ISPs get legal notices from companies and are liable if it is found that their users are downloading illegal torrents and they don’t take action against those users.

How are VPNs any different? By using a VPN, aren’t you essentially transferring your accountability to the VPN provider? Wouldn’t courts find that since this or that VPN service’s exit server was used in ____ illegal online activity, they’re responsible and must cease operations?

How do VPNs operate? Are laws different for them? If yes, then how does that benefit the state? Wouldn’t the state benefit from treating VPNs the same as ISPs so they get more control?

    • refalo@programming.dev
      1·
      3 hours ago

      Even if Section 230 didn’t require providers to terminate the user’s service, providers further upstream could technically punish that ISP for breaking their own ToS depending on what it is.

      People like Liz Fong-Jones and Keffals have successfully lobbied multiple Tier 1 ISPs to blackhole websites that have posted information about them that they didn’t like based on this fact, behavior which the EFF has specifically called out as a threat to the free and open Internet. Even the CEO of Cloudflare has openly admitted to being personally involved in blocking sites without a really good reason.

    • u/lukmly013 💾 (lemmy.sdf.org)@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
      14·
      10 hours ago

      those users are using a lot of bandwidth and the piracy forms a handy excuse.

      Or they could improve their network for torrenting like some Indian ISPs did in the past

      Several Internet providers in India have found a clever way to reduce the load BitTorrent transfers put on their network, […] They’ve teamed up with Torbox.net which offers a fully fledged torrent search engine that connects users to ‘local’ peers to guarantee maximum download speeds.

      Some [ISPs] have had their own custom ‘caching’ setups but increasingly they are teaming up with the torrent search engine Torbox.

      Torbox links them to peers in the local network, which means that the traffic is free for the ISP.

      Most people who visit Torbox will see a notice that their ISP doesn’t have a peering agreement. However, for those who have a supporting ISP the torrent site returns search results ordering torrents based on the proximity of downloaders.

      TorrentFreak spoke with EBS director Victor Francess, who says that with this setup most torrent data is served from within the ISP’s own network.

      “It all creates a very powerful user experience, so in fact just about 10-20% of all torrent traffic comes from the upstream and everything else is local,” Francess says.

    • Valmond@lemmy.world
      46·
      10 hours ago

      There is like no information in your link except the USA supreme court or whatever wants to have some power (so over USA VPN only if ever that actually happens).

      And what you “think” is kind of irrelevant IMO.

      • PhilipTheBucket@ponder.cat
        5·
        10 hours ago

        There was a mixed ruling at the US Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit as the appeals court affirmed a jury’s finding that Cox was guilty of willful contributory infringement but reversed a verdict on vicarious infringement “because Cox did not profit from its subscribers’ acts of infringement.”

        That ruling vacated a $1 billion damages award and ordered a new damages trial. Cox and Sony are both seeking a Supreme Court review. Cox wants to overturn the finding of willful contributory infringement, while Sony wants to reinstate the $1 billion verdict.

        Cox has said that letting the piracy ruling stand “would force ISPs to terminate Internet service to households or businesses based on unproven allegations of infringing activity, and put them in a position of having to police their networks.” Cox said that ISPs “have no way of verifying whether a bot-generated notice is accurate” and that even if the notices are accurate, terminating an account would punish every user in a household where only one person may have illegally downloaded copyrighted files.

        Record labels urged the court to reinstate the vicarious infringement verdict. “As the District Court explained, the jury had ample evidence that Cox profited from its subscribers’ infringement, including evidence ‘that when deciding whether to terminate a subscriber for repeat infringement, Cox considered the subscriber’s monthly payments,’ and ‘Cox repeatedly declined to terminate infringing subscribers’ Internet service in order to continue collecting their monthly fees,'” the record labels’ petition said.

        So, current precedent is that the ISPs do have to terminate, but there’s no penalty if they don’t. Is November recent enough that the ruling has actually had any impact? Did the Supreme Coury decide to take up the case or not yet? How much does it means that the ISPs “have to” terminate users, but there doesn’t seem to be a penalty if they don’t? Is the fact that there was no ruling until recently, confirmation that they were doing it voluntarily for their own reasons before November? Or were they doing it “voluntarily” because they didn’t want to defend lawsuits like this, except Cox which was refusing to do it apparently? I have no sure idea of the answer to any of those questions. That’s why I said “I think.” But, unlike some people on the internet, I don’t just make up some bullshit and then decide that’s what I “think” and go spouting off about it. I’m just relaying my best guess, reasons for it, and being honest about the fact that it’s a guess.