Three Strikes Law For French Pirates

The French Senate has voted in favor of a law that will throw persistent illegal file sharers offline after two warnings.

The French Senate has overwhelmingly (297-15) voted in favor of a law that would penalize persistent illegal file sharers by severing their net connection after two e-mail warnings. The proposal is now heading to the French National Assembly for approval, the BBC reports.

In November 2007, when the law was first mooted, President Nicolas Sarkozy called it “a decisive moment for the future of a civilized Internet.”

French ISPs will become watchdogs to keep tabs on their customers, and if the law is enacted there will be a new government body to oversee the anti-piracy work. The Senate rejected an amendment that would have seen a fine rather than a net cut-off for offenders.

If enacted, the law will see France butting heads with the EU, which rejected a similar Europe-wide three-strikes law earlier this year, saying tossing people offline contravened "civil liberties and human rights."

Sweden is also supposedly working on a law, which might come into effect next year, to make finding and prosecuting net pirates easier.