File sharing just became legal in Spain, changing the rules on what is legal, and what is fair.
In a court ruling that will surely shake the Spanish and European legal scene for years to come, a Spanish judge has today declared not only that sites containing links to copyrighted information are legal, but that torrenting copyrighted information for non-profit reasons is also inside of the law.
If you think that we are in some way confused, or kidding, here is a quote from the judge in question:
“P2P networks are mere conduits for the transmission of data between Internet users, and on this basis they do not infringe rights protected by Intellectual Property laws”
It is hard to confuse what that means. Provided that the sharer of the information is not profiting (garnering any revenues whatsoever), off of the transfer, then the action is legal now in Spain according to this new precedent.
Also, the same judge has ruled that websites such as elrincondejesus are perfectly legal, as there is no law on the books saying otherwise. Put together, websites can host torrents, citizens can download them, and torrent the files legally, provided that no one is making a profit along the way.
How long will this last? Time will tell, but happily for Spanish users of Bittorrent, today they are safe.
Via our friends at TorrentFreak.
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