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A German court has ruled that even if the owner of the Wi-Fi connection has prove that they were not responsible for downloading pirated content, they are still liable for damages.
The court case came about when a musician sued the owner of a home Wi-Fi network for engaging in the transfer of pirated content. However, the owner provided prove that the household was on holidays when the infringement occurred, but the judge still ruled in favour of the musician.
"Private users are obligated to check whether their wireless connection is adequately secured to the danger of unauthorized third parties abusing it to commit copyright violation," the court said.
Most Wi-Fi routers are sold with security features turned off, or with the easily broken WEP security protocol used. Some devices, such as the original Nintendo DS, only works with WEP security, not the more secure WPA2. Most home users are unaware of the need for security, and may not be technically competent to implement such a security regime.
But by making owners responsible for their own network connections, it in essence makes it an requirement for users to provide security to their home network, and more dangerously, allows third parties to misuse connections without penalty to them. Criminals could take advantage of this and use hacked connections to conduct serious crimes, which they would not be liable for, only the owners of the connection, which one can consider to be one of the victims of the crime.
British intellectual property barrister David Harris says this ruling is unlikely to stand elsewhere, including in the UK. "There is no criminal provision in English law that requires you to secure a wi-fi connection, and currently no liability for the acts of another party if they misuse your connection," he said.
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The court case came about when a musician sued the owner of a home Wi-Fi network for engaging in the transfer of pirated content. However, the owner provided prove that the household was on holidays when the infringement occurred, but the judge still ruled in favour of the musician.
"Private users are obligated to check whether their wireless connection is adequately secured to the danger of unauthorized third parties abusing it to commit copyright violation," the court said.
Most Wi-Fi routers are sold with security features turned off, or with the easily broken WEP security protocol used. Some devices, such as the original Nintendo DS, only works with WEP security, not the more secure WPA2. Most home users are unaware of the need for security, and may not be technically competent to implement such a security regime.
But by making owners responsible for their own network connections, it in essence makes it an requirement for users to provide security to their home network, and more dangerously, allows third parties to misuse connections without penalty to them. Criminals could take advantage of this and use hacked connections to conduct serious crimes, which they would not be liable for, only the owners of the connection, which one can consider to be one of the victims of the crime.
British intellectual property barrister David Harris says this ruling is unlikely to stand elsewhere, including in the UK. "There is no criminal provision in English law that requires you to secure a wi-fi connection, and currently no liability for the acts of another party if they misuse your connection," he said.
More:
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