Belgian ISP Says it Can't Stop Illegal File-Sharing

A Belgian ISP, SA Scarlet, has told a court in the country that it cannot feasibly stop illegal file sharing following a 2007 court order that it must block or filter copyright infringing files from being traded on its network. The ISP tried both slowing P2P traffic and filtering it before eventually coming to the conclusion that the court’s demand was unworkable.

For every day that Scarlet doesn’t filter or remove illegal P2P traffic from its network, the company has to pay 2,500 Euros in compensation according to the 2007 court verdict. That makes convincing the court that filtering all illegal content is infeasible an important proposition from the company.

ZDNet in Belgium reports (GOOGLE TRANSLATION) that Scarlet has refused to block all P2P traffic, since that would negatively affect legitimate traffic as well as copyright infringing file sharing. Initially, Scarlet attempted to slow peer-to-peer traffic on its network, but all that did was lead to customer complaints. Illegal files were still widely available, it just took longer get them.

Next, the ISP attempted to filter out illegal traffic using software from Audible Magic, after being ordered to do so by a court appointed P2P “expert.” However, according to Scarlet, the software didn’t actually work and failed to filter illegal files.

Scarlet’s initial response to the 2007 ruling was to make the claim that filtering P2P traffic would be illegal under Belgian law, which the ISP says doesn’t allow it to spy on customers.

“This measure is nothing else than playing Big Brother on the Internet," said managing director Gert Post. "If we don’t challenge it today, we leave the door open to permanent, and invisible and illegal, checks of personal data.”

Clearly, filtering and traffic throttling don’t work and really just end up aggravating customers. The only way to positively identify, filter, or block copyrighted material is by inspecting each and every "suspicious" file. This is certainly impossible not to mention a huge invasion of a customers privacy.

[Via TF]