Film theft in the UK - Future of Copyright

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the local authority order to cease allowing the
illegal practice. In default an injunction can be
sought. Alternatively an offence could be
created for failure to comply with the notice;
• A requirement for the person giving
registration details to the authorities on behalf
of the trader to be over 18 years. This is
intended to clamp down on the habit of
traders using under-age children as a front for
their illegal activity in order to avoid liability.
While it will not be able to stop this entirely, it
will ensure that an adult has to be present
when registration is taking place and will
remain within the precinct of the market;
• Amendment of the Proceeds of Crime Act to
enable trading standards to recover the costs of
prosecution of IP offences. This would help
address the problem of local authorities not
having sufficient funds to allocate to
prosecution of IP crime and ensure that serious
IP offences could be pursued in the courts;
• Enaction of Sections 107A and 198A to give
TSOs the power to enforce copyright;
• Make it a legal obligation for Trading
Standards to submit information on
investigations and prosecutions being
undertaken for IP infringement to the Patents
Office. This would require amendment to
Copyright Designs and Patents Act (in tandem
with implementation of s107A) and to the
Trade Marks Act 1994, and possibly to TDA as
well to allow disclosure to the Patents Office
and to include investigations; and
• Introduction of an improved registration
scheme that would require owners and
organisers of occasional sales to notify the local
Trading Standards authority 21 days in advance
as well as place an obligation on the organiser
to gather names, address and vehicle licence
details of all dealers at the sale. The Alliance
also recommends pressing for an obligation on
organisers also to note the type of goods being
sold (eg anyone selling new DVDs is going to
be of interest).
The need for international
co-operation
The international element in computer-related
crime creates new problems and challenges for
criminal procedural law. Systems may be
accessed in one country, the data manipulated
in another and the consequences felt in a third.
Pirates can operate physically in one country,
move electronically across the world from one
network to another and access databases on a
different continent. The result of this is that
different sovereignty jurisdictions and laws
come into play. More than in any other transnational
crime, the speed, mobility and
flexibility of computer crime challenge the
existing rules of criminal procedural law.
Law enforcement agencies have argued for the
preservation of a minimum of traffic-related
data considered as essential for investigating
and prosecuting computer crime offences. Cooperation
between industry, law
enforcement/judiciary and privacy authorities in
identifying whether this could be acceptable
and what, if any, these minimal elements could
be, is clearly needed.
Given the trans-national nature of these crimes,
the need for enhanced co-operation in the
enforcement of copyright is therefore
particularly acute. Yet the trans-border
character of offences enters into conflict with
the territoriality of national criminal law 51 .
An Internet strategy must include an
understanding that activities contemplated
may require defensive litigation in a foreign
country because of the uncertainty as to what
law governs electronic contracts. A premise in
international copyright law is that copyright
protection is territorial: each country
determines what is the scope of copyright
protection and the remedies available in case of
infringement. This territorial approach is under
strain with regards to the digital world. Which
law is applicable in the case of online
exploitation? This is a crucial question if one is