Here's a story on the BBC, that, following a successful Norwich Pharmacal application in March, the rightsholders (one hopes...?) in a series of pornographic films are to contact individuals suspected of having uploaded the content in question, to extract some money from them.
(You can read the judgment granting the order here, but it's one of Arnold J's now pretty common lengthy judgments!)
The producer of the content in question claims, rather reasonably, that, whilst someone who downloads a mainstream film may be using it as a quality testing process before going to the cinema, and thus supporting production in that way, pornographic content does not have the same alternatives for reaching an audience, and thus a download is less likely to lead to revenue.
It's still apparent to me that, under English law, there is nothing to indicate that one should be liable for another's use of their Internet connection (at least, in terms of a duty to prevent — if one were to authorise the infringement, then liability as a primary infringer under copyright law might be made out) and that, in any case, the only "evidence" is an IP address purporting to indicate that the traffic originated from a machine behind a given router, and says nothing about the individual in question. For those in houses with multiple occupants, proving who downloaded (or uploaded) the content is likely to be very difficult.
The second notable aspect here is that, perhaps following the ACS:Law fiasco, the court has approved the wording of the letter which is to be sent out — with certain phrases watered down or removed, it seems. This seems more than appropriate, as the ACS:Law letters were, in my opinion (having advised on the response to one of the letters), bullying and aggressive — a view seemingly shared with Arnold J.
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