A trial of the program uncovered more than 1100 attempts to download Chicken Little

A trial of the program uncovered more than 1100 attempts to download Chicken Little

Powerful, intrusive new technology is about to be used to spy on New Zealanders online.

The software, developed to hunt movie pirates, can track internet searches in what an international privacy watchdog says is an alarming intrusion. It can trace Google searches and other download attempts back to the computer they came from.

New Zealand anti-piracy investigators used the program in a recent trial, discovering 1153 attempts to illegally download hit children's movie Chicken Little.

Now the Weekend Herald can reveal that the Motion Picture Association, a consortium of major movie studios, is about to use the anti-piracy program fulltime.

The way it could allow private companies to intrude on personal computer use and gather evidence for legal action has raised concerns with internet companies, the Privacy Commissioner and the police.

The New Zealand Federation against Copyright Theft, the MPA's representative here, will use the software to identify pirates by their IP address - a computer's unique identity.

It could track the IP address to the internet company which holds the user's details. The internet company could then agree - or be compelled - to give those details to NZfact.

Federation executive director Tony Eaton said action against pirates could begin with a "cease and desist" letter.

In more serious cases, Mr Eaton said, the police could be informed, a search warrant executed, the computer seized and the user prosecuted under the Copyright Act. It is believed that nobody has yet been prosecuted here for downloading movies or music off the internet, although it has happened overseas.

"If the anti-piracy message isn't getting through, then this is one of the tools we will use," Mr Eaton said.

He described the pirate-hunting software as "basically a search engine that searches the search engines", not spyware or a virus.

Mr Eaton has appointed a internet investigator whose first job will be to try to get the co-operation of internet companies in giving the details behind the IP addresses. However, ihug and Orcon have said they would not give up the information without a court warrant.

Privacy Commissioner Marie Shroff said computer users could ask her to investigate. "It is understandable that people can feel strongly about companies covertly accessing information from their personal computers," she said. "It is an intrusion into personal space."