Since the recent passage of the government's problematic Internet lockdown bill
C-11, old media conglomerates have been dreaming up ways to
put it to use in their quest to protect out-dated business models. This
is very reminiscent of Canada's big telecom companies who tried to impose a pay-meter on the
Internet use of all Canadians in an effort to prevent us from
cutting our TV subscriptions in favour of online video.
In this case these old media bureaucracies are trying to get
Internet service providers to pass along the private online information
of Canadians they accuse of violating copyright rules. What a good way
to scare us away from using the Internet as source of content.
The media conglomerates appear to be targeting independent Internet
service providers. First it was Teksavvy who took some
measures to push back against media company Voltage. You can see my
posts on that case here
and here.
Now it's Distributel,
an independent internet service provider, who is being asked by NGN
Prima Productions to turn over our online information.
NGN Prima, and co-plaintiff Riding Films Inc., said in
mid-January that they want Distributel and two other ISPs to reveal the
identities of the ISPs' customers who purportedly infringed the film
companies' copyrights. If that motion is successful, Distributel and
the others will be compelled to reveal the customers' names and
addresses.
Distributel is thankfully formally
opposing the motion seeking the disclosure of subscriber
information.
Distributel has suggested that the media conglomerates are
targeting the customers of smaller ISPs. This is the second time
Distributel customer identities have been sought in addition to the
Teksavvy case mentioned above. Teksavvy is seeking costs of $190,000
for the process they been force to take part in so far, and there's
much more to go.
Canada's big telecom giants appear to getting a free ride for
the time being. Maybe that's because they have common cause with the
media companies (most of Canada's big telecom giants have their own
content assets) in their view of the Internet ecosystem as a threat to
their legacy businesses in TV, radio and content in general.
As I've said before, if Bill C-11 was meant to discourage
these attacks on citizens, as was claimed
by MPs behind the bill, then the government should clearly articulate
what a content company can and cannot do in this regard. Since Canada
is one of the few countries that adds a monetary penalty for
non-commercial infringement, then why not just remove that part of C-11
entirely? Should we really give giant media conglomerates an extra
financial incentive to seek our private information?
These activities cost us in privacy and they add new costs to
our Internet services. These costs will grow substantially if Canada
doesn't oppose the Trans
Pacific Partnership's (TPP) new Internet restrictions during
negotiations (Canada is bound by the outcome of the TPP agreement).
Distributel
is on the front lines of this issue at the moment and they've shown
they'll stand up for Canadians when push comes to shove. Anyone who's
using one of the big telecom companies for Internet access should
switch to Distributel or another independent provider. If not for the
cost savings, then for your own right to privacy.
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