Mass Web Filtering Plans Suspended in UK

The UK government has suspended its plans to have ISPs filter access to websites that facilitate copyright infringement at the request of copyright owners.

Such a mechanism was specified in the Digital Economy Act of 2010 and caused great controversy among freedom of information activists and the Internet community.

The government's decision not to go ahead with the plan is based on a report from UK communications regulator Ofcom which was asked to review the technical feasibility of web blocking provisions.

Ofcom released its report at the end of May and even though it doesn't reject the use of website-blocking as a method of combating copyright infringement entirely, it does make it clear that circumvention is possible for all analyzed blocking methods.

Ofcom looked at four web filtering techniques, by IP, DNS, URL and packet inspection, and analyzed their speed of implementation, cost, effectiveness, difficulty of circumvention, ease of judicial process, network performance and level of granularity.

"[F]or all blocking methods circumvention by site operators and Internet users is technically possible and would be relatively straightforward by determined users," the regulator concluded.

"We welcome the UK government’s announcement, and commend its commitment to evidence-based policy-making," the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) said in response to the decision to suspend the plan.

"Let’s hope that policymakers across the world take the time to understand the implications for all Internet users’ security, for human rights and the rule of law, and the future of the open global Internet of telling DNS servers to 'lose' parts of the Internet in the name of enforcing copyright holders’ private rights," it added.

This doesn't mean that blocking infringing sites cannot be done in UK. A recent court ruling that forced BT to block access to Usenet index Newzbin2 is proof that such blocking can take place, however, each individual case will have to go through the courts, which is a significant hassle for rights owners.