ISP Issues Rare Apology to ‘3 Little Piggies Cafe’ Over Customer Pirate Downloads Accusations

• The ISP acknowledged the mistake of sending a warning letter regarding illegal downloads to a business account.
• Almost all HoReCa offers free Wi-Fi to guests, and the Irish ISP made the company liable for piracy activities conducted by guests.
• The mistake, it appears, resulted from Eir believing the letter had been sent to a residential customer.

Following pushback, Irish ISP (Internet Service Provider) “Eir” has issued a formal apology to the Irish 3 Little Piggies cafe’s owner after accusing the business of enabling music piracy through its free Wi-Fi service last year.

Paul Walsh, the owner of the cafe in Cork, Ireland, received a warning letter from the ISP. The letter cited Eir's 'three strikes' anti-piracy policy and warned of potential disconnection if further infringement occurred.  

Initially implemented over 15 years ago, such protocols allowed rightsholders to track IP addresses engaged in illegal file sharing through Torrent platforms. ISPs were tasked with identifying subscribers connected to these activities, issuing warnings, and terminating accounts for repeat offenders.  

While innovations like YouTube and Spotify’s free-tier service have drastically reduced music piracy via Torrents, the 3 Little Piggies case shows the policy remains active at Eir.  

The warning letter claimed that Walsh was responsible for future violations, even though he provided Wi-Fi as a courtesy to patrons. This raised questions about what liability could arise if guests downloaded anything illegal. 

After reviewing Walsh’s account details, Eir acknowledged the mistake and clarified that its ‘three strikes’ program applies solely to residential customers and does not include business accounts.  

The apology from Eir—a rare occurrence in these kinds of disputes—acknowledged that the warning letter should never have been sent in the first place.  

What’s more, details of Eir’s enforcement tactics raise further questions. For instance, a leaked document from 2009 outlining the original draft protocol for administering the three-strikes program revealed various procedural flaws.  

The warning letter to 3 Little Piggies lacks sufficient evidence against the alleged offender. Critical details required for verification, such as copyright ownership, time-stamped investigation data, and hash identifiers for the copyrighted material, were absent in the notice issued to Walsh.  

The warning letter notes that the alleged infringement investigation began and ended at precisely the same time, which allegedly hardly constitutes an investigation, undermining confidence in the three-strikes protocol's validity.