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Swedish IP enforcer calls for web-blocking and domain seizing powers

By | Published on Tuesday 3 May 2016

The Pirate Bay

Sweden’s National Co-ordinator For IP Enforcement has called on the country’s government to introduce some of that trendy web-blocking, so that he can force internet service providers to block access to piracy websites. Paul Pintér also wants increased powers to seize the domain names of copyright infringing operations.

Web-blocking has become a preferred anti-piracy tactic in a number of countries, though in other jurisdictions a change in the law is still needed to enable rights owners to go this route. According to Torrentfreak, Pintér reckons that Sweden, home of The Pirate Bay, and of the most high profile of all the legal battles against the file-sharing site, now needs those laws.

Though his call for new powers to seize the domain names of piracy operations is perhaps more interesting. As previously reported, the authorities in Sweden have been trying to seize the Pirate Bay’s .se domain for some time, the piracy site having lost alternative domains in numerous other countries. But those efforts have been caught up in all sorts of legal wranglings that are still ongoing. Pintér’s proposals, submitted in a memorandum to ministers, would remove those legal problems in the future.

The push for web-blocking in Sweden comes as it has been revealed 330 websites have already been blocked in Portugal, where a government-instigated agreement between the content industries and the country’s ISPs enabled web-blocking just last summer. It makes Portugal home to some of the most rampant web-blocking by entertainment companies, though – as always – the impact of the anti-piracy measure remains limited by the fact it is usually pretty easy to circumvent the blockades, usually with the help of a trusty search engine.



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