German Government - Data Retention is for Terrorists, Not Copyright Infringers

posted by DrewWilson in file sharing // 196 days 13 hours 40 minutes ago

Last year, ZeroPaid reported on the German music industry saying it would sue 1000 file-sharers every month in the year of 2007.

This crackdown on copyright infringement was an attempt to deter file-sharers, making it seem as though one couldn't get away with it in Germany. A new report on Heise Online seems to show a significant setback on the file-sharing crackdown - namely the new resistance to using data retention laws in civil matters.

The Justice Minister of Germany Zypries said in an interview for Focus Magazine, "Connection information can assist in the prosecution of terrorists and organized criminals but cannot be used to help the music industry pursue its rights under civil law" Ouch. Not good news for the IFPI when they were jumping for joy earlier over the new laws. A Google translation of an earlier report showed a chairman of the German arm of the IFPI saying that it would be contradictory for the government to not hand over all the information over to them for copyright legal pursuits.

The data retention laws would have all internet service providers retain all the information that goes through their networks for six months starting on January of this year. It's little wonder why the record labels would want to have access to that information.

It may not be too far fetched to believe that the German record labels will simply give up after being told 'no', but for now, it looks as though the record labels will have to go back to their old tactics which is probably similar to some of the questionable information gathering techniques employed by their US counterparts.

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#1 Interest groups or companies should have no right to that data period.

posted by Spurge 195 days 16 hours 33 minutes ago
#2 Thats not even going far enough Spurge. Governments should have to go through a moderator for any talks with special interest groups.

posted by mountain_rage 195 days 16 hours 29 minutes ago
#3 Even though this is in Germany, there is an important comment to make here. Governments (at least those which claim to be "free") should not be eavesdropping on their citizens. I know there's the big argument about "terrorists," but the fact remains that the intelligence before 911 in the U.S. was there WITHOUT snooping on the citizens. It was merely ignored.

And, this is true of other terrorist plots which have been uncovered throughout the world. We don't need to trample on people's rights to protect ourselves.There's always the temptation to use such surveillance for other purposes. Those in charge presently in Germany might have this policy, but who knows about those in the future?

In the U.S. in the 1950's, we had a very unfortunate situation concerning "protecting" us against "the commies." Now, it's the same thing, only insert "terrorists" for "commies." It's a darnn good thing that Senator Joe McCarthy didn't have the Internet. How many more innocent people would have lost their livelihoods and careers?

Germany's history offers an even more terrifying concept: Hitler with the Internet?

There is more than file sharing at stake here.

posted by Burd 195 days 4 hours 53 minutes ago
#4 "Germany's history offers an even more terrifying concept: Hitler with the Internet?"

As a german, I would be pleased that you don't make such "comparison".

you can't compare Hitler to anything, even "Osama" has never killed so many people.

What ever, Im not a friend of this and Im realy against this 1984 BigBrother mentality, but what can we do?

posted by Christoph 194 days 4 hours 50 minutes ago
#5 the thing that the RIAA, CRIA, IFPI, etc. would not be happy with at all if they really thought about it is the fact that as "copyright holders" pretty much anyone would be able to request any data from anyone- namely in my case being an independent musician who distributes my music for free online with license clearly granted to use for non-commercial use only- I could get data on them delivered to me as they could be potentially "violating my copyrights" whereas no one else would be. Beyond this anyone that shares ANY personally copy written material (pictures you take on their camera, blog entries, etc.) would be able to gain access to ALL of their data.... no one has done it yet, but if they have their way- it can be done.

posted by entropyman 193 days 5 hours 47 minutes ago