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US Expelled Saudi Students For Using Pirate Software, Official Says

Posted: 13 May 2014 04:10 AM PDT

When compared to most countries around the world, the United States has some of the toughest copyright laws around. While many countries view infringement as a relatively petty issue, in the U.S. custodial sentences are in place for many offenses.

Viewing local laws and attitudes as some of the best around, each year the USTR produces its Special 301 Report in which it criticizes trading partners for letting standards drop. This year there were just two Middle Eastern countries on the list – Lebanon and Kuwait – but according to a report in a Saudi Arabian newspaper, the U.S. isn’t afraid to flex its muscles against citizens of other allies in the region.

In an article published in the Makkah Daily Newspaper (Arabic), it’s being claimed that after illegal software was found on their laptops, 34 Saudi students studying in the United States were disallowed from completing their studies.

Citing Rafiq bin Ibrahim Aqeeli, Director General of the General Administration of Copyright at the Ministry of Culture and Information, the newspaper says those same students were subsequently expelled from the United States, forcing them to complete their studies in another country.

And the claims don’t stop there. Citing the same government source, Makkah Daily reports that the U.S. also intercepted 40 Saudi tourists at the border with illegal software on their laptops, denied them entry, and sent them home. Australia had also deported three Saudi university students for the same reasons, Aqeeli said.

But despite the clear claims from the Saudi government, ejecting students from the country on copyright grounds seems like a hugely draconian response, even by U.S. standards. However, looking into Saudi Arabia’s recent responses to copyright infringement one can see a country sometimes taking harsher measures than those usually seen in the United States.

Three weeks ago the Saudi government reported on its anti-piracy activities for 2013. Rafiq bin Ibrahim Aqeeli said his inspectors had carried out 2,500 inspections at stores, service providers, plus businesses and corporate headquarters

More than 7,590 “violations” were identified, 667 of which were related to copyright. As a result several businesses were penalized with enforced temporary shutdowns ranging from 14 to 60 days, to a total of 3,562 days overall.

“Last year the offences varied between copies of books and intellectual works, audio-visual materials and computer programs, while other infringements included the use by corporate facilities of computer software without permits, receiving satellite feed via individual subscriptions, and violations by newspapers using images without the consent of the copyright owners,” Aqeeli said.

The Ministry of Culture and Information says it will collaborate with the Business Software Alliance (BSA) to crack down on software piracy in line with its stance on reducing the effect software piracy has on the local economy. Violators can look forward to imprisonment, heavy fines and being “defamed” by having their names published in local newspapers.

In April, the Saudi government confirmed it had blocked 22 domains, including The Pirate Bay, on copyright grounds.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Hadopi Recommends Super Injunctions to Keep Pirate Content Down

Posted: 12 May 2014 09:37 AM PDT

For an extended period anti-piracy agency HADOPI stayed in the news due to its responsibility for maintaining France’s controversial three-strikes anti-piracy scheme. While many of the big headlines have subsided, the authority is still tasked with dealing with an issue that simply refuses to go away.

Last July, Aurélie Filippetti, Minister of Culture and Communication, tasked Mireille Imbert-Quaretta, president of the Commission for Protection of Rights, to find solutions against large scale commerical piracy online, i.e against the sites and services offering music and movies for free.

The report, obtained by Les Echoes and scheduled to be handed over to the government today, envisions a multi-pronged approach to the issue.

“There is no single solution to fight against counterfeiting on the Internet,” warns Mireille Imbert-Quaretta (MIQ).

MIQ’s recommendations begin with what is now forming into somewhat of an industry standard tactic for dealing with ‘pirate’ sites, that of hitting their finances. MIQ foresees a tightening of the noose around unauthorized sites by building cooperation among advertising players to restrict support for such domains. In addition it’s recommended that the same kind of agreements should be forged in order to cut off sites’ access to payment processing facilities.

“These kinds of charters are intended to create a framework for the involvement of stakeholders in the advertising and online payment industries in the fight against infringement of copyright and neighboring rights on the Internet, and to put in place certain rules for their actions,” the report reads.

Another proposal foresees the creation of a master list of sites deemed to be engaged in “massive” breaches of copyright. While various lists of this nature already exist in several places around the world, such as at City of London Police, they have until now remained secret. MIQ recommends that the French list is made publicly available, for several key reasons.

- To update the public about the legality of sites online
- To allow advertising and payment industry players to make informed decisions
- For the reference of other potential intermediaries involved in the piracy eco-system

MIQ’s final recommendation will be of broad interest, especially if the French can do the seemingly impossible and actually pull it off.

“The copyright holders are faced with the constant recurrence of content and links they have already demand the withdrawal of,” the report reads.

To deal with this issue the final recommendation foresees the “creation of an order for extended withdrawal”, in other words a DMCA-style takedown notice that not only says “takedown”, but also “stay down”.

These notices would oblige a host to “stop and prevent, for a specified period, the reappearance of content that has been identified as constituting an infringement of copyright or related rights on the site.”

It’s suggested that these kinds of orders could be valid for up to six months but at least initially would only be directed at sites hosting actual files, not links to files such as in the case of BitTorrent indexes.

“These are all distinct responses gradually leading to the establishment of an effective action against websites taking advantage of a massive operation of counterfeiting,” the report concludes.

Time will tell how the government will respond but it seems likely that all proposals will be taken very seriously.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.