File sharing service abolishes sharing function due to EU Digital Services Act

It has been discovered that the file sharing service 'Ulož.to' has abolished the file sharing function and will limit downloading of files only to the person who uploaded them. According to Ulož.to, this change is to comply with the EU's Digital Services Act (DSA).

Pro novináře | Ulož.to Disk

File-Sharing Giant Uloz.to Bans File-Sharing Citing EU's Digital Services Act * TorrentFreak

Court Orders File-Sharing Service to Pay $46,000 Piracy Damages For User Upload * TorrentFreak
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Ulož.to is a file sharing service operated in the Czech Republic. The operator says, ``We have carefully checked whether it complies with Czech and European laws,'' but in reality, there are users who use it to share pirated copies of videos and music.

In 2020, the Czech film distribution company CineMart filed a lawsuit against Ulož.to, demanding that it block search results for the movie title 'Šarlatán.' must be filtered and blocked.' However, in the second instance following Ulož.to's appeal, the High Court overturned the district court's decision and ruled that the block was unnecessary.

CineMart subsequently filed a lawsuit demanding damages from Ulož.to for sharing copies of its films without permission. The Prague District Court ordered Ulož.to to pay 976,000 Czech Koruna (approximately 6.54 million yen). Judge Jana Przybylova, who was in charge of the trial, concluded that ``From at least December 9, 2020 to February 2023, the copyrighted works owned by the plaintiff were available for download on Ulož.to.''

Rudolf Reschka, CineMart's legal representative, expressed his joy in response to the ruling, saying, ``This is the first time we have won a lawsuit seeking financial compensation against a repository operator.'' It has been announced that an investigation has begun against .to.

In its appeal, Ulož.to argued that the authorities' investigation related to financial statements and was unrelated to the trial.

However, in November 2023, the policy changed. We have announced that from December 1, 2023, based on DSA, we will be able to download only files that you have uploaded to your storage. Although the file itself will not be deleted, you will no longer be able to make the file public or share it using a link.

If users of the paid version do not request continued use, they can switch to the free version or delete their account, in which case they will receive a refund according to the remaining period.

The change in policy was prompted by the Motion Picture Association (MPA), an American film industry group consisting of Sony Pictures, Walt Disney Studios, Warner Bros., Universal Pictures, Paramount Pictures, and Netflix. It is believed that he has even referred to .to as a ``market with a bad reputation.''