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The answer by user248 provides references to the Canadian copyright legislation and authorities, but none are directly on point. Given the similarity between the Canadian and Australian legal systems, it is worth noting that this question has been directly addressed by the Federal Court of Australia, although it was only a preliminary decision.

In Dallas Buyers Club LLC v iiNet Ltd [2015] FCA 317, some ISPs resisted an application for pre-action discovery of the identity of account holders associated with the IP addresses of BitTorrent users. Perram J found [28]–[30]:

I therefore accept the submission made by the ISPs that the individual ISP addresses which Maverik Monitor detected making the film available for downloading from the identified IP addresses reveal only a download of a very small sliver of the film. I reject the ISPs’ argument that it is not sufficiently shown that the end-users infringed the film’s copyright because no ‘substantial’ copying occurred. I do so, in short, because that is not the question to be asked, which is instead whether the end-user has made the film available on the internet.

This follows from the prohibition in s 86 of the Copyright Acts 86 of the Copyright Act on communicating the film to the public and the definition of ‘communicate’ in s 10 as including ‘make available online’ …

I am comfortably satisfied that the downloading of a sliver of the film from a single IP address provides strong circumstantial evidence that the end-user was infringing the copyright in the film. It certainly provides enough evidence on a preliminary discovery application … I do not regard as fanciful the proposition that end-users sharing movies on-line using BitTorrent are infringing the copyright in those movies. Indeed, if there is anything fanciful about this, it is the proposition that they are not.

While the judge was willing in principle to provide the copyright holders with the account holders' information, the copyright holders abandoned their case after their proposed letters to account holders were rejected by the judge as an attempt at speculative invoicing: Dallas Buyers Club LLC v iiNet Limited (No 5) [2015] FCA 1437.

The answer by user248 provides references to the Canadian copyright legislation and authorities, but none are directly on point. Given the similarity between the Canadian and Australian legal systems, it is worth noting that this question has been directly addressed by the Federal Court of Australia, although it was only a preliminary decision.

In Dallas Buyers Club LLC v iiNet Ltd [2015] FCA 317, some ISPs resisted an application for pre-action discovery of the identity of account holders associated with the IP addresses of BitTorrent users. Perram J found [28]–[30]:

I therefore accept the submission made by the ISPs that the individual ISP addresses which Maverik Monitor detected making the film available for downloading from the identified IP addresses reveal only a download of a very small sliver of the film. I reject the ISPs’ argument that it is not sufficiently shown that the end-users infringed the film’s copyright because no ‘substantial’ copying occurred. I do so, in short, because that is not the question to be asked, which is instead whether the end-user has made the film available on the internet.

This follows from the prohibition in s 86 of the Copyright Act on communicating the film to the public and the definition of ‘communicate’ in s 10 as including ‘make available online’ …

I am comfortably satisfied that the downloading of a sliver of the film from a single IP address provides strong circumstantial evidence that the end-user was infringing the copyright in the film. It certainly provides enough evidence on a preliminary discovery application … I do not regard as fanciful the proposition that end-users sharing movies on-line using BitTorrent are infringing the copyright in those movies. Indeed, if there is anything fanciful about this, it is the proposition that they are not.

While the judge was willing in principle to provide the copyright holders with the account holders' information, the copyright holders abandoned their case after their proposed letters to account holders were rejected by the judge as an attempt at speculative invoicing: Dallas Buyers Club LLC v iiNet Limited (No 5) [2015] FCA 1437.

The answer by user248 provides references to the Canadian copyright legislation and authorities, but none are directly on point. Given the similarity between the Canadian and Australian legal systems, it is worth noting that this question has been directly addressed by the Federal Court of Australia, although it was only a preliminary decision.

In Dallas Buyers Club LLC v iiNet Ltd [2015] FCA 317, some ISPs resisted an application for pre-action discovery of the identity of account holders associated with the IP addresses of BitTorrent users. Perram J found [28]–[30]:

I therefore accept the submission made by the ISPs that the individual ISP addresses which Maverik Monitor detected making the film available for downloading from the identified IP addresses reveal only a download of a very small sliver of the film. I reject the ISPs’ argument that it is not sufficiently shown that the end-users infringed the film’s copyright because no ‘substantial’ copying occurred. I do so, in short, because that is not the question to be asked, which is instead whether the end-user has made the film available on the internet.

This follows from the prohibition in s 86 of the Copyright Act on communicating the film to the public and the definition of ‘communicate’ in s 10 as including ‘make available online’ …

I am comfortably satisfied that the downloading of a sliver of the film from a single IP address provides strong circumstantial evidence that the end-user was infringing the copyright in the film. It certainly provides enough evidence on a preliminary discovery application … I do not regard as fanciful the proposition that end-users sharing movies on-line using BitTorrent are infringing the copyright in those movies. Indeed, if there is anything fanciful about this, it is the proposition that they are not.

While the judge was willing in principle to provide the copyright holders with the account holders' information, the copyright holders abandoned their case after their proposed letters to account holders were rejected by the judge as an attempt at speculative invoicing: Dallas Buyers Club LLC v iiNet Limited (No 5) [2015] FCA 1437.

Source Link
sjy
sjy
  • 9.3k
  • 27
  • 48

The answer by user248 provides references to the Canadian copyright legislation and authorities, but none are directly on point. Given the similarity between the Canadian and Australian legal systems, it is worth noting that this question has been directly addressed by the Federal Court of Australia, although it was only a preliminary decision.

In Dallas Buyers Club LLC v iiNet Ltd [2015] FCA 317, some ISPs resisted an application for pre-action discovery of the identity of account holders associated with the IP addresses of BitTorrent users. Perram J found [28]–[30]:

I therefore accept the submission made by the ISPs that the individual ISP addresses which Maverik Monitor detected making the film available for downloading from the identified IP addresses reveal only a download of a very small sliver of the film. I reject the ISPs’ argument that it is not sufficiently shown that the end-users infringed the film’s copyright because no ‘substantial’ copying occurred. I do so, in short, because that is not the question to be asked, which is instead whether the end-user has made the film available on the internet.

This follows from the prohibition in s 86 of the Copyright Act on communicating the film to the public and the definition of ‘communicate’ in s 10 as including ‘make available online’ …

I am comfortably satisfied that the downloading of a sliver of the film from a single IP address provides strong circumstantial evidence that the end-user was infringing the copyright in the film. It certainly provides enough evidence on a preliminary discovery application … I do not regard as fanciful the proposition that end-users sharing movies on-line using BitTorrent are infringing the copyright in those movies. Indeed, if there is anything fanciful about this, it is the proposition that they are not.

While the judge was willing in principle to provide the copyright holders with the account holders' information, the copyright holders abandoned their case after their proposed letters to account holders were rejected by the judge as an attempt at speculative invoicing: Dallas Buyers Club LLC v iiNet Limited (No 5) [2015] FCA 1437.