Swedish anti-piracy legislation moves ahead

The EU anti-piracy directive that would let intellectual property holders get information about file sharers has been implemented in a Swedish bill, which this week received approval to be presented to Parliament.

Sweden's English-language news site The Local reports this week that the Lagrådet Legislative Council has green-lighted a bill that would make file sharers' IP addresses available to copyright holders.

In the proposal, the court would be able to order ISPs to release information about IP addresses through which copyrighted material was downloaded. With probable cause, the copyright owners could obtain a court order and then use the information released from the ISP to seek legal retribution against the copyright violators.

The Anti-Piracy Act, or the Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Directive (IPRED1), is an EU directive not forced upon any single member of the union. However, lobby groups have pushed for a Swedish implementation of the EU directive, which some call the "Pirate Hunter act."

On Wednesday, the Swedish legislative council gave the government approval to proceed with the bill and present it to Parliament.

The Pirate Party's Rickard Falkvinge posted a blog today, saying, "This is a bill that creates a private police force with the power to sue individuals for fantastic sums just to avenge the technological developments that have run past them."

Falkvinge calls on everyone to e-mail the Members of Parliament immediately, to "show them what we ordinary citizens think about the demolition of civil rights and the rule of law." He encourages Swedes to write not as pirates, but as ordinary citizens, and is careful to remind concerned persons to be polite.