In this guest column, Jim Killock of the Open Rights Group explains why minister Ed Vaizey is wrong to consider plans for blocking websites.
Website blocking is being discussed by ministers in the UK Government to deal with the supposed scourge of illicit downloads.
Last year, the Digital Economy Act sought to create legal powers for website blocking and disconnection of users following allegations of copyright infringement.
However, the Act has run into extraordinary trouble, being well over six months behind schedule. And it’s facing potentially years more delay if it’s referred to the European Union courts, so copyright lobby groups have turned their efforts to so-called ‘voluntary’ website blocking.
There are already two long-established legal routes to take for blocking websites that are involved in copyright infringement. Nevertheless, rights holder lobby groups are asking the Government to persuade ISPs to block sites through private arrangements.
Private schemes like this are unaccountable to the public and are extremely difficult to subject to legal examination. They’re an attempt to place public law enforcement – censorship and the blocking of published material – into private hands and remove the need for accountability and respect for individual rights.
There’s also a simple practical question. Finding new ways to infringe copyright is trivial. Creating incentives to make infringement more difficult to detect will simply provoke a Darwinian evolutionary struggle. And, frankly, in that battle, it’s likely that the mice, rather than the lumbering lizards, will win.
Which brings us back to the real question: how do we make sure that the music and film industries adapt to today’s not-so-new digital environment? The issue here is about listening to customers, which only the industry itself can do.
Providing false hopes, like the Digital Economy Act, and discussions about private website censors just reduces the incentive for the industry to get on and generate compelling new services.
We also have a job to do with our elected representatives. They need to know that censorship and site blocks are heavy-handed and inappropriate. You can write to your MP via the Open Rights Group website.
Jim Killock is executive director of the Open Rights Group, which campaigns to defend freedom of expression, privacy, innovation, consumer rights and creativity on the internet.
