Cable Europe, the association for Europe’s MSOs was swift to react to Commissioner Neelie Kroes’ recommendation to the European Parliament that €9 billion be spent on broadband infrastructure between 2014 and 2020 through the Connecting Europe Facility. Caroline Van Weede, Managing Director, Cable Europe says: “There is a case for state aid funding to make […]
A leading member of Australia’s Federal Attorney-General’s department is backing the creation of a self-regulated industry code between Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and rights holders to combat piracy issues. A growing number of rights holders, service providers, user groups and copyright experts consider an industry code would be preferable to further litigation or copyright legislation. […]
Australian telco industry trade group Communications Alliance has applied to participate in the copyright case between iiNet and the Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft (AFACT) , with the anticipation that an industry-led solution to content piracy online can be reached by early 2012. AFACT, on behalf of a number of big movie studios, took […]
BT and TalkTalk have won permission to appeal against a High Court ruling that had backed the provisions of the government’s Digital Economy Act which expects ISPs to police piracy. The Digital Economy Act had been the subject of ongoing legal challenges since it was rushed through Parliament just before the general election. Under the […]
Sixty French net users could have their connection cut for a month after ignoring letters telling them to stop infringing copyright. They are the first to reach the end of the controversial ‘Hadopi’ process France operates to tackle pirates. About 650,000 people have received one warning and a further 44,000 are on their second warning. […]
Online content drives demand for broadband, bringing fixed and mobile revenues of €155 billion in Europe in 2010, according to a report commissioned by the BBC, Channel 4, Blinkbox, Skype and Yahoo. The report, by Plum Consulting has been published to help lobby the Government that the existing open internet and their content helps drive […]
Members of a broad coalition of industry and labour groups have stepped up their campaign to rally support for legislation that would give them new tools to crack down on foreign websites engaged in piracy and counterfeiting by lobbying the US House of Representatives en masse. Some 40 representatives of the Coalition Against Counterfeiting and […]
Hit international TV formats such as Big Brother and Who Wants to be a Millionaire? are being protected by the laws of copyright, unfair competition, passing off and breach of confidence, according to a report launched at MIPCOM by FRAPA — the Format Recognition and Protection Association. The FRAPA Report 2011: Protecting Format Rights, […]
US telco Verizon Communications is suing to overturn regulations governing the flow of Internet traffic. The lawsuit filed in Washington’s US Court of Appeals contends the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) overstepped its authority in setting its so-called ‘net neutrality’ rules in 2010. The regulations are scheduled to go into effect November 20. They prohibit Internet […]
UK media regulator Ofcom has fined Noor TV £75,000 for “extremely serious” breaches of its rules, and that the channel provided no detailed evidence of any compliance procedures. Noor TV beams its channel to Muslim viewers living in Europe and is licensed by Ofcom. The breach was in regard to a programme, “Saturday Night Special” […]