Consumer groups want increased fairness for file sharers

A coalition of consumer groups is calling on the UK communications regulator Ofcom to ensure that broadband users who file share are treated with fairness.

The UK’s communications regulator recently released its draft proposals over the action to be taken against broadband users that are found to be illegally filesharing and downloading copyrighted material. The draft has been met with a lot of controversy as was expected, and was produced in accordance with the requirements outlined in the controversial Digital Economy Act.

Whilst the regulations in the new draft are designed to protect holders of copyrighted material many are concerned that there is not enough in there to protect broadband users. It has now been announced that in order to address this, a coalition of consumer campaign groups has called on Ofcom to take into consideration a set of principles to protect consumers and to implement these into their proposals.

The groups that are involved in the coalition are the Communications Consumer Panel, Consumer Focus, Which?, Citizens Advice, and the Open Rights Group. The principles and guidelines that the coalition has put forward to Ofcom include a number of measures that would help to ensure that the user was actually guilty before taking action and to help consumers to better understand what was happening.

According to reports the requirements include the need for checks to be carried out to ensure that the user is guilty of any wrongdoing before action is taken, the need to provide clear and transparent information to the consumer, and the need to ensure that the user is able to defend themselves. The groups want an appeals process to be available at no cost to the consumer to further ensure fairness.

Source – Smart-Products