me*dia*or

Join consumer advocates, MPs, prominent academics, and others in an open letter to the House of Lords criticizing recent proposal to amend the Digital Economy Bill in order force ISPs to proactively block websites suspected of copyright infringement.

A number of UK ISPs have joined forces with consumer advocacy groups, prominent academics, filmmakers, actors, and even websites eBay, Facebook, Yahoo, and Google to forge an open letter to the House of Lords criticizing the recent proposal to amend the Digital Economy Bill.

Amendment 120a, as written, would use the threat of “injunctions” against those ISPs that have “actual knowledge of another person using their service to infringe copyright,” but has failed to “prevent copyright infringement content being accessed at or via that online location or taken reasonable steps to remove copyright infringing content from that online location (or both).”

What it doesn’t spell out is exactly how ISPs are supposed to verify claims of copyright infringement (a new ISP detective bureau?) or the means of appeal. Some site operators may be falsely accused of copyright infringement and subsequently erroneously sanctioned by their ISP.

It’s already been observed that it would cause a “chilling effect” on the Internet, but these signatories add that it would “have unintended consequences that far outweigh any benefits it could bring.”

“Put simply, blocking access as envisaged by this clause would both widely disrupt the internet in the UK and elsewhere and threaten freedom of speech and the open internet, without reducing copyright infringement as intended,” they add.

In fact, they argue that the amendment threatens the “reputation of the UK as a place to do online business and conflict(s) with the broader objectives of Digital Britain.”

The signatories include:

• Tom Alexander,Chief Executive, Orange
• Richard Allan,Director of Policy EU, Facebook
• Neil Berkett,Chief Executive, Virgin Media
• Matt Brittin,Managing Director, Google UK and Ireland
• Charles Dunstone,Chairman, Talk Talk Group
• Stephen Fry
• Jessica Hendrie-Liaño,Chair, Internet Services Providers Association
• Jill Johnstone,International Director, Consumer Focus
• Jim Killock,Executive Director, Open Rights Group
• Mark Lewis,Managing Director, eBay UK
• Ian Livingston,Chief Executive, BT Group
• Sarah Oates,University of Glasgow
• Jenny Pickerill,University of Leicester
• Mark Rabe,Managing Director, Yahoo! UK and Ireland
• Paul Reilly,University of Leicester
• Jess Search,Founder, Shooting People independent film makers
• Ian Walden,Queen Mary, University of London
• Tom Watson MP

The real problem with the amendment is that it could shutter websites with merely the threat of action since there’s no mechanism to make a case or even appeal the findings. All one has to do is be accused of copyright infringement to run afoul of the law.

Stay tuned.

jared@zeropaid.com