VPN Trust Initiative (VTI) Opposes Misguided Legal Effort to Extend Website Blocking to VPNs—English and French Versions

As VPN providers have been formally summoned to appear in French court on 10 December as part of Canal+’s anti-piracy efforts, the VPN Trust Initiative (VTI) believes that a coordinated industry response is necessary. The VTI has have published its letter in opposition to any request for French courts to mandate VPN services to block access to potentially infringing streaming websites. You will find English and French versions of the full letter below.

The letter reads in part:

“History has shown that restrictions targeting digital infrastructure fail to address the root causes of piracy. Despite increasing legal pressures on infrastructure providers to tackle content problems on their networks, global piracy rates rise. Focusing on content-neutral tools like VPNs rather than addressing the sources of illegal content not only fails to combat piracy but creates and inflicts collateral damage to cybersecurity and privacy, putting users at risk.

On top of that, these sweeping measures target all VPN services, including those that adhere to strict industry principles (see: VTI Principles), such as robust security and privacy practices.  Users may be pushed toward insecure alternatives, which can lead to cybercrime and other malicious activities. By requiring this group of security and privacy principle-adhering VPN providers to restrict access, this measure is not only unjustified but also exposes French residents to significant new cybersecurity risks, undermining their safety online .”

Here is the full English version: