blocking orders Archives

Fact checking Michael Geist’s criticisms of the FairPlay site blocking proposal

The FairPlay coalition comprising more than 25 organizations representing hundreds of thousands of members of Canada’s creative community made a reasonable proposal to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), Canada’s telecommunications and broadcast regulator, to address the scourge of online copyright infringement.[1] The proposal, which involves website blocking, was immediately attacked by anti-copyright activist Michael Geist (“Geist”) in a series of articles and interviews. As I showed in a prior lengthy blog post,[2] his criticisms were unfounded and overblown.…

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Why the CRTC should endorse FairPlay’s website-blocking plan: a reply to Michael Geist

The Hill Times published my op-ed on the FairPlay Canada website blocking proposal, Why the CRTC should endorse FairPlay’s piracy site-blocking plan. The full unedited version, complete with endnote references is below.

Last week Fairplay Canada filed an application with the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), asking for a new tool to help Canadian creators to combat online theft of their content by illegal piracy websites. It proposed that the Canada’s telecom regulator create an independent agency to identify websites and services that are “blatantly, overwhelmingly, or structurally engaged in piracy”.…

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Support for creators: pirate streaming and the value gap, my op-ed in the Globe

Here is my full unedited op-ed published in today’s Globe and Mail.

The cultural industries in Canada are facing major challenges. A significant contributing cause is our outdated legal frameworks. They did not contemplate, and have not been updated to address, the new means of stealing content or uses of content by Internet platforms and others without permission or paying just compensation. These issues and proposals to address them deserve our attention. Two examples are illustrative.

The first involves Internet streaming piracy.…

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Globe and Mail editorial attacks on Canadian creators and broadcasters: what’s up with the Globe?

There was a time you could count on The Globe and Mail to support the Canadian cultural industries and to favour legal frameworks designed to strengthen them. You could also count on the Globe not to be soft on content theft by commercial pirates that harm Canadian businesses and impede their ability to innovate. Recently, however, the Globe has taken one-sided positions opposite the creative community. Worse, it has taken these positions relying on inadequate research and supporting them with inaccurate factual assertions, in some cases by relying on writings of anti-copyright activist Michael Geist.…

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Website blocking effective without over blocking: EUFA v British Telecommunications

Site blocking is an important tool to reduce online copyright piracy. As I argued in a recent blog post, Website blocking proposal good policy, there are persuasive reasons why these orders should also be available in Canada.

Some opponents of effective protection for the creative industries, broadcasters and distributors oppose site blocking, questioning whether it is effective and suggesting it is a disproportionate remedy, despite the studies and decisions around the world that show otherwise.

In a recent U.K. decision, Union Des Associations Européennes De Football v British Telecommunications Plc & Ors [2017] EWHC 3414 (Ch) (21 December 2017) Justice Arnold made an injunction order on behalf of UEFA, the governing body for association football in Europe, requiring the ISP defendants to block, or at least impede, access by their customers to streaming servers which deliver infringing live streams of UEFA competition matches to UK consumers.…

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Website blocking proposal good policy

CANADALAND recently reported (Inside Bell’s Push To End Net Neutrality In Canada) that a coalition of Canadian companies is considering a proposal to have Canada’s telecommunications and broadcast regulator, the CRTC, establish a regime to block egregious copyright infringing websites.

The proposal is long overdue and, if adopted, would modernize Canada’s laws relating to Internet piracy and bring them into line with those of many of our trading partners. The proposal is not an attack on net neutrality; rather it is an efficient means of stopping content theft.…

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Google v Equustek: worldwide de-indexing order against Google upheld by Supreme Court

The Supreme Court of Canada released a landmark decision today ruling that Canadian common law courts have the jurisdiction to make global de-indexing orders against search engines like Google. In so, ordering, the Court in Google Inc. v. Equustek Solutions Inc., 2017 SCC 34 underlined the breadth of courts’ jurisdiction to make orders against search engines to stem illegal activities on the Internet including the sale of products manufactured using trade secrets misappropriated from innovative companies.

The decision arose from a lower court decision that ordered Google to block websites that were selling goods that violated the trade secrets of the plaintiffs.…

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Equustek decision to be released soon by Supreme Court of Canada

The decision of the Supreme Court of Canada in the Equustek v Google case is likely going to be an important precedent. It will decide whether a Canadian common law court has the jurisdiction to grant de-indexing orders against search engines to aid in enforcing court injunctions, and if it does, the test to apply in making such orders.

The Supreme Court has invited counsel for the parties to make comments on a possible media lock-up immediately prior to the release of the decision by the court.…

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Equustek v Google: my Fordham talk

Fordham Law School has the best annual intellectual property conferences. I had the privilege of speaking at its 25th Annual IP Conference yesterday on the Equustek v Google case. In this case the Supreme Court of Canada is being asked to decide if Canadian courts have the jurisdiction to make global de-indexing orders against search engines like Google, and if so, the factors to be considered in making such orders. My slides from the talk are shown below.

What made my talk such a treat, was the presence of Mr Justice Arnold in the audience.…

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Blocking orders against ISPs to combat trade-mark infringement legal says Court of Appeal in Cartier

The English Court of Appeal released an important decision last week confirming that courts’ equitable jurisdiction to grant injunctions where “just and convenient” is broad enough to order internet Service Providers (ISPs) to block web sites from selling trade-mark infringing goods. The Court in Cartier International AG & Ors v British Sky Broadcasting Ltd & Ors [2016] EWCA Civ 658 (06 July 2016) confirmed the correctness of the prior comprehensive decision of Arnold J. in Cartier International AG & Ors v British Sky Broadcasting Ltd & Ors [2014] EWHC 3354 (Ch) (17 October 2014).…

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