like a positive thing for each day that passes. By the time May is done Australia will be sending its delinquents over there instead.

They probably will at this rate. As a NZer who's country has a free trade deal with Australia and China, I can attest to how little such agreements prevent you from being screwed over by the bigger country/better negotiator. Britain is going to get a nasty wake up call when it wonders off to the nations of the world to do deals and ends up tangled up in a mess of agreements that give them far less freedom than they get in the EU.

Some examples: NZ has, for the last thirty years, been trying to get its apples in to Australia. It has a trade deal that should allow this, and it has gone to the WTO (that will apparently give Britain great default access to everywhere once it leaves the single market) repeatedly to try to prevent Australia halting the imports. It has not worked, because Australia keeps coming up with new reasons why the apples cannot be imported on trumped up biosecurity grounds. Good luck. In addition to this, NZ has been trying to break into the Australian aviation market for about the same amount of time. They finally managed it many years ago by buying out Ansett Australia, which was promptly grounded by the Australian Civil Aviation regulator a month later on the grounds of 'safety'. The result was that Air New Zealand had to be renationalised by the NZ government and withdrew from Australia with its tail between its legs. More recently, just months after a new agreement had been reached by the two governments on creating a pathway to citizenship for NZers currently stuck in an immigration no-mans land (due to continual erosion of the free movement provisions that were previously agreed) the Australian government announced new changes that put a whole new bunch of kiwis into a new no mans land. Basically they gave with one hand while pulling the rug with the other.

With China things were not so bad, with the exception that the Chinese put a provision in the agreement that prevented NZ from discriminating against investors from there. This has hamstrung the NZ govts ability to prevent Chinese flooding their money into our tiny country, as it would have to renegotiate parts of the Australian agreement to do this.

This is the sort of great stuff Britain has to look forward too. Already the stage is being set for them to be screwed by both NZ and Australia, which are attempting to position themselves as the UK's allies in their brave new word (even offering to send trade negotiators to help the UK), while lobbying the EU to replace existing UK meat and dairy imports with their own.

If the UK expects to do trade with anyone, then it will quickly realise that doing trade deals always requires flogging off some sovereignty as well.

Re:Glad they won't be in the EU for much longer

[Malc]

Yep, same thing for Canada. Just ask the lumber industry in BC how good job security was even after NAFTA and the WTO ruled in their favour. About the only way to make Brexiters realise how riduculous their position is is to rephrase this in terms of a relationship that they understand: what would they say if Ireland or Norway tried to make similar demands of the UK that the UK is making of the EU? And by the way, every county in the UK gets to have a vote on the final arrangement (per Wallonia throwing a spanner in the works of the EU-Canada deal).

Re:Glad they won't be in the EU for much longer

[thegarbz]

which was promptly grounded by the Australian Civil Aviation regulator a month later on the grounds of 'safety'

Safety, sans quotes, and there was nothing prompt about it. Ansett's fleet had been deteriorating majorly under the American control of News Corp (that should have been the first clue). They started dropping off the preferred flyer list of many companies long before being bought out by Air New Zealand. This was a spectacular case of lack of due diligence and lack of forethought, buying a company it couldn't afford with an ancient fleet that had high running costs, and the grounding? Well they were told to show cause as to why they missed their legal inspection requirements, they prepared an accepted plan to inspect the plans and then were grounded when the first 4 inspected showed signs of cracking in the wings.

I'm sorry you feel personally attacked by Australia that Ansett was grounded after the American portion was sold to New Zealand (like anyone here gave a crap). But really get a bit of a clue.

More recently, just months after a new agreement had been reached by the two governments on creating a pathway to citizenship for NZers currently stuck in an immigration no-mans land (due to continual erosion of the free movement provisions that were previously agreed) the Australian government announced new changes that put a whole new bunch of kiwis into a new no mans land. Basically they gave with one hand while pulling the rug with the other.

