“In April last year Sweden’s Internet tr…
“In April last year Sweden’s Internet traffic took a dramatic 30 per cent dip as the country’s new anti-file sharing law came into effect.
“Prior to this, Sweden, the home of the Pirate Bay, had been a hotbed of illegal trade in movies and music.
“But several months later traffic levels started to surpass the old levels. Consultancy firm Mediavision found that the accessing of illegally shared movies, TV shows and music simply recovered. But there was with one crucial difference. Much of the internet traffic was now encrypted.
“In other words, the very laws the entertainment industries had lobbied politicians to pass in order to protect their industry, had created the even bigger headache of untraceable file sharing.
“For them, this will be the legacy of the Digital Economy Bill.
“But a worse legacy will be the wrongly accused (without the presumption of innocence) and the technology innovators discouraged from innovating, and thus actually creating the new digital economy the Government continually lauds with words but not, it turns out, with actions.”
