Criminal copyright proposals: are they appropriate in the information era?

Abstract

There has been an increasing tendency to implement criminal IP provisions into UK law. This paper proposes that the current UK law should not be reformed so as to have increased criminal penalties, because such penalties when applied to information can be too blunt in an information society. This is particularly so in the information age where the UK system of economic IP rights is similarly becoming an increasingly blunt tool, where convergence of technologies may lead to overlapping and unexpected legal complexities, and where information is increasingly becoming a unit of exchange. It is important to work towards certainty in an environment of legal uncertainty and increasing criminal penalties should not be considered unless the legal situation is more certain. The proposals in their current form are not what we term ‘appropriate’, ‘affordable’, or ‘feasible’.