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By Kate Holton Tue Feb 12, 7:56 AM ET

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain could follow France in cutting Internet access to users who repeatedly download music or films illegally.

The government had given the music and film industries a year to come to a voluntary agreement with Internet Service Providers over how to tackle illegal file sharing, but that timeframe expired at the end of 2007.

With no sign of an agreement in place, it is due to publish its options in a strategy document in the coming weeks and a separate consultation later in the year to examine how it can cut down on piracy.

One suggestion put forward by the music industry is to adopt the French model, where warning messages are sent to those who frequently download music or films illegally.

If the messages are ignored, users can have their accounts suspended or closed altogether.

The body representing Internet Service Providers (ISPs) says they would prefer a voluntary agreement but the music industry argues it has been forced to demand legal action after rampant Internet piracy rocked its traditional revenue model.

A report in the Times newspaper on Tuesday suggested ISPs could be legally required to take action against users who accessed pirated material.

An alternative system would be based on filtering, which could block illegal files from being downloaded.

Global music sales were down around 10 percent in 2007 and the international music trade body, the IFPI group, estimates that tens of billions of illegal tracks were swapped in the year.

But John Kennedy, the head of the IFPI, said the mood was turning towards ISPs having to take more responsibility for cracking down on illegal activity.

"It is simply not acceptable for ISPs to turn a blind eye to the piracy on their networks which is at such a rate that there are 20 illegal music downloads for every legal track sold," he said in a statement.

"Record companies have licensed more than six million tracks to over 500 legal services and consumers can now legitimately get access to music online in a wide variety of ways.

"If the French and British governments take action and others follow, there will be more room for the legal market to grow as services will not have to compete with the something for nothing' deal available on the illegal networks that do not invest a penny in generating new music."

A spokeswoman for the Department of Culture, Media and Sport declined to comment on what options would feature in the strategy report.

(editing by Elizabeth Fullerton)

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British illegal downloaders face Internet ban: report

LONDON (AFP) - Internet users in Britain who illegally download films and music face being banned from going online, according to leaked government proposals published in The Times on Tuesday.

According to the plans, the government "will move to legislate to require internet service providers to take action on illegal file sharing" which record companies and film companies say is costing them billions of dollars (euros) in lost revenue.

The proposals were included in a Green Paper -- the first step to changing a law in Britain -- on the creative industries that is due to be published next week.

The Times said that the plans would involve a "three-strikes" regime -- users would first receive an e-mailed warning if they were suspected of illegally downloading films or music.

They would then receive a suspension from their Internet service upon their second offence, and face a termination of their Internet contract if they were caught on a third occasion.

Let me just say this all you big ISP's keep doing what yer doing make your customers mad then sit back and wonder where all your best customers have gone sure follow in the footsteps of the no clue record companys.

Then you'll use the excuse it's the p2p pirates lol.

where the heck did these guys go to business school they should be asking for their money back sheesh.

yep, seen it and read it in the news the last few days... it's the beginning of the corporate takeover of our system here. first it'll be illegal downloading, then it'll be any downloads from unlicenced sites... including indie music. then people will either find anonymous ways to download (but leaving large bandwidth footprints which ISPs will either ignore or just cut off anyway) or will stop downloading all music... and which is worse? the latter, obviously but if millions have their internet cut off because they were downloading something that didn't belong to the majors or was unlicenced then the music industry will effective net themselves more enemies and even more powerful than us. how much damage will they do to us indies in the process i wonder... i fear a lot.

The majors crave control, and they want to eliminate indie (which they can't otherwise control).

Re: anonymous ways to upload/download . . .
Uploading/downloading of music using encryption with random proxy servers can't be tracked, and, as long as the activity uses just typical amounts of bandwidth, this method likely doesn't leave significant footprints or take up too much bandwidth resources. I'm guessing craftiness will prevail.

Private networks would be virtually unstoppable if there is developed a good way around having to use corporate ISPs at all. That day may come.