

In the UK? Don't secure your wifi - bensummers
http://revk.www.me.uk/2010/04/dont-secure-your-wifi.html

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joshsharp
This sounds ridiculous but in fact a link in the article clarifies:
<http://aaisp.net.uk/legal-cp.html>

"If you are a subscriber then the Digital Economy Act means we will have to
pass on copyright infringement reports we get about your IP addresses; count
those reports; and maybe take measures to block or restrict your internet
service. If you are a communications provider or service provider we do not
have to do any of those things as they only apply to subscribers."

Although it's worth noting this ISP doesn't require you to have unsecured wifi
to be a communications provider: "A communications provider is anyone that is
providing a communications service to anyone else, whether other people in
their house or office, visitors wanting to check their email"

Sounds like just about anyone qualifies as long as they have a wifi network
and go to the effort of telling their ISP they're a "communications provider".

~~~
eli
And how many ISPs go along with that? It's definitely against my ToS to resale
my bandwidth

~~~
teamonkey
ISPs may change their ToSes to allow it as it's less hassle for them than
enforcement of the DEB.

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pmichaud
This one of those legal logic puzzles that geeks love to do, but that lawyers
roll their eyes at.

He uses a series of statutes to show that if you have public wifi you exist in
a legal gray are between subscriber and service provider, and therefore you
can't be monitored by your ISP or held accountable for copyright infringement.
Good luck with that.

~~~
kez
I didn't read this as an exercise as avoiding accountability for copyright
infringement, I read it as a thought exercise that picks apart the Digital
Economy Bill for the joke that it is.

I would like to fill the House of Commons with all those who voted for the
bill and have someone read out said thought exercise to see how many of them
remotely understand it.

~~~
Quarrelsome
Do you read the Hansard? Read the comments by Lord Whitty as per the digital
economy bill. Ministers/Lords are making the points we want discussed, however
in a lot of cases they are ignored due to the power of the whip.

~~~
flipbrad
The minister that promoted the bill typo'd that IP in IP address referred to
'intellectual property'

Freudian, or just cretinous? let's hope the Lib Dems get their way and repeal
the bloody thing. [http://www.boingboing.net/2010/04/08/minister-for-
digital.ht...](http://www.boingboing.net/2010/04/08/minister-for-digital.html)

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binarymax
Along with following those excellent instructions, you can make it even more
rock solid:

If you have rights to register your address as a business then you can easily
do this through your own limited company. Make yourself the company secretary
and give yourself 1 share of stock. If you are on BT (or similar with a
business internet plan), you can easily switch to a business account - which
is usually the same price. With BT they automatically enable your new business
hub as open on the BT Openzone (Disable it, and unsecure your wifi). Register
with companies house with your SIC code as 64200 (Telecommunications). You
should be good to go.

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pierrefar
In the UK? Don't unsecure your wifi, but have a word with your MP.

Some background on who voted for it:
[http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/apr/08/digital-
eco...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/apr/08/digital-economy-bill-
passes-third-reading)

~~~
bensummers
I think the point of the article was to point out the ignorance of those who
drafted the bill, not as a practical suggestion.

I'm sure that if you tried this, our friendly authorities would find something
else to accuse you of.

~~~
pierrefar
I take your point, and as a voter, it's really informing my decision. That's a
practical suggestion.

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Anon84
This sounds a bit like the idea that you don't have to pay income tax in the
US... You might think you're safe, but the courts will probably disagree.

~~~
arvinjoar
I followed the TPB trial,and I have read some things about Irwin Schiff, and
what I've seen is exactly what you are saying. Even though some people find
loopholes that should allow them to do X, the courts simply dismiss the
loopholes as if they weren't there. Ultimately, those who are closest to the
enforcement of the laws, make the laws, it's not the the politicians, it's the
police. Do not misunderstand me, politicians do make the laws, but what I am
trying to say is that it's not the politicians who will interpre them or
enforce them, the ultimate responsability to enforce a law falls on the
police, if they fail to enforce a certain law, it might aswell not exist. Law
is force.

~~~
boredguy8
Richard Elmore wrote in 1980: "The emergence of implementation as a subject
for policy analysis coincides closely with the discovery by policy analysts
that decisions are not self-executing. Analysis of the policy choices matters
very little if the mechanisms for implementing those choices is poorly
understood. In answering the question, 'What percentage of the work of
achieving a desired governmental action is done when the preferred analytic
alternative has been identified?' Allison estimated that, in the normal case,
it was about 10 percent, leaving the remaining 90 percent in the realm of
implementation."

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barrkel
I'm not 100% sure of my own status. I use bethere.co.uk (now part of O2), but
I'm a Be Pro customer, which means I can provide access to anyone merely
located at my endpoint, rather than residing at my endpoint (which is the case
for non-Pro customers). Similarly, as a Pro customer I could be running a
business (not just a sole trader) and using this connection as the means for
employees to access the web. Doesn't that mean that I'm technically more in
the line of provider than subscriber?

FWIW, I run two APs, one with WPA2 and one open. The open one is routed
through another machine (DNS / DHCP / etc. server) which keeps track of
mappings between IP leases and MAC addresses, but doesn't do any accounting or
snooping other than that.

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motters
Even if this is legally correct, I expect that they will close down this
loophole within a few years. The effects of the Digital Economy Bill have yet
to be felt, but one thing that seems certain is that potentially a lot of
erroneous allegations or disconnections could take place. Perhaps a more
proactive way to deal with this is to build up a legal defence fund for people
wrongly accused of copyright violation and to vigorously contest such cases.

In the longer term, and assuming that current trends continue, aggressive
enforcement of copyrights will be very good for creative commons media and
free/open source software.

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staticshock
It seems unlikely that anyone will be able to buy service as a communications
provider in the same fine-grained quantities in which a subscriber can buy it.
I don't know how pricing is generally structured for ISPs, but I would guess
that if you're buying service as a communications provider you are assumed to
have at least x number of customers, and will be charged accordingly.

Cute idea, though.

~~~
dotBen
"It seems unlikely that anyone will be able to buy service as a communications
provider in the same fine-grained quantities in which a subscriber can buy it"

It is simple. Assuming the Ts&Cs don't define you as a subscriber, you simply
write an official letter to your ISP stating that you are purchasing their
service as a communications provider and not a subscriber and that upon
receipt of the letter they acknowledge their notification of this.

Pop it in the post with registered mail (so you have proof they received it)
and you are done.

Whether it stands up in court, though, is another thing...

