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us-wall-1 In 2012, America missed a golden opportunity to show the world how site blocking and other internet restrictions could be deployed at scale to protect rightsholders’ revenues.

Vast opposition led to the SOPA bill being withdrawn but elsewhere, site blocking was being introduced in one country after another, driven by the same core rightsholders.

Claims that the United States needed to catch up led to a new push towards site blocking. After publicly getting underway in January, a key statistic concerning the common use of blocking outside the U.S. seems to have changed its appearance.

Blocking Democracy

Confirmation that site-blocking was back on the political agenda was announced at CinemaCon in April 2024.

“Site-blocking is a common tool in almost 60 countries, including leading democracies and many of America’s closest allies,” MPA Chairman and CEO Charles Rivkin informed the audience.

“So today, here with you at CinemaCon, I’m announcing the next major phase of this effort: the MPA is going to work with Members of Congress to enact judicial site-blocking legislation here in the United States.”

The FADPA bill, the yet-to-be-published ACPA bill, and new addition Block BEARD bill, represent three different takes on a familiar site-blocking recipe.

Each bill contains more or less of the same core ingredients utilized in countries engaged in blocking elsewhere. The headline figure of 60 countries may have needed some initial adjustment, and potentially even more after democracy entered the site-blocking equation.

“This targeted legal tool mirrors successful approaches used in over 50 democratic countries,” the background text for the Block BEARD bill explains.

Site Blocking and Democracy

block beard bill If site blocking is a common tool in 60 countries around the world, having 50 democracies in the mix seems to imply that blocking is compatible with democratic values.

While that may well be the case, it doesn’t explain the sudden disappearance of 10 countries, which in theory could include “leading democracies” and/or close American allies.

In reality, quietly disposing of a few isn’t such a bad idea. While many countries block pirate sites, some also have a tendency to block other sites for different reasons, including around election time to ensure a ‘fair’ vote. These countries swell the numbers, but on balance the optics aren’t that great.

Framing site blocking as popular in democracies isn’t new. However, the headline figure of 60 countries in which the MPA previously reported positive site-blocking experiences, “with one of the most effective tools” in the toolbox, has no corresponding public list of countries for reference.

As a result, determining how 60 sites became 50 isn’t straightforward. That being said, presentations made available by the World Intellectual Property Organization show blocking countries on a map of the world, and color coded to show the blocking mechanisms they use.

The only thing left to do was add them all up.

Site-Blocking Countries Part 1

Using the presentation slides, data from other sources, and a more clearly defined map, we attempted to identify every country present in the most recent original dated February 2025 (above/far right, below/grayed out) to compile a more detailed list.

Countries potentially identified: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Malaysia, Netherlands, Norway, Philippines, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Thailand, Turkey, United Kingdom, Vietnam (30 countries)

Based on the original map, all of these countries block sites on copyright grounds, but how many are democracies?

Full democracy (22), Flawed democracy (3) Not a democracy (6)

We assume the 22 full democracies above are among the ~50 countries referenced in the bill, but since there’s no official list with every country named, we don’t know which of the remaining countries are accounted for.

Site-Blocking Countries Part 2

Countries potentially identified: Argentina, Benin, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Democratic Republic Of Congo, Ecuador, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Guinea, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Madagascar, Mali, Mexico, Niger, Paraguay, Peru, Republic Of Congo, Senegal, Uruguay, Venezuela (23 countries)

Based on the original map, all of these countries block sites on copyright grounds, but how many are democracies?

Full democracy (2), Flawed democracy (11), Not a democracy (10)

We assume the pair of full democracies are among the ~50 countries referenced in the bill, but since a comprehensive list remains elusive, we draw no firm conclusions.

Overall, we’ll also assume that both full and flawed democracies from both sets qualify for inclusion, which leaves us with 22 full democracies and 14 flawed democracies. That’s 36 countries in total but still short of the ~50 required. If anyone has any additional details to share, please feel free to contact us.

Additional Countries and Aggressive Blockers

Countries that allow site blocking that we initially missed include Israel (barely visible but indeed present on the MPA’s map) and Egypt, which was not identified as included according to the February 2025 presentation.

Whether the latter currently allows site blocking in a usable format isn’t clear. Nor does it help us get closer to the increasingly unlikely target of 50 site-blocking democracies, which comes under further pressure from countries heavily engaging in non-copyright blocking.

Indeed, many countries in the list use their pirate site-blocking capabilities to target other sites for reasons that have nothing to do with copyright. Some clearly need no encouragement to do so.

Furthermore, there are numerous countries that despite having site-blocking ‘on the books’, haven’t blocked any sites in years or haven’t made use of their blocking mechanism at all. Nevertheless, it appears that some must’ve been counted in the overall total.

Blocking Can Always Be Justified

In Europe, full democracies overwhelmingly use their blocking abilities as intended, i.e they’re used to block access to copyright infringing sites. However, most if not all EU countries (plus the UK) currently block access to a number of Russian news outlets in response to the invasion of Ukraine. Rather than censorship, the official reason for blocking is sanctions/misinformation.

Whether one agrees or disagrees that from a perspective of conflict new rules inevitably come into play, blocking access to information on political grounds, using systems designed to block something else, was always inevitable. Every government in the world has some information it would like to suppress, for a wide range of reasons, and the system of government – democracy or otherwise – doesn’t mean much when blocking is presented as justified.

Strategic Friction

Just as regular site-blocking is meant to put an obstacle in the path of a potential infringer, no access to an instant blocking system reduces the likelihood that blocking becomes a go-to solution for all kinds of problems.

Putting a system and/or new legislation in place increases the risk of blocking being used to solve an ‘off-brand’ problem unrelated to its original purpose. Some may argue that would be impossible in a full democracy but events in the UK (1,2) show how quickly things can go in the wrong direction.

It was recently revealed that the government hoped to censor certain types of social media content by having Big Tech do it for them. Of course, that would’ve had a similar effect to the unthinkable and exposes clear underlying intent. In the event of non-compliance and a perceived need to demonstrate strength, it would be better if instant blocking options didn’t exist.

But they do exist, and democracy failed to prevent that. A law that denied any and all additional uses would’ve been useful at the start, at least in hindsight.

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.