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Argument: Three strikes has hard time determining offending user

Issue Report: Graduated response antipiracy laws

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“Graduated response.” Open Rights Group: “whole families and shared households of internet users would be cut off from the internet as a result of one person’s unlawful activity. Which raises the question, who receives the sanction? The account holder? If so, what if it’s not the account holder carrying out the unlawful activity?”

“‘Three strikes’ for the Web.” Los Angeles Times Editorial. April 13, 2010: “British lawmakers seem to have paid scant attention to the fact that copyright holders can’t tell who, exactly, is bootlegging their movies, games and songs online. No one can. ISPs can tell which account was involved and, potentially, which computer was used. But they can’t tell who was sitting at the keyboard. And in the case of a public wireless network at an airport or a restaurant, they may not be able to say for sure which of the dozens of simultaneous users was the pirate. As a result, by exposing those who pay for broadband accounts to sanctions rather than the specific users, the law muddles the issue of who’s responsible for misdeeds online. It also could give copyright holders too much power over ISPs and disruptive technologies.

[…] Another potential pitfall is that the law’s appeals process won’t prevent broadband account holders from being penalized for a third party’s misbehavior. Nor are ISPs in any position to judge when an alleged infringement is actually a fair use of copyrighted works.”