Five major Australian internet service providers (ISPs) — iiNet, Internode, Primus, Optus and Telstra — have released a proposal for dealing with online piracy. It’s an education-based scheme that doesn’t force ISPs to cut off customers accused of piracy by movie studios, but there’s a way to go before it becomes reality.
ISPs have resisted an ongoing push by the entertainment industry to make providers primarily responsible for enforcing copyright laws against people who download movies and TV shows via torrents. The general argument is that making ISPs responsible for activities conducted by their users would be like holding a phone company responsible if two burglars plan a robbery on a mobile call. That view has generally been supported by the courts, but it’s clear that without some kind of system in place, brawls over the issue will continue — via redwolf.newsvine.com