The founder of a pirate website called surfthechannel.com has become the first Briton to be jailed for providing links to illegal copies of films and TV shows and thereby facilitating copyright infringement.
Anton Vickerman was jailed for four years at Newcastle Crown Court last month after being found guilty of two counts of conspiracy to defraud, which prosecutors said had cost the film and TV industries between £52m and £198m in revenue.
Vickerman’s website circumvented British copyright laws by linking to pirated content instead of hosting it. Because of that, the Federation Against Copyright Theft (FACT), which is funded by Hollywood and affiliated with the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), set up a sting operation to catch Vickerman.
During one of the arranged meetings with an undercover agent, Vickerman revealed that the site had an average of 400,000 visitors each day and made about $50,000 in monthly revenue from ads.
Ultimately, the UK authorities decided not to pursue a case against the Vickermans. However, FACT and the MPAA were allowed to pursue a private prosecution over conspiracy to defraud, which ultimately resulted in Vickerman’s jail sentence. Vickerman’s wife Kelly faced the same charges but was cleared by the jury
FACT was delighted at the result of the case, with its Director General Kieron Sharp saying: “Mr Vickerman knew what he was doing from the outset, having been involved in the pirate community for some time.
“This was not a passive search engine. Surfthechannel was created specifically to make money from criminal activity and it became the biggest site of its kind on the internet within two years.
“The sentencing indicates the severity of the offences committed and the sophistication of his criminal enterprise and should send a very strong message to those running similar sites that they can be found, arrested and end up in prison.”
For more information about intellectual property law, speak to our solicitor Chloe Bunn.