Stopping broadband should arrest online piracy - Daniel Castro

[Alex Gakuru]

Congress told that Internet data caps will discourage piracy
By Nate Anderson <http://arstechnica.com/author/nate-anderson/>

Internet data caps aren't just good at stopping congestion; they can also be
useful tools for curtailing piracy.

That was one of the points made by Daniel Castro, an analyst at the
Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF) think tank in
Washington DC. Castro
testified<http://judiciary.house.gov/hearings/pdf/Castro03142011.pdf>
(PDF)
yesterday before the House Judiciary Committee about the problem of
“parasite” websites, saying that usage-based billing and monthly data caps
were both good ways to discourage piracy, and that the government shouldn't
do anything to stand in their way.

The government should allow "pricing structures and usage caps that
discourage online piracy," he wrote, which comes pretty close to suggesting
that heavy data use implies piracy and should be limited.

While usage-based billing and data caps are often talked about in terms of
their ability to curb congestion, it's rarely suggested that making Internet
access more expensive is a positive move for the content industries. But
Castro has a whole host of such suggestions, drawn largely verbatim from
his 2009 report <http://www.itif.org/files/2009-digital-piracy.pdf> (PDF) on
the subject.

Should the US government actually fund antipiracy research? Sure. Should the
US government “enlist” Internet providers to block entire websites? Sure.
Should copyright holders suggest to the government which sites should go on
the blocklist? Sure. Should ad networks and payment processors be forced to
cut ties to such sites, even if those sites are legal in the countries where
they operate? Sure.

Castro's original 2009 paper goes further, suggesting that deep packet
inspection (DPI) be routinely deployed by ISPs in order to scan subscriber
traffic for potential copyright infringements. Sound like wiretapping? Yes,
though Castro has a solution if courts do crack down on the practice: "the
law should be changed."

After all, "piracy mitigation with DPI deals with a set of issues virtually
identical to the largely noncontroversial question of virus detection and
mitigation."

If you think that some of these approaches to antipiracy enforcement have
problems, Castro knows why; he told Congress yesterday that critics of such
ideas "assume that piracy is the bedrock of the Internet economy" and don't
want to disrupt it, a statement patently absurd on its face.

(One target of his criticism, the Center for Democracy & Technology, was
also at the hearing. CDT's David Sohn opened by describing his support for
reducing online infringement and told how, back in 2005, CDT had actually
filed complaints against two websites that charged money for access to
"legal" P2P music. Reading Sohn's measured, thoughtful
testimony<http://judiciary.house.gov/hearings/pdf/Sohn03142011.pdf>
(PDF)
is a good reminder of why process matters when it comes to IP enforcement.)

Still, several of Castro's ideas made it into last year's COICA Web
censorship bill<http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/11/pirate-slaying-censorship-bill-gets-unanimous-support.ars>,
which will soon return to Congress (Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) has promised
that COICA will pass this year.) Could some of his other ideas—such as
asking government to bankroll antipiracy research—make the cut when COICA
returns?

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/03/congress-told-that-internet-data-caps-can-discourage-piracy.ars
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