sWEDEn
Barry franks
Brann AB
IP to tHE foRE
Intellectual property was a hot issue in Sweden during 2009. A single- who was running a server upon which audio books were made available
issue party, the Pirate Party, won two of the Swedish seats in the European for downloading. Th e court decided that Ephone was obliged to give the
parliament on the basis of its hostile stance towards IP. subscriber’s details to the publishers. Th is decision has been appealed.
Th e implementation of the Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Th e second case under IPRED concerned Grafi skt Centre, which asked
Directive (IPRED), which came into eff ect on April 1, 2009 in Sweden, Malmö District Court to order Internet service provider Telia Sonera to
was also the subject of much discussion in the media, in particular how to
reveal the identity of one of its subscribers, who had accessed the company’s
fi nd the correct balance between enforcing IP rights while protecting the
computer system without authorisation. In order to bring the case under
integrity of Internet users. Th e IP courts were also active in 2009 and took a
IPRED, Grafi skt Centre claimed that the intruder had had access to and
number of interesting decisions.
thereby violated the copyright of the soft ware system developed by Grafi skt
Centre. Th e evidence supplied by Grafi skt Centre to support the allegations
IPRED-related decisions was a log fi le showing that a database had been opened on several occasions.
IPRED gives a copyright owner the right to ask an Internet service provider
Malmö District Court determined that this was not suffi cient evidence to
for the identity of the subscriber to an IP address that is suspected of
show copyright infringement and decided that Telia Sonera did not have to
being used for illegal fi le-sharing. Internet service providers have objected
disclose the identity of its subscriber.
to this, citing their interest in protecting the integrity, that is to say the
Four fi lm companies fi led a suit at Södertörns District Court against Telia
privacy, of their subscribers. Internet service providers have claimed that
Sonera, which had refused to disclose the details of the people behind
subscribers should have the right to communicate without third parties
Swetorrents. Swetorrents is a fi le-sharing service that allegedly provides
being able to read what they are communicating, as is precisely the case
access to copyright-protected fi lms, some of which have yet to be released.
with a physical letter.
On December 4, 2009, the court decided that Telia Sonerna must disclose
Shortly aft er IPRED came into eff ect, the fi rst case under it was raised the identity of the people behind Swetorrents. Telia Sonerna had earlier
before Solna District Court by fi ve book publishers. Th ey sued the Internet stated that it would appeal a decision against it, but at the date of writing this
service provider Ephone, which had refused to give details of a subscriber article, no appeal has been fi led.
146 World Intellectual Property Review Digest 2009 www.worldipreview.com
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