Confirmed: web blocking in Digital Economy Bill

Despite firm warnings from ourselves, Consumer Focus and others, Liberal Democrat and Tory peers Lord Clement Jones and Howard pushed through an amendment allowing the courts to order web blocking for ‘substantially infringing’ websites.

Later today, protests prompted a public justification of the approach from Clement Jones, on LibDem Voice which got torn apart, mostly by fellow Liberal Democrats.

Thus we are faced with an appalling sight: on the one hand, Labour, pushing Clause 17 as a means to ‘future proof’ copyright against new infringement, and on the other, the Lib Dems and Tories, pushing an approach likely to produce straightforward threats, bans and withdrawals of sites with user generated content.

We will be asking to meet the Liberal Democrat and Conservative front benches. We will let you know if they can find time for us.

Take action

In the meantime, you should take action yourself. You should write to your local paper, about the disconnection proposals, and these new measures for web blocking and backdoor censorship, and make this a national political debate. And if you haven’t already, join ORG.