Digital Economy Bill Passed by House of Commons

by Katy Murcutt - Paralegal

09 April 2010, filed under Ecommerce

The House of Commons passed the Digital Economy Bill yesterday. The purpose of the Bill was to implement last summer’s Digital Britain Report. The Bill has already received widespread criticism due to its passing by ministers so close to the general election.

It has been speculated that Business Secretary Lord Mandelson pushed the Bill through the Commons despite the insertion into the Bill of several controversial clauses by the government.

Under the Digital Economy Bill, ministers shall have the authority to compel internet service providers (ISPs) to block online sites that are likely to be used for copyright infringement and illegal file sharing and to disconnect households and companies believed to be using the internet with the intention to misuse copyrighted resources. The authority given to ministers under the Bill will be free from judicial guidance, meaning that ministers will have the exclusive power of interpreting a user’s online antics free from supervision by the courts.

The Digital Britain Report did not contain these contentious measures, which were first suggested by Liberal Democrat and Conservative ministers when the Bill was initially debated in the House of Lords earlier this year. Although the government retracted the oppositions amendments to the Bill, similar clauses were inserted into the final draft of the legislation, which was passed before the House of Commons yesterday afternoon without any further changes being made to the proposed legislation.

Ofcom shall be responsible for implementing a standard level of evidence required by ministers in order for an action to be brought against a copyright infringer. The evidence will not be based on the individual but the location of that individual using the IP address. Illegal file-sharing has become a highly publicised contemporary issue with regard to the relationship between internet users and the law as an increasing amount of people are infringing copyright by downloading music and films from file-sharing sites.

However, internet users are able to purchase encryption technology and ISP proxies that enable the location of the IP address to be distorted. Some services provide the ability for an IP address to seem as though it is located in a different country for a fee. The new Bill will undoubtedly create greater commercial pressure on these service providers to help customers evade detection.

In Sweden and Japan similar legislation has been put into effect. Since this legislation has been implemented there has been a steady increase in the number of subscribers to encryption technologies and ISP proxies to prevent exposure.

It has been argued on several occasions by digital rights campaigners that the Digital Economy Bill was rushed through due to the impending general election on 6th May and so not adequately substantiated the government so that it could be made legally effective before parliament was dissolved.

Furthermore, some activists groups have stated that the majority of ministers present for the voting in of the Bill were not actually present at the time the draft legislation was debated in the House of Lords. This has lead to greater speculation that the dissonant amendments made to this piece of legislation is an attack on individual’s rights to communicate freely when online, to enforce ‘big brother’ tendencies on internet users as a way round privacy laws.