IRELAND (CelebrityAccess MediaWire) — The Irish Recorded Music Association a recording industry trade association have taken legal action against a pair of Ireland-based Internet Service Providers (ISPs) who they claim are not taking sufficient action against people illegally sharing copyrighted material.
The lawsuit stems in part, from a legal settlement against Irish telecom Eircom, who agreed to block persistent downloaders by instituting a "three strike" system. The IRMA then set their sights on making other ISPs in Ireland tow the same line, and had been pressuring them to conform, however the Internet Service Providers' Association of Ireland (ISPAI) had resisted these efforts, describing them as "spurious," Billboard reported.
Now IRMA has filed suits in an effort to give their pressure some teeth and some of Ireland's biggest ISPs, including the telco BT Ireland and cable provider UPC Ireland have been named litigation, the Irish Times reported.
A similar, "three strike" system was recently rejected by a French court and the European Union's Parliament also rejected the plan, stating that Internet access was a "fundamental right." – CelebrityAccess Staff Writers
