Britons who download and share pirated content on the internet could face up to ten years imprisonment under new Government proposals.
The news comes following calls from the UK Intellectual Property Office (UK IPO) to tighten the screws on pirates – and impose similar sanctions to those typically used to battle the rise of counterfeit goods.
First unveiled in late May as part of The Queen’s Speech, the Government’s Digital Economy Bill proposes a maximum ten year prison sentence for copyright infringement – as opposed to the current maximum penalty of two years.
A previous Government statement read: “a maximum sentence of ten years allows the Courts to apply an appropriate sentence to reflect the scale of the offending.”
However, the UK IPO has spoken out against ‘hysterical’ reports that the increased maximum penalty would directly target casual downloaders who commit ‘minor infringement’.
A UK IPO document read: “There are already a range of safeguards in place which would limit the risk of a very low level infringer being subjected to a high penalty in practice”.
The UK IPO said that infringement would need to be “proven to the criminal standard, beyond reasonable doubt,” and that “the level of penalty should [always] meet the scale of the crime”.
It added: “enforcement agencies and private prosecutors have a staged response system, encompassing education, ‘cease and desist’ notices, and domain suspension”.