ISP Attacked Copyright Trolls in Sweden

File-sharers all over the world have been targeted with lawsuits by copyright trolls, if they refuse to pay a settlement fee. This scheme was first tried in Germany, and then copyright holders started targeting alleged pirates all over Europe, in the United States, Canada and elsewhere.

Now Sweden was hit with a wave of settlement offers for alleged infringers. One of the most active anti-piracy groups is Spridningskollen, which uses data collected by German entity Excipio and is going to start by targeting around 1,000 alleged pirates, demanding settlements of about $230. The group compared the process with speeding cameras, where file-sharers run a risk to be “fined” if they get caught. This will bring profit, but can also deter other people from violating copyright.

But this story is not about how a copyright troll targeted file-shares, but about how it suffered an attack from the local Internet service provider. Swedish company Bahnhof accused Spridningskollen of trademark infringement, claiming the rights on the “spridningskollen” mark and saying it was the first to apply for the trademark rights at the national Patent and Registration Office.

By the way, Bahnhof was the first broadband provider to warn its users about the looming flood of settlement demands and encourage people to assess the severity of the problem by launching the website Spridningskollen.org, which maps the extortion letters from copyright trolls.

After it turned out that the anti-piracy group has stolen their trademark, the ISP decided to take action over the apparent infringement. Bahnhof demands the authorities to shut down the website Spridningskollen.se. The ISP also said there are many different ways that interfere with their operation. It called settlement letters “unethical, anachronistic and counter-productive.”

Besides, the Swedish ISP is calling on the local government to reform copyright legislation in order to prevent such “excessive and overbroad enforcement tactics.” In the meantime, Bahnhof vows to protect its customers from the copyright trolling practice. In other words, the copyright holders won’t get IP-address info and user details from the ISP without obtaining a court order.

Thanks to TorrentFreak for providing the source of the article.