Except no new people are in no-mans-land. The people who were on SCVs now qualify for citizenship. The fact that the timeline for this has been extended slightly doesn't put you anymore in no mans land then you were before. But I suppose you would like it if nothing was done at all and you can permanently be excluded from citizenship?

With China things were not so bad

That just shows your bias towards what you think is bad vs what free trade actually accomplishes. By freely trading with a country that has lower standards than yourself you effectively sell your future to them. Profits, manufacturing, investment, everything starts heading to the other country. It's worth remembering why there's restrictions to trade in the first place.

You say things aren't so bad with China and you compare it to a story of Apples, a botched acquisition of a struggling airline in one of the toughest times for the industry, and a general improvement in rights for NZers in Australia, holy shit do you have a surprise coming.

Re:Glad they won't be in the EU for much longer

[myowntrueself]

Brexit seems more and more like a positive thing for each day that passes. By the time May is done Australia will be sending its delinquents over there instead.

No one is happier that the English voted to leave the EU than the Europeans.

The old Commonwealth countries are going to be highly bemused at the UK coming to them, cap in hand, for some sweet trade deals since, after the UK marginalised the commonwealth those guys have gone and made other trade deals with their (closer) neighbors. The English are about to get a nice lesson in their place in the modern world (and it isn't Empire).

Leave it to the UK

[Notabadguy]

Leave it to the UK to treat the movie "Minority Report" as a template to governance.

Laws are as written not as intended

[Anonymous Coward]

FTA "However, the new law will most likely target individuals and groups making a business out of selling illegal content,"

No, it will be used against average people if prosecutors find it in their interest. It simply becomes another tool in the toolbox. Just like terrorism laws. I am willing to bet that anti-terrorism laws are used far more often to elevate ordinary crimes (or even non-crimes) than they are used to prosecute genuine acts or threats of terrorism. I had a family member sit as a juror on a trial where a disgruntled employee making a drunken threatening phone call to a boss was charged with "Conveying a terrorist threat."

Kill someone 3 yrs, watch Frozen 10 yrs

[Anonymous Coward]

So lets get this right, you watch something illegal and get 10 yrs. Kill someone and get 7 yrs and out in 3 yrs for good behaviour.

Such BS...

[PortHaven]

Here I have a bunch of digital films. These are films I have bought the digital rights to. I have a phone and a mini-projector. Apparently, I am no longer allowed to stream content from phone to external device. Excuse me?

WTF???

So at this point, I am nearly ready to capitulate and start just pirating movies as it's so much !@#$% easier than dealing with the legitimate channels.

Quid Pro Quo for Rupert Murdoch

[Martin S.]

Rupert Murdoch has been propping up a lame Government with his Satellite channel Sky (thing Faux News) and the Sun (think national enquirer). This anti-competitive law is his reward.

Ascent of Fascism in 21st Century Britian

[Martin S.]

This article outlines what fascism is, how it is growing in the 21st Century United Kingdom, how it has nothing to offer working people and how we can combat it.

https://libcom.org/thought/fas...

Re:Leading the way to a police state: Trump will h

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, it only took 17 minutes before someone could find a way to whine about Trump. In an article about streaming movies in the UK.

Why do you think this would change anything?

[Opportunist]

Ask yourself: 2 years of prison. Imagine this, just for a moment.

Now imagine 10 years of prison.

Now answer me one question: Do 10 years of prison really scare you more than 2 years? Does it? If so, you probably already know what prison is like and only worry about losing more time of your life. For everyone how hasn't, probably the threat of spending a DAY with hardened criminals is already scary enough to make them ponder.

Does anyone honestly think that the average copyright infringer's train of thought goes "For 2 years I'll watch that show, but for 10, hell no!"?

The legal system of Airstrip One

[Applehu Akbar]

Gen years for downloading g a file? That's a lot more than burglars in the U.K. get, though not as much as a homeowner who injures a burglar by resisting.

