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Archive for the ‘Denmark’ Category

Internet Freedom under pressure in Denmark: “

On 27 May the Danish Supreme Court upheld a lower court decision which obliges internet service providers (ISPs) to block access to websites that may contain – or link to other sites which contain – material which infringes copyrights (the Pirate Bay in this instance).

The decision has rightly been criticized as a setback for internet freedom in Denmark. The decision attaches undue weight to the interests of copyright holders while ignoring obvious dangers of abuse, restrictions on internet freedom and access to information and the lack of any due process. The decision may lead to the blocking of websites that mainly includes content that does not infringe copyright and thus restrict the free flow of information. Moreover, by forcing ISP’s to police the Internet without due process the decision marks a dangerous precedent that is likely to include other ‘illegal’ or ‘offensive’ material in the future.

The Supreme Court’s decision is only the latest instance of a wider trend towards internet regulation in Denmark (ranked as the country with the freest press in the world by Reporters Without Borders).

In 2005 The Danish police set up the so-called Child Pornography Filter in co-operation with the Danish NGO Red Barnet (Save the Child). When Red Barnet and the Police identify web-sites that contain child pornography the police informs ISPs and request them to block access to these sites with no prior warning or hearing. The sites blocked by the filter are kept confidential by the police. In 2008 Wikileaks leaked all the sites blocked by the filter which seemed to show that several sites were either inactive or contained material that had nothing to do with child pornography.

Earlier in 2010 the Danish parliament (Folketinget) passed a law, which will allow the tax authorities to notify ISPs of web sites operated by ‘unauthorized’ providers of online-gambling. ISPs will then be requested to block access to such sites. Should the relevant ISPs refuse or fail to do so they will be subject to criminal liability. No courts or tribunals will review the decisions of the tax-authorities nor will the owners of the relevant websites be heard prior to a decision. It is an open question whether this law violates the Danish constitution’s prohibition against censorship and/or the European Convention on Human Rights’ protection of freedom of expression and access to information.

Several Danish lawmakers have proposed wide ranging restrictions on Internet access. Earlier in 2010 the Socialist Peoples’ Part proposed criminalizing surfing on ‘terror related web sites’ and the Danish Peoples’ Party has twice proposed banning www.psychedlica.dk a website dedicated to sharing information about drugs. According to media reports the Danish governments has also been very active in keeping the ongoing Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) negotiations confidential. According to leaks from the ACTS negotiations the current ACTA draft envisages intrusive measures likely to threaten internet freedom and the right to privacy.

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(Via Global Voices Advocacy.)

(Via TorrentFreak.)

Danish Pirate Bay Block Sets Sail for Supreme Court: “

A Danish appeals body has accepted a petition from Telenor to take a High Court decision ordering it to block The Pirate Bay, to the Supreme Court.

‘We are pleased that we now have the opportunity to find out whether it is Internet Service Providers responsibility to ensure the closure of a website,’ said Telenor’s regulatory chief Nicholai Kramer Pfeiffer.

Referring to the court’s decision last year ordering it to block the world’s largest tracker, Pfeiffer added, ‘We have always been highly skeptical when we receive subpoenas in this type of case.’

Pfeiffer told Computerworld that he believes taking the case to the Supreme Court will result in a clearer picture for those dealing with these types of cases (blocking sites) in the future. ‘We seek a clarification of whether we have a responsibility to help the stuff flowing through our networks, as we have no commercial interest in the individual sites,’ said Pfeiffer.

Pfeiffer also said that it makes ‘good sense’ to get as close as possible to the source of a problem. Indeed, if the Swedish authorities could close down The Pirate Bay, then there would be no need for Telenor to block anything at all, since there would be nothing to block.

Earlier this year Pirate Bay’s Peter Sunde told TorrentFreak that they are seriously considering suing the IFPI for unfair competition. ‘They have had a monopoly on distribution and we’re breaking that monopoly, and in turn they sue people that allow access to our distribution method,’ he told us at the time.

