Fergie's Tech Blog

Entertainment Industry: Treat our customers like terrorists!

Via Boing Boing.

The EU is rushing to enact a "data retention" directive that will make ISPs and phone carriers wiretap every bit and call, storing it all practically forever. Supposedly this is only to be used by coppers who are chasing the mafia and/or terrorists, but a newly formed entertainment industry group wants it applied to file-sharers as well.

The newly-formed Creative and Media Business Alliance (CMBA), made up of companies such as Sony BMG, Disney, EMI, IFPI, MPA and Universal Music International, this week expressed an interest in communications traffic data so that they can more easily prosecute "intellectual property infringements".

Thanks to a combination of two fast-tracked EU directives, they may just get their wish: and allow a UK plan to limit civil liberties to turn into a privacy-invading free-for-all by the entertainment lobby.

The Open Rights Group site has instructions for emailing your MP and your MEP -- the majority of Internet users in the world are file-sharers. Under this proposal, their privacy would be stripped away under the same rubric used to hunt terrorists.

posted by Fergie @ 11/23/2005 11:43:00 AM