U.K. ISPs ordered to block torrent sites

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LONDON, Feb. 28 (UPI) -- Britain's highest court has ruled the country's major Internet service providers must block three websites accused of offering links to pirated material.

The High Court ordered the ISPs to block access of their users to Kickass Torrents, H33T and Fenopy, cited by the British Phonographic Industry as infringing copyrights on a "significant scale," the BBC reported Thursday.

The mandated ISP blocking follows a similar ruling last year involving The Pirate Bay, a file-sharing site founded in Sweden.

"The growth of digital music in the United Kingdom is held back by a raft of illegal businesses commercially exploiting music online without permission," BPI head Geoff Taylor said following the court's action.

"Blocking illegal sites helps ensure that the legal digital market can grow and labels can continue to sign and develop new talent."

Loz Kaye, the leader of Pirate Party UK, said the BPI was "out of control."

"The British music industry has nothing positive to show from their site blocks and personal legal threats," he said.

"Looking at sales figures from 2012, you can't draw the conclusion that stopping access to the Pirate Bay did anything to help artists."

"The United Kingdom has now handed the power over what we see on the Internet to corporate lobbyists," he said.