The Netherlands is taking action to combat the illegal downloading of music and films from internet, junior justice minister Fred Teeven said in a statement on Monday.

The changes will give people whose copyright has been infringed the right to go to court to claim compensation. This is already the case for games and software but will now be extended to music and film, the minister said.
Copyright holders will also be able to go to court to request internet service providers block foreign websites from operating in the Netherlands, Teeven said.

Websites
The legislation targets websites which offer large-scale downloading, not private individuals.
‘Consumers do not have to fear they will be criminalised,’ Teeven said. ‘There will be no ‘three strikes’ law as in France and Britain where users can be banned from the internet.’
A spokesman for performing and authors’ rights society Buma/Stemra said the measures are ‘in proportion because the focus is on the facilitator’ rather than the consumer.
The aim is not to criminalise consumers, spokesman Hein van der Rhee told the Telegraaf. ‘It is the sites which earn millions off the backs of composers and writers which need to be tackled,’ he said.