Unlike the speed of light in a vacuum or the infinite journey into Pi, measures to enforce copyright are subject to constant change and perpetual expansion.
As the site-blocking debate revs up in anticipation of a green light in the United States, fifteen years of global site blocking experience is poised to hit the ground running. After that, calls for further improvement and expansion are only a question of time.
Australia: A Decade of Site Blocking
Last month marked the ten-year anniversary of amendments to Australia’s Copyright Act. The Copyright Amendment (Online Infringement) Act 2015 enabled rightsholders to obtain injunctions against ISPs to compel blocking of overseas pirate sites, the same entities now targeted in the FADPA and ACPA bills.
Unfortunately, the 2015 amendments weren’t quite good enough. In 2018, further amendments expanded the threshold test for site blocking orders and extended the provision to search engines; Google began deindexing pirate sites shortly after that, marking a likely world first for Australia and a signal for other countries to follow suit.
Local movie company Village Roadshow in partnership with the usual Hollywood studios, plus Netflix, Amazon, and Apple, are responsible for the majority of blocking applications filed at Australia’s Federal Court. Targeting up to 100 or more pirate sites each, the injunctions usually name in excess of 50 local ISPs as respondents. Not only are the ISPs required to prevent subscribers from accessing the domains on the initial list, but also those subsequently identified by rightsholders as proxies or mirrors.
New Order Handed Down This Week
This week the Federal Court handed down a new blocking order in favor of Village Roadshow, Disney, Paramount, Columbia, Universal, Warner Bros., Netflix, Apple, and Viacom.
The injunction targets 35 pirate streaming sites, many operating from multiple domains, often with significant levels of traffic. The application was filed early April, so turnaround time was roughly three months.
The order is dynamic, meaning it allows additional domains to be added later when reported by rightsholders. In addition to the usual parameters, dynamic blocking in this case encompasses sites using similar domain names, similar branding, or those linked by common ownership. Used regularly in the UK, this aspect of blocking was first deployed in Australia.
Given the nature of the first few sites in the latest injunction, ‘brand blocking’ will see extensive use once again. Several of the largest switch their domain names regularly, but the one constant across all sites is their use of Cloudflare.
If any unrelated sites decide to impersonate a blocked site to get traffic, ‘brand blocking’ won’t discriminate in any way; it can and probably will block everything within its scope.
An Example for the United States?
There are many blocking mechanisms around the world, mostly encouraged, assisted or influenced by major U.S. rightsholders, European sports leagues, and/or their broadcasting partners. Different approaches, strengths, weaknesses, and various quirks are to be expected, especially when countries don’t even share a common language.
Since Australia and the United States are rumored to understand each other perfectly, would the Aussie approach (which in no small part was driven by the demands of the U.S.) be of interest if site blocking gets underway in the United States?
In many ways Australia’s approach should receive more credit than it does. Attention to detail is evident everywhere, and the Court ensures that everyone’s rights are respected, regardless of which side of the piracy battle they’re on, including those not involved at all. While nothing can prevent every blunder, a system like this can only reduce the number. If there have been any blunders in the last decade, we’re aware of exactly none.
Less Haste, More Speed?
How Australia managed to build such a robust and relatively transparent system is the product of many moving parts, but there’s no doubt that paying attention to the rights of all internet users was of critical importance. These things naturally take time and as a result, Australia’s methodical system may absorb a little too much time for those determined to rush.
It takes around 90 days to obtain a blocking order and in the interim, a lot can happen. The “online location” HydraHD listed in the new court order had roughly 4.5 million visitors in April, but just 1.3 million at the beginning of June.
Depending on visitor location, Cloudflare currently prevents access to that domain following legal action by S.R.L. The 12th Player and DAZN in Belgium (pdf). Meanwhile, the site’s alternative .cc domain is currently blocked by various vendors for allegedly spreading malware.
Moving Targets
Other things can happen too. The Australian injunction lists andyday.tv as a blocking target, which makes sense given the 12.7 million visitors the site received in April when the application was filed. Yet a month later, monthly traffic had fallen to just 1.87 million, followed by a further collapse to 653K in June.
Right now the domain doesn’t work at all, while potential replacement andyday.cc is likely to disappoint pirates. It was recently transferred to the Motion Picture Association, most likely following some type of action by the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment.
New domains may improve a pirate site’s visibility for a while, but new domains can also be added to Australian blocking orders. Comments by the Court indicate that the process of adding new domains may take a week or two. On one hand that ensures fewer mistakes but on the other, rightsholders seem to have something quicker in mind for their automated, state-of-the-art blocking program in the U.S.
Or at least, that’s as far as we know. Those who actually know aren’t sharing the details right now.
The Federal Court order in Roadshow Films v Telstra [NSD190_2025] is available here (pdf)
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