A Court of Appeal has ordered The Pirate Bay and streaming portal Swefilmer to be blocked by an ISP in Sweden. The landmark ruling, in favor of Universal Music, Sony Music, Warner Music, and the Swedish film industry, will see local ISP Bredbandsbolaget forced to block the sites for the next three years.

In 2014, Universal Music, Sony Music, Warner Music, Nordisk Film and the Swedish Film Industry teamed up in a lawsuit designed to force Swedish ISP Bredbandsbolaget (Broadband Company) to block The Pirate Bay and streaming portal Swefilmer.

In a move that was to irk the ISP, the rightsholders argued that Bredbandsbolaget should be held liable for the infringements of the ‘pirate’ sites, if it refused to block them.

In response, Bredbandsbolaget dug in its heels while insisting that its only role is to provide subscribers with unfettered access to the Internet. The upholding (or otherwise) of this concept would be a landmark moment for all Swedish ISPs.

The case went to trial at the Stockholm District Court during October 2015. Considering the outcomes of similar cases against ISPs elsewhere in Europe, Bredbandsbolaget was expected to lose. Instead, however, the ISP won its case, with the District Court ruling that when Bredbandsbolaget facilitated access to The Pirate Bay, that did not amount to participation in a crime under Swedish law.

Soon after, the defeated rightsholders filed an appeal. The case was heard again last September, running for several days at the brand new Patent and Market Court of Appeal. Today the Court made its decision and it’s bad news for the ISP and by extension other ISPs and their collective customers.

In a ruling handed down minutes ago, the Court overruled the earlier ruling of the District Court and ordered Bredbandsbolaget to implement “technical measures” to prevent its customers accessing the ‘pirate’ sites through a number of domain names and URLs.

The Court found that under EU law it is possible for copyright holders to obtain an injunction against ISPs whose services are used to commit copyright infringement, even if the ISP only provides its customers with Intenet access. It found that the Swedish Copyright Act should be interpreted “in the light of EU law.”

The Court also considered whether such a blocking injunction would be proportional. In this respect, it found that since the content being made available via The Pirate Bay and Swefilmer is primarily copyright protected and distributed illegally, then an injunction would be an appropriate response.

“In today’s judgment, the Patent and Market Court held that right holders such as film and music companies can obtain a court order in Sweden against an ISP, which forces the ISP to take measures to prevent copyright infringement committed by others on the Internet,” Court of Appeals Judge Christine Lager said in a statement.

“The decision is based in EU law and Swedish Law should be interpreted in the light of EU law. Similar injunctions have already been announced, such as in Denmark, Finland, France and the UK, but the verdict today is the first of its kind in Sweden.”

The injunction has a time limit of three and years and has a penalty of $56,000 if the ISP fails to comply. The verdict can not be appealed.

“It is a dangerous path to go down, which forces Internet providers to monitor and evaluate content on the Internet and block websites with illegal content in order to avoid becoming accomplices,” Bredbandsbolaget and fellow ISP Telenor warned in an earlier statement.

“We don’t think that tougher legislation and blocking requirements are an effective way to stop the illegal distribution of copyrighted works on the Internet.”

While the current injunction covers just two sites, this ruling opens the floodgates to rightsholders looking to block potentially hundreds of sites.

Source: Torrentfreak.com

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