The most obvious downward piracy trends have arrived in response to rightsholders addressing market demands.
But, when authorities feel something drastic needs to be done, legal crackdowns can also be the weapon of choice. The idea is that these actions will punish offenders while also sending a deterrent message to others who operate in the same business.
Climate of Change
A man recently sentenced in Greece for his role running private torrent site P2Planet, appeared in court at a time when Greek authorities insist piracy will not be tolerated. Right on cue, the criminal court in Piraeus handed down not just a harsh custodial sentence, but one effective immediately, apparently to the surprise of those who attended the hearing.
According to a local report, those present in court were shocked when three police officers handcuffed the 59-year-old local man and escorted him out of the court. He was taken directly to prison for a five-year sentence, with a €10,000 fine, and a €1,800 bill for costs to consider.
A criminal prosecution involving BitTorrent is certainly rare in Greece, with local media reporting the case as a first. The severity of the punishment seems to have come as a shock too. Yet, all things considered, the general outcome shouldn’t have surprised anyone.
A site operator received an identical sentence in 2019, although the judges in that matter declined to issue a fine. Citing “mitigating factors,” the judges concluded that fining someone already in prison would be “meaningless.”
P2Planet: 44,300 Users, 14,000 Torrents
Private torrent site P2Planet came online early 2011 and got off to a bumpy start.
At the time, it wasn’t unusual for sites to be held together with hopes and prayers; from the clues on its front page, P2Planet used PHP BitTorrent tracker and forum TorrentStrike which did have a couple of quite serious issues.
Targeted by DDoS attacks along with other Greek trackers of the day, the site was eventually hacked and later had its database posted online.
More than a decade later, these details are effectively relics of the past but when viewed as a whole, they highlight an interesting point. Multiple Greek news reports clearly identify the convicted man as the operator of P2Planet, while confirming the site’s full domain name, p2planet.net.
A brief statement posted on social media in June 2014 noted that P2Planet had “unfortunately shut down” and that was that. Gone forever.
In parallel, and with no reference to the name of the site, police revealed that a Cybercrime Prosecution Directorate investigation had identified an individual they believed was the operator of a pirate site. On or around June 16, 2014, an officer of the court observed as police raided a man’s home in Piraeus. After confirming his ability to administer the site named in the investigation, he was arrested and a hard drive was reportedly sent for forensic examination.
Since then, snapshots on the Wayback Machine have shown the P2Planet.net domain on a parking page and precious little else, for more than a decade.
10+ Years Between Arrest and Sentencing
P2Planet.net statistics reported in the media in connection with the recent sentencing, claim that the tracker had 44,342 registered members and tracked 14,000 torrents, mostly relating to movies, TV shows and music. Reports also state that users of the site downloaded content with Azureus, a torrent client that received its last update in 2017.
Based on the assumption that the sentencing concerns offenses exclusively committed at P2Planet, the 59-year-old could’ve been as young as 44 or potentially 48 or 49 at the time.
Taking more than a decade to reach a conclusion makes the case stand out against any prosecution that doesn’t involve Kim Dotcom. When compared to similar site closures and prosecutions in Greece, involving one defendant in particular, much more can be done in just over half the time.
The identical five-year prison sentence mentioned earlier concerned the operator of greekstars.net and greekstars.co. Between 2009 and 2012 this individual was prosecuted four times, but each time continued to infringe.
In April 2014, a court in Thessaloniki sentenced the same person to five years in prison in connection with the domain greekstars.biz. The court decided to make that a suspended sentence. In November 2014, after relaunching under the domains greekstars.net and greekstars.co, a return to court led to a five-year prison sentence, starting immediately.
Sending someone almost sixty years old to prison for five years should in theory act as a deterrent. When people remember the site, recall the turmoil surrounding the arrest, and link both to this negative outcome, the deterrent effect is at its strongest.
When stretched out over a decade, there’s a chance that news of a stranger going to prison will mean almost nothing to many people. Others will be indifferent, others will move on without a second thought. As a deterrent, it could hardly get any worse than that
From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.
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