The IFPI is not scared of yet another confrontation. ‘Peter Sunde is welcome to sue us,’ Jesper Bay, the head of the Danish IFPI said when the news was announced. Ironically, one of the websites explaining how to get around the Danish blockade carries Jesper Bay’s name.

Post from: TorrentFreak

Danish ISPs to Fight the Pirate Bay Block

In a court case initiated by the IFPI, a Danish judge ruled last year that Tele2 had to block its users from accessing The Pirate Bay. IFPI argued that Tele2 was assisting in mass copyright infringement, and that access to the site therefore had to be blocked.

At the time, The Pirate Bay co-founder Brokep told TorrentFreak: ‘I hope the torrent community understands what this will do to Danish people. It will also act as a very bad precedent for the European Union, and I hope everybody will fight this.’

Unfortunately for the many Danish Pirate Bay users, it got even worse. Last month TDC, Denmark’s largest ISP and owner of most of the cables, decided to block access to The Pirate Bay as a preventive measure. And now, a Danish court has ruled that all ISPs will have to do the same, or else they will face a hefty fine.

The ISPs, however, are not planning to accept the court order without a fight. TDC, Telia and Telenor have announced that they are going to appeal the decision, and they will take the case to the Supreme Court. One of their arguments is that they are not responsible for the potential copyright infringement of their subscribers.

‘Accessing The Pirate Bay is not in itself a violation of copyright,’ Jens Ottosen of Telia told dn.se. ‘We make access possible for our subscribers, and they have to decide if it is illegal. It is not our task. If so, we also contribute to illegalities on YouTube, Myspace and Google. It is completely cluttered,’ said Ottosen, who is also Chairman of the Danish telecom industry.

Indeed, this case is about more than just The Pirate Bay, it is about censoring the Internet. Will YouTube with all its copyright infringing content be next on the list? Despite the argument whether it is fair to block a BitTorrent site or not, it is completely ineffective. It is fairly easy to circumvent, and all the publicity will only drive the traffic figures up.

Wikileaks tells Wikinews why they published Danish child porn censorship list – Wikinews, the free news source

From Wikinews, the free news source you can write!

Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Wikileaks has obtained and released a list of all 3,863 websites that are being censored by Danish Internet Service Providers as of February 2008. The system is used to filter out child pornography, although Wikileaks points out it “can be used to censor anything” and claims “most sites on the list are still censored (i.e must be on the current list), even though many have clearly changed owners or were possibly even wrongly placed on the list.”

Wikinews was able to contact Wikileaks. We discussed the unusual leak with them, and the results are published here.

We asked if Wikileaks was worried about the criminal implications of linking to so much illegal content, but they were not. They said that it was “politically untenable” to prosecute them, pointing out that Wikileaks is hosted in many different countries across the globe.

We asked them if they were “concerned about the possibility of censorship in the UK, Denmark, Finland etc.?” “No,” Wikileaks told us “We welcome it.” Wikinews wondered if this was because of the Streisand effect, but Wikileaks said it was “because it will demonstrate how censorship systems are abused.”

Wikinews asked Wikileaks why they didn’t simply post a list of the sites which they felt were legal and add that all the others contained child porn, but Wikileaks felt “that would not be a fair representation of the material we obtained.” After seeking clarification, Wikinews was told “the question is not what we need to be told. The question is what we need not to be told and who decides. Secret censorship systems are unaccountable and dangerous.”

Wikinews then asked why they didn’t leave the full list available, but mark which sites they felt should not be censored. “We have better things to do,” was the response given. So how would Wikileaks suggest dealing with child porn?

“Block financial transactions after due process. It’s easy to set up servers. It is not so easy to set up merchant accounts.” And what would due process be? “Due process would involve sending a letter to the owner of the merchant account with the accusation and giving them a right to be heard and an appeal process. The banks are politically a lot more powerful than the internet industry so this hasn’t happened.”

