New Zealand proposes "guilty until proven innocent" copyright law

[u-Bob]

http://www.boingboing.net/2010/11/04...-proposes.html

New Zealand's three-strikes Internet law is back. Under this proposed copyright law, people who are accused without proof of multiple copyright infringements can eventually face disconnection from the Internet, along with their families. A substantively similar law was passed and then rescinded in 2009, after enormous public outcry. The parliamentary committee responsible for the legislation describes it as being based on the presumption of guilt (not innocence, as is customary in democratic societies).

It's hard to argue with the logic of speed here; creating a presumption of liability certainly will "fast-track" the process, though concerns about accuracy remain. As a New Zealand legal blogger noted this week, almost one-third of all New Zealand copyright litigation fails because rightsholders can't actually show they own the copyright and that the copyright is governed by New Zealand law. And Google has previously indicated that large percentages of the infringement claims it routinely receives are defective in some way.

InternetNZ, which runs the top-level .nz Internet domain, said in a statement that the new presumption of liability "reverses the burden of proof in the regime by saying that rights owners' notices will be considered conclusive evidence of infringement, with alleged infringers having to prove they have not done so. This reversal of proof is not a welcome development, and our initial view is that it should not be passed by Parliament."

5 minutes before someone comes in and thinks this will bring 2001-type ratios back to the TGPs.

[u-Bob]

reply from boingboing:

Why can't we extend this obviously sensible law to other areas? After all, surely the onus should be on car owners to prove that they weren't speeding or illegally parked (possession of a motor vehicle should be taken as prima facie evidence that they had the means and possibly the motive to commit the crime).

Similarly, employees should be prepared to offer "valid reasons" to support their claim that they were paid by their employer for performing the activity described in their contract rather than, say, extortion or selling drugs. At tax time, everyone should be able to prove conclusively that they had declared all their income: an inability to demonstrate this to the satisfaction of the tax authorities would be taken as evidence of guilt.

To prevent possible abuses, presumption of guilt would not be automatic, but would only be made following a complaint from a recognized and impartial authority. For instance, speeding fines for presumed infractions would not be issued unless a police department had first declared that they had grounds to believe that such an infraction had occurred. The department would not, however, be required to reveal their grounds for this belief, as knowledge of police procedure might assist criminals in breaking the law. Counter-assertions to the effect that, for example, the department was facing a budget shortfall and therefore had a material interest in levying bogus fines, will not be considered 'valid reasons'.

[ottopottomouse]

Originally Posted by u-Bob

5 minutes before someone comes in and thinks this will bring 2001-type ratios back to the TGPs.

Markham must be asleep.

I don't like the way a lot of the proposed things like this recently are completely accusation = guilty. Is the whole world trying to turn into Cultural Revolution China?

[blackmonsters]

I would think that if someone had many complaints that some of the complainers
should have some proof. Why would multiple people accuse the same person without
any evidence that points to that person? Maybe circumstantial evidence is not enough.

Anyway, I think websites should be responsible for infringement more than "uploaders",
because the uploader is not broadcasting the content, the website is.