Piracy: More prevalent than previously thought

Ofcom commissioned a study into so-called 'illegal' (or not, see below) downloading of copyrighted content (i.e. piracy) online which has revealed that the issue is wider than previous research has suggested, with around twice as many web users having partaken in it than had previously been thought.

The study showed that as many as 30.9% of web users in the UK had undertaken unauthorised downloads (unauthorised rather than illegal as this is a civil manner and not a criminal one) of copyrighted content and come out alongside a pair of other studies that Ofcom published in order to fulfil their reporting obligation as a result of the anti piracy provisions of the Digital Economy Act.