And should funds in these accounts be seized straight away, or simply frozen until a judge or similar clears their release? “If the accounts are in-jurisdiction, they should be frozen and released or not at the end of the process. There are plenty of existing mechanisms to do this for drug trafficking, for example.”

Wikileaks then added “As an analogy, one might argue that everyone should have a loaded gun in the house to protect themselves against home invasions. This seems perfectly reasonable; however experience has shown that once the gun is in the house, it will find other targets.

Denmark: 3863 sites on censorship list, Feb 2008 – Wikileaks: “Denmark: 3863 sites on censorship list, Feb 2008″

WIKILEAKS PRESS RELEASE Tue Dec 23 01:15:59 GMT 2008

“Denmark: 3863 sites on secret censorship list”

Wikileaks has released the secret Internet censorship list for Denmark. The list contains 3863 sites blocked by Danish ISPs participating in Denmark’s censorship scheme as of February 2008. Danish ISPs “volunteer” to censor their users rather than face legislation and the top three ISPs are particpants.

The system can be used to censor anything, but is meant to be for child pornography sites found by the Danish police and the Danish “Save the Children” group.

The list is generated without judicial or public oversight and is kept secret by the ISPs using it. Unaccountability is intrinsic to such a secret censorship system.

Most sites on the list are still censored (i.e must be on the current list), even though many have clearly changed owners or were possibly even wrongly placed on the list.

The list has been leaked because cases such as Thailand and Finland demonstrate that once a secret censorship system is established for pornographic content the same system can rapidly expand to cover other material, including political material, at the worst possible moment — when government needs reform.

Two days ago Wikileaks released the secret Internet censorship list for Thailand. Of the 1,203 sites censored this year, all have the internally noted reason of “lese majeste” — criticizing the Royal family. Like Denmark, the Thai censorship system was originally promoted as a mechanism to prevent the flow of child pornography.

The Danish filter is maintained by the National High Tech Crime Center of the Danish National Police and Save the Children Denmark. The police department is led by Peter Carpentier, and can be reached by phone: +45 33 14 88 88. The Save the Children-project is led by Kuno Soerensen, +45 25 14 00 69.

The list can be independently tested by any customer of a participating Danish ISP by visiting the URLs of the sites listed. If the customer is presented with a “STOP!” page, the site is still listed in the filter.

Post from: TorrentFreak

Pirate Bay Censorship Case Not Over Yet

Earlier this year a Danish court ordered the ISP ‘Tele2′ to block its customers from accessing The Pirate Bay. The appeal of this initial ruling was lost two weeks ago, but the case is far from over. Tele2 has decided to appeal the decision before the Supreme Court, supported by Denmark’s telecommunications industry association.

The case in question is a unique one that has already generated a heated debate on the liabilities of Internet service providers. According to the court’s decision, Tele2 was infringing copyright on a grand scale, because users were transferring pirated material, copied (like all traffic) via the ISP’s routers.

Consequently the court ruled that access to The Pirate Bay had to be blocked. Tele2 appealed this decision, but lost again two weeks ago.

The court case was initiated by the IFPI – the infamous anti-piracy organization that represents the recording industry. The IFPI later tried to use the ‘landmark decision’ to force Swedish ISPs to do the same, but failed. In fact, it seems that filtering traffic to The Pirate Bay is actually illegal according to European law.

The fight is not over yet though. Since this case could have huge implications for other ISPs and websites, Tele2 has announced that it will take it all the way to the Supreme Court. Fortunately for them, they won’t be alone either. They are backed by the telecommunications industry association. Jens Ottosen, president of the association told Computerworld that, if this decision is upheld, Danish ISPs might be forced to block other sites as well.

In a response, Pirate Bay co-founder Peter Sunde told TorrentFreak: ‘We’re confident that Tele2 will win in the Supreme Court, when they [the court] really dig into the technology and try to understand the whole concept. It’s important for net neutrality and it’s also important for file sharers in Denmark to have this tried (and won).’

