The European Commission recently published wide proposals to reform copyright law. One particular concern is that the proposals appear to reduce the existing legal protections for sites that host third party content. Under the current e-Commerce Directive, such sites are generally protected from liability until they are informed of allegedly infringing content (Article 14), and […]
Tag: Copyright
Posts relating to copyright: mostly the obligations that may be placed on intermediaries to deal with breaches of it
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Apples and Oranges
In discussions of the “Right to be Forgotten” it is often observed that Google manages each month to deal with tens of millions of delisting requests for breach of copyright, as opposed to tens of thousands for inaccurate personal data. Often the implication seems to be that those numbers should be more similar. However it […]
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Ofcom Copyright Infringement Research
Over the past year, Ofcom have commissioned a series of research studies into online copyright infringement. They and the Intellectual Property Office (IPO) held a workshop to present the results of these and other studies and to consider what continuing research is needed to provide an evidence base for future policy in the area of […]
I’ve just submitted a response to the Intellectual Property Office on their proposed amendments to the education exemptions to UK copyright law. These aim to extend the same permissions for distance learning as currently apply to the premises of an educational establishment. From Janet’s point of view as operator of a network and an access management […]
I’ve been looking at the Intellectual Property Office’s proposals to update copyright exemptions for education, to see if there’s anything I need to comment on. My initial observations are as follows, but I’d be very grateful for comments if I’ve missed something. I’m not an expert on copyright exemptions or education licensing, but I am […]
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Blocking “Internet locations”
I had a meeting with Ofcom this morning as part of their review of section 17 of the Digital Economy Act 2010. That section, if enabled by the Secretary of State, would allow courts to order a service provider “to prevent its service being used to gain access to [an Internet] location”. This power could […]
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Nominet Domain Suspension Paper
Nominet have published an interesting analysis of the legal issues around any possible process for suspending domains associated with criminal activity. This raises the rather worrying issue that the legal position is not clear if a registry is informed of unlawful conduct somewhere in their domain and decides that the evidence is not strong enough […]
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DEA progress report
The Chief Executive of OFCOM, Ed Richards, gave evidence to the House of Commons Culture, Media and Sport Committee last week, in which he reported on progress on the copyright enforcement and web blocking parts of the Digital Economy Act 2010. He first confirmed that the Initial Obligations Code was completed and passed to the […]
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DNS Filtering: Good or Bad?
With various Governments looking at the Domain Name Service (DNS) as a tool to implement national policy (for example the USA’s SOPA and PIPA proposals) Rod Rasmussen’s talk at the FIRST conference was a timely reminder of the possible problems with this approach. DNS is a critical part of the Internet, providing the conversion between […]
My talk at Networkshop looked at some of the changes going on in the law, especially in the measures that those who operate parts of the Internet are expected or required to take to help deal with unlawful activities on line. The law recognises a couple of general roles: Internet Access Providers who provide Internet […]