KickAss Torrents is Never Coming Back to Ireland Unless...

There's a saying from the Princess Bride: "It'll take a miracle!" Feel free to apply that sentiment to the possibility of KickAss Torrents, or KAT, returning to Ireland any time soon. Only two conditions will bring it back, a collapse of the political/judicial system, or, a court order reversing a prior December 2013 decision forcing several Irish ISPs (eircom was not a party) to block the BitTorrent indexer. Of course, there's always TOR or other such circumvention (like Proxy KAT or Pirate Proxy), but for the masses, this block is a full out assault on the concept of free speech.

Of course, such a ruling would never happen in the United States. Rather, courts like to just levy massive civil judgments against BitTorrent indexers (or other file-sharing sites) in order to achieve the same effect. Because as you know, using copyright law to chill speech is acceptable in America, but never a direct assault on the First Amendment.

eircom's "voluntary" block of KickAss Torrents wasn't so voluntary. As other IPSs tried, but ultimately failed, to secure uninterrupted passage to whatever BitTorrent website their customers wished, eircom saw the writing on the wall and realized they were in a no win situation. From eircom:

"The High Court order requires UPC, Vodafone, Digiweb, Hutchison 3G and Telefonica Ireland to block access by their subscribers to the KAT website. eircom and Meteor were not listed in the High Court Order as eircom, Meteor, Magnet, Sky and Imagine Telecommunications all indicated in correspondence with the music companies they would block the KAT websites voluntarily provided the court made an order to that effect against any ISP. As the High Court has made such an order eircom and Meteor together with other ISPs are now blocking access to the KAT websites in accordance with the commitments they have given to the music companies."

That statement from eircom represents the insurmountable legal challenge that KickAss Torrents and The Pirate Bay (also ordered blocked) face in Ireland. One would, in effect, have to mount a legal challenge to reverse that order. We're no masters of Irish law, but to say the least, without a free speech recourse, the chances of that happening are slim.

In correspondence with eircom's Director of Corporate Affairs, Slyck discussed bandwidth management in general and the the extent of eircom's blocking. At current, eircom claims no throttling or adjustments to the BitTorrent protocol itself, while indicating a limited scope of blocking.

"We don’t throttle or manage bandwidth for torrent sites. We only block access to sites when instructed by court order or it is clear that a court order will be granted. We do not throttle."

With only KickAss Torrent and The Pirate Bay ordered blocked, one might be inclined to think, "Wow, it's just two sites!" But really, those two sites are two of the most popular BitTorrent indexers around. And also, if I were a music industry lawyer, I would be preparing a list of every BitTorrent website I could find and make the same argument as I did for KickAss Torrents and The Pirate Bay. The flood gates for BitTorrent blocking in Ireland is open, and with little in the way to stop the music industry, this could be just the beginning.