In a small victory for book publishers, the UK's High Court has ordered internet service providers (ISPs) to block several major sites offering pirated e-books. The decision means that BT, Sky, Virgin Media, TalkTalk and EE now have 10 days to comply and ensure their customers can't access the following sites: AvaxHome, Ebookee, Freebookspot, Freshwap, Libgen, Bookfi and Bookre. The Publishers Association (PA), which sought the restrictions under the UK's Copyright Design and Patents Act 1988, claims the sites collectively hold roughly 10 million e-books, and that at least 80 percent of them infringe copyright. The group says the case is "the first action of its kind" by UK book publishers, following a raft of similar ISP blocks levied against sites hosting music, movies and TV shows illegally.
The PA says it's already sent nearly one million takedown requests to the sites in question, and asked that Google pull 1.75 million related URLs from its search results. As we've seen with The Pirate Bay though, blocking sites at the ISP level isn't always effective, especially for savvy users familiar with Virtual Private Networks (VPN). The larger problem is that when one piracy site disappears, another five quickly sprout in its place. Even if the High Court's blocks are successful, it's safe to assume readers will find alternative sources.
Filed under: Internet
Source: The Publishers Association
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