Suspend your internet connection.

This has finally breached the media membrane although the web's been whittering on about it for ages now - if your internet provider suspects that you're downloading illegal stuff they might suspend your account.

Now everyone online seems to have pounced on the word "suspect" and given it a pounding along the lines of 'how dare they cut of your service for something they think you may have done' then the talk of how it might not be you doing this, which given the track record of some companies record-keeping isn't entirely unjustified, and how someone might be using your connection without your knowledge or using a shared connection etc. etc.

Okay stop - they're a business providing you with a service that you are paying for. You are not entitled to an internet connection, when you signed up with them you agreed to their terms and conditions which I have very little doubt contained a clause along the lines of 'Given X days notice we can disconnect you from our service for any reason we want'.

They get it wrong and disconnect you for something you haven't done - take your business elsewhere; it's not as if you still have to pay them. If you can't switch because they've told everyone you're a illegal downloader then you sue them for defamation or complain to the Data Protection Agency for breach of confidentiality.

My annoyance is over the GMTV report that a) talked about this as if it's only children doing it; b) that the only thing being transferred illegally is music; and c) parroted the record industry's quote of losing £X billion pounds in lost revenue. Rubbish, rubbish, and more rubbish.