Australians who allegedly illegally downloaded the film Dallas Buyers Club have scored a small victory in the case between their Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and the film’s creators.
The Australian Federal Court has dealt a major blow to Dallas Buyers Club‘s case against the alleged pirates, ruling that the film’s creators cannot send their proposed legal notices to the alleged infringers, and will have to pay the big bucks if they want to continue their case.
As ZDNet reports, Justice Nye Perram dismissed Dallas Buyers Club’s proposed letters to the alleged infringers — which came to light in June this year — on the grounds that two of the four heads of damages the film studio was claiming can’t be recovered.
“The applicant [Dallas Buyers Club] was claiming four heads of damages and was proposing to negotiate with account holders in relation to those four amounts,” Justice Perram has said.
“I’ve concluded that two of those amounts could never be recovered, and in those circumstances, I’ve decided that what is presently proposed by Dallas Buyers Club in terms of its correspondence ought not to be permitted.”
The two heads of damages Justice Perram said the film studio could not collect were damages relating to alleged infringers’ uploading of the film and damages relating to alleged illegal downloads of other copyrighted works. Just Perram said both of these claims were “untenable”.
What’s more, Dallas Buyers Club will now be required to pay a AU$600,000 bond to the Federal Court before it can obtain the names and addresses of Aussies who allegedly pirated the film.
Justice Nye’s decision also effectively prevents the practice of ‘speculative invoicing’, which is when a rights holder sends a letter to an alleged pirate demanding money as compensation to avoid being sued for copyright infringement.
In April, the Federal Court ordered ISPs iiNet, Dodo, Internode, Adam, Amnet and Wideband to disclose details of 4,726 customers who had allegedly downloaded illegal copies of Dallas Buyers Club.
Dallas Buyers Club’s proposed letter to alleged pirates came after ISPs argued that making them hand over customer information would put customers at risk of ‘speculative invoicing’.
The practice will now be effectively impossible, and guilty pirates can at least sleep a little easier.
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