DOWNLOADING

Internet service providers in Sask. may soon aid in illegal download investigations.

REGINA — Saskatchewan residents who illegally download the newest movie or their favourite song may soon hear from their Internet service provider (ISP).

Two ISPs in the province, SaskTel and Access Communications, confirmed they will soon be legally required to forward allegations of copying and distribution of copyrighted material from copyright holders and owners to the customers.

Copyright owners can detect the Internet addresses of illegal downloaders and will send a notice to the service provider, which must forward that notice to the customer.

“SaskTel does not track our customers’ activities online regarding possible copyright infringement activities,” said SaskTel spokeswoman Michelle Englot.

“It is the copyright holder who provides SaskTel with the information associated with the alleged infringement.”

For service providers and hosts, the “notice and notice regime” will go from voluntary to a legal obligation on Jan. 1, when the federal government’s Copyright Modernization Act will be fully in force.

Englot said SaskTel has not been voluntarily forwarding the piracy notices or tracking the number of notices received from copyright holders and owners. The Crown corporation will start tracking the number of notices in mid-December.

Access Communications privacy officer Carmela Haines said the company is finalizing an automated system to receive and forward the notices.

The notice emails will include the copyright holder’s contact information, identify the copyrighted material, specify the date and time of the alleged piracy, the IP address associated with the incident and actions required by the customer to remove the content.

Internet service providers will only be involved in identifying the customer with the suspected IP address in the allegation notice, forwarding the email and informing the copyright owner once the notice has been sent.

The copyright holders will not have the name or address of the customer.

Hosts and service providers must retain records of the notices for a minimum of six months in case a copyright owner decides to pursue legal action.

“If it does go to court, then the copyright owner will come to us with a court order and we would release the (customer’s) information,” Haines said.

For OpenMedia, a Vancouver-based Internet safeguard community organization, having Internet service providers act as the intermediary protects customers because the rights holders, like music labels and movie studios, do not actually obtain the name and address the Internet user.

“It balances the needs of copyright holders against, particularly, the privacy concerns of individual Internet users,” said Open Media spokesman David Christopher.

“It also helps to safeguard Canadians from some of the real abuses of the copyright system that we can see in the U.S.,” he said. “Internet users are much more vulnerable there to being extorted, often for ridiculous amounts of money, on copyright grounds.”

While protecting Internet customers, Christopher said he also believes the notice and notice system will be an effective copyright infringement deterrent.

He cited Rogers data that suggests 67 per cent of recipients (only five per cent of subscribers) do not infringe after receiving a notice and 89 per cent cease infringing activity after a second notice.

Within two notices, about 99 per cent of subscribers stop receiving infringement notifications.