Australian Screen Association

Australian Screen Association
Formation 2004
Type NGO
Purpose Copyright protection lobbying
Region served
Australia
Affiliations Federation Against Copyright Theft
Website www.screenassociation.com.au

The Australian Screen Association (ASA) (formerly known as Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft) is an anti-piracy lobby group that was established in 2004. Its aim is to protect the film and television industry and retailers from what it claims are adverse impacts of copyright infringement in Australia. The Australian Screen Association is affiliated with the United Kingdom organisation, Federation Against Copyright Theft and the United States organisation MPAA.

ASA actively works to reduce camcorder recording of films screened in cinemas. It is also dedicated to educating people about its own view of copyright infringement.

In mid-2011, the Pirate Party Australia accused AFACT of intimidating ISPs after they threatened unspecified actions if they didn't engage with the organisation in talks on file-sharing.[1]

A classified Wikileaks cable revealed that AFACT was acting as the MPAA's Australian subcontractor and that the MPAA wanted to avoid the view that the court case was about Hollywood trying to bully an Australian ISP.[2]

Members

The organisation comprises Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment, 20th Century Fox, Paramount Pictures, Roadshow Entertainment, Sony Pictures, Universal Pictures, Warner Brothers and the MPAA.[3]

Court case

The organisation brought a lawsuit to the Federal Court of Australia against Australian internet service provider, iiNet, on 20 November 2008, alleging that iiNet had authorised copyright infringement on its network. AFACT had used Dtecnet, a company that tracks online copyright infringement to discover users sharing copyrighted content through BitTorrent.[4]

The Federal Court decision cleared iiNet on 4 February 2010. Justice Cowdroy found that "mere provision of access to internet is not the means to infringement".

AFACT lost its appeal to the Federal Court on 24 February 2011.[5] It was ordered to pay iiNet's legal bills.

AFACT lost a further appeal to the High Court of Australia on 20 April 2012.[6]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Renai LeMay (13 July 2011). "AFACT strong-arming ISPs: Pirate Party". ZDNet Australia. CBS Interactive. Retrieved 14 January 2012.
  2. ↑ Richard Chirgwin (31 August 2011). "Wikileaked cable: AFACT was MPAA’s cat’s-paw". The Register. Retrieved 14 January 2012.
  3. ↑ "About Us". AFACT. Retrieved 14 January 2012.
  4. ↑ Josh Taylor (30 November 2011). "iiNet vs. AFACT: the road to High Court". ZDNet. CBS Interactive. Retrieved 14 January 2012.
  5. ↑ Chris Jager (24 February 2011). "iiNet vs AFACT: Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft loses appeal". PC & Tech Authority. Haymarket Media. Retrieved 14 January 2012.
  6. ↑ "High Court Judgment Summary: Roadshow Films Pty Ltd & Ors v iiNet Ltd" (PDF). 20 April 2012.
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