When the appeal is successful, The Pirate Bay will claim damages from IFPI. ‘I hope that they [Tele2] win so we can demand retribution from IFPI.’ Peter said. ‘As I’ve stated earlier we would like them to have to pay damages to us. In that case we would help set up a fund for Danish aspiring musicians that in turn would release music using a Creative Commons license.’

The Supreme Court still has to accept the appeal before the case can go on. Despite the outcome, blocking The Pirate Bay didn’t have the effect that the IFPI was hoping for. On the contrary, traffic from Denmark went up, instead of down. However, this case is about more than just The Pirate Bay, it is about censoring the Internet.

(Via TorrentFreak.)

Danish ISP ordered again to block Pirate Bay: “

Landmark decision or just a needle prick?

Danish ISP Sonofon (part of Tele2) has once again been ordered by a Danish court to block the controversial Swedish BitTorrent site The Pirate Bay. The record industry represented by The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) calls it a landmark ruling and says the decision confirms the illegality of Pirate Bay.…

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(Via The Register – Public Sector.)

Post from: TorrentFreak

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ISP Must Continue to Block The Pirate Bay: “

In February 2008, a Danish court ordered the ISP Tele2 to block its customers from accessing The Pirate Bay. The controversial ruling was under appeal but today, in a move which will delight the IFPI, the High Court upheld the decision to force the ISP to stop its customers from accessing the world’s largest BitTorrent tracker.

The original court case to force Danish ISP Tele2 to block The Pirate Bay was initiated by the IFPI, the anti-piracy organization representing the worldwide recording industry. IFPI argued that Tele2 was assisting in mass copyright infringement, and that access to the site therefore had to be blocked.

At the time, The Pirate Bay co-founder Brokep told TorrentFreak: ‘I hope the torrent community understands what this will do to Danish people. It will also act as a very bad precedent for the European Union, and I hope everybody will fight this.’

In February, a Danish court sided with IFPI and ruled that Tele2 had assisted in copyright infringement because they give their customers access to The Pirate Bay, thereby copying copyrighted material in their routers.

The decision heated the debate on ISPs filtering the Internet, not least because it goes against European law, which states that ISPs are not responsible for the traffic their users generate. Nonetheless, IFPI booked an initial success in forcing Tele2 to block the site on a DNS level.

However, at this stage, all was not lost. Traffic to the site only increased as a result of the publicity generated by the block, and the decision was subject to a Tele2 appeal. The Pirate Bay also promised that if Tele2 subsequently won, they would claim compensation and use the money to fund aspiring Danish artists who make music and release it for free.

The result of the appeal was announced just a short time ago, and it is not good news for the Swedish tracker, Tele2, and potentially other ISPs who desperately do not want to become unpaid ‘Internet policemen’. The High Court upheld the decision to force Tele2 to continue the DNS level block on The Pirate Bay, so that its customers cannot access the site.

This isn’t the first time a Danish ISP has been ordered to censor the Internet. In December 2006 a court ruled against Tele2 in a similar case, ordering the ISP to block access to Allofmp3.com. According to the ruling, Tele2 was willingly infringing copyright if their customers use AllofMP3 to download music.

At the time of the initial decision in February, the IFPI threatened that if it was successful and Tele2 lost its appeal, it would take further steps to force other ISPs to start blocking The Pirate Bay too. Jesper Bay, the head of the Danish IFPI told Computer World today that he expects other ISPs to follow suit, and block access to The Pirate Bay as well.

Whether or not Tele2 will appeal the decision at the Supreme Court is not known yet. More on this pivotal breaking news as we get it.

Muslim cartoon case fails to reach Denmark’s top court: “Muslim cartoon case fails to reach Denmark’s top court
AFP
Published: Tuesday, October 21, 2008

COPENHAGEN – Denmark’s justice ministry rejected Tuesday a bid by seven Muslim lobby groups to take the Jyllands-Posten to the Supreme Court for publishing controversial cartoons of Prophet Muhammed.