Re:The legal system of Airstrip One

[Applehu Akbar]

The American ability to shoot back also inhibits recidivism. The British online press is full of home invasion stories that often involve torture for the hell of it, and invariably by criminals with a long record of predation.

Re:The legal system of Airstrip One

[dave420]

So much bullshit. Sooo much bullshit.

Burn out their eyes!

[santax]

That will teach them to not become pirates or witches! When they have no eyes, they can not watch our Holy Movies without a ticket! On topic: for the last 20 to 15 years for the first time in history we are witnessing a deterioration of the human state and human states. Fought for freedoms have been lost and while media has become much faster and could be much more powerful, we see that a lot of media is actually knowingly or unknowingly part of a propaganda-machinery and most of them are no more than vehicles to deliver commercials to the viewer. These are harsh times. A modern black age.

Sorry, but that's a bit naive

[Weaselmancer]

There is nuance, the maximum prison term has increased but it doesn't mean you will get 10 years for watching your favorite TV series on a illegal streaming website. Judges are not complete morons, and when minor copyright cases go to judgment, the sentence typically ends up being a reasonable fine.

I believe the point isn't what should happen with these laws, it's what can.

Here in the US we have the DMCA, which was intended to keep people from copying movies. And is now currently being used by John Deere to keep anyone other than John Deere from fixing tractors.

You have to consider when you make a legal ruling that is broad exactly how it might be abused. If it is possible to get 10 years for watching TV illegally, you know that someone will get 10 years for it eventually. Judges are like any other group of people. Gather a few dozen together and it's a safe bet at least one will be an asshole.

Re:Sorry, but that's a bit naive

[Anonymous Coward]

It may or may not be a thing in the UK (I really don't know), but in the US having lots of laws with ridiculous maximum punishments for minor offenses has become an established way to ensure that anyone a prosecutor decides he or she doesn't like can be forced to plea-bargain into a criminal conviction. Often the people prosecutors don't like are people who have committed real crimes that can't be pinned on them, but it could also be someone the prosecutor truly believes committed a crime, but didn't. And with that kind of power, it certainly starts getting tempting to use it against your political enemies, or your ex-wife's new boyfriend, or to get your conviction rate up so you look better, etc.

Nabbing Al Capone for tax evasion was a good way to get a dangerous criminal out of power, but it set a terrible precedent.

Re:Sorry, but that's a bit naive

[Aighearach]

The situation with John Deere is exactly what the DMCA was supposed to do.

Just because you only paid attention to the part about filesharing doesn't mean anything.

Protecting proprietary commercial services from trespass was exactly the point of the parts of it that John Deere makes use of.

IMO it is a good thing because it prevents them from mixing their proprietary crap with the open stuff that I use. They stay on their side, I stay on my side. No embracing, no extending, no problems. If the customer does even a tiny bit of research they'll learn that they can't use a regular mechanic if they buy that brand, and they'll either be happy about that, or not. And they'll buy it, or not.

Re:Sorry, but that's a bit naive

[BlueStrat]

You have to consider when you make a legal ruling that is broad exactly how it might be abused. If it is possible to get 10 years for watching TV illegally, you know that someone will get 10 years for it eventually. Judges are like any other group of people. Gather a few dozen together and it's a safe bet at least one will be an asshole.

I'll just leave this here.

"Did you really think we want those laws observed?" said Dr. Ferris. "We want them to be broken. You'd better get it straight that it's not a bunch of boy scouts you're up against... We're after power and we mean it... There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws. Who wants a nation of law-abiding citizens? What's there in that for anyone? But just pass the kind of laws that can neither be observed nor enforced or objectively interpreted - and you create a nation of law-breakers - and then you cash in on guilt. Now that's the system, Mr. Reardon, that's the game, and once you understand it, you'll be much easier to deal with." - Atlas Shrugged - Ayn Rand

Strat

Please start all yro post with country of origin!

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, editors: Comments on news laws are meaningless with a description of where they apply.