Posted on 09/10/2009 9:57:21 PM PDT by TigerLikesRooster
Foreign porn companies refile suit against Korean netizens
By Kim Eun-jung
SEOUL, Sept. 11 (Yonhap) -- A group of U.S. and Japanese porn companies will refile a lawsuit from next week against South Korean uploaders, their legal representative here said Friday, accusing the country of holding a double standard in investigating copyright violations of local and foreign material.
Some 50 foreign firms sued 10,000 Korean Internet users in July for uploading their adult materials onto local Web sites, but prosecutors limited their investigation to those confirmed to have uploaded content more than three times. Only 10 were punished.
The porn companies said they will refile with a list of 65,000 netizens who fit Seoul's investigation criteria, the agency said.
The companies stepped up their protest after South Korean prosecutors launched a probe into the digital theft of local blockbuster "Haeundae," one of this year's biggest hits, breaking the 10 million viewer mark last month. They say the applied standards and the intensity of the prosecution's investigation into copied foreign porn material were vastly different from those in the "Haeundae" piracy case.
"We believe that (the prosecution) should not be discriminatory in applying copyright laws," an official at the legal firm said. "Illegal copying and distribution run rampant in South Korea because it is one of the world's most wired countries. We decided to take legal action to minimize our past business losses and to protect anticipated future profits."
The firm warned that the porn companies will consider taking their case to the U.S. government should they judge Seoul's investigation to be discriminatory.
Ping!
Will this affect all torrents or just porn torrents?
Sounds like a way to get a ruling that will affect torrents in Korea in general.
I’ll have to see the porn in question to render a verdict, your honor.
Of interest.
Porn makers upset that South Korea enforces copyright For Sci-Fi movies but not for porn.
I don’t see that as anything close to a given.
In fact, if they manage to get the US government to make a plea on their behalf, it could make the Korean government even more intractable.
Can you see it now — Obama defends porn pushers in Korea.
They took our porn! / Southpark reference.
There’s porn on the internet?
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