The Danish newspaper caused a furore in September 2005 when it published the cartoons, triggering anti-Danish protests in several Muslim countries.

One of the 12 cartoons portrayed Muhammed as a terrorist wearing a bomb-shaped turban.”

The judicial commission, which decides if cases can be heard by the Supreme Court, rejected the groups’ claim without giving reasons. It was the third attempt by the group to take the case to the Supreme Court.

The case had already been defeated in Denmark’s Court of Appeal in June this year, which upheld a lower court ruling from October 2006.

In its ruling, the Court of Appeal said the caricatures did not aim to insult followers of Islam, as the claimants alleged.

The court emphasized that “terrorist acts have been committed in the name of Islam, and it is not illegal for these acts to be made the object of satirical representation.”

The seven groups say they will continue their legal action by pursuing the case at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.

Post from: TorrentFreak

IFPI Wins Danish File-Sharing Case: “

A man who was tracked sharing over 13,000 music tracks on Direct Connect back in 2005 has lost his appeal. The Vestre Landsret, one of Denmark’s higher courts, has ordered the middle-aged man to pay $24,400 (160,000 kroner) in compensation.

As far as anti-piracy headlines go, the IFPI would prefer those coming from Denmark recently to be kept as quiet as possible. Back in September, Danish ISPs rejected the IFPI ‘3 strikes’ proposals and then the anti-piracy group lost two court cases where alleged file-sharers used the so-called ‘wireless defense’.

This week, however, the IFPI and Danish Antipiratgruppen achieved a small victory in the case of a middle-aged man from Aalborg who used Direct Connect (DC) to share around 13,000 music files in 2005.

According to a Comon.dk report, the IFPI/Antipiratgruppen tracked activity which it linked to an IP address registered to the man. Obviously – as in all such cases – it was not possible to positively identify the person at the keyboard simply via the IP address, but the man made some admissions in what appears to be a generally weak defense, and these seem to help seal his fate.

Having previously lost his case in the district court, the man appealed and the case went to the Vestre Landsret, one of Denmark’s highest courts.

The defendant claimed that he couldn’t figure out how to use Direct Connect but admitted visiting the software’s homepage, albeit on an old PC which dated back to the mid 1990’s. It was also made clear in court that the man did not operate any type of wireless network, eliminating a defense which proved successful in other cases.

The ruling from the Vestre Landsret which was announced yesterday morning, stated that the man was guilty of copyright infringement. ‘The Court held that no person other than him [the defendant] could have used the IP address, and therefore he was sentenced,’ said Antipiratgruppen lawyer, Maria Fred Lund.

The defendant was ordered to pay 160,000 kroner ($24,400) in damages, which was substantially less than the 440,000 kroner ($67,200) the anti-pirates wanted. He was also ordered to delete the music files he had obtained illegally.

Although the damages are less than the IFPI would’ve liked, the defendant’s lawyer, Per OverBech, says they could appeal to get the damages reduced. The court calculated the damages based on the losses estimated to have been suffered following the breach of copyright. The Vestre Landsret set an amount of 80,000 kroner ($12,200) and used the principle of ‘double-up’ to reach a final figure of 160,000 kroner ($24,400).

The ‘double up’ provision in Danish law is comprised of two parts. The first part covers the losses estimated to have been suffered following the breach of copyright. The court then doubles this amount to cover the actual losses and the documenting of such losses, which Antipiratgruppen and IFPI did not do.

‘It is worth noting that it certainly pays to deal critically with the requirements of Antipiratgruppen,’ said Per OverBech. ‘But in this case, the Vestre Landsret applied the principle of double-up, and I do not think there is reason for this,’ noting that Antipiratgruppen provided no evidence to prove that sales had declined due to the alleged file-sharing activities of his client.

OverBech admits that it is unlikely that he will achieve an acquittal for his client but could go to the Supreme Court to contest the ‘double up’ principle applied by Vestre Landsret.

Thanks Peter_Pan