Between 2007 and 2008, Odex, a Singapore-based anime licencing company, initiated a series of demands and legal actions against internet service providers (ISPs) in Singapore to obtain details of subscribers who they alleged were involved in illegal download activities of content. As the licensor and releaser of Japanese anime for Southeast Asian consumption, the company was appointed by the copyright holders to submit legal documents and court proceedings on their behalf in Singapore.
Actions Japanese copyright owners appointed Odex to engage BayTSP, an anti-piracy service provider, to track illegal downloading activities of Japanese anime in Singapore, using a method similar to that of the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). BayTSP took several months to obtain the IP addresses and evidence of Singaporean illegal downloads, and singled out the website AnimeSuki as a major source, tracking many of its BitTorrent users.
From early 2007 to January 2008, court orders for pre-action discovery with evidence of illegal download activity were issued to various ISPs to request for their subscriber's details. In May 2007, ISP SingNet consented in writing to release details on internet accounts associated with illegal download activity. On 13 August, further documentations were submitted to court, with a court order being issued to ISP StarHub, to reveal the identities of account holders linked to illegal download activities. It was subsequently revealed that Starhub did not disclose account holders' information to Odex as they were reviewing their rights when Odex lost their appeal to Pacific Internet (PacNet).
Japanese copyright owners were represented by law firm Rajah & Tann in the pre-action discovery court procedure to the major ISPs, including its application against PacNet. Odex was the appointed representative of Japanese copyright owners on the legal proceedings and applications to court.
After rulings from the Subordinate Courts of Singapore, letters of demand by Odex were sent to alleged offenders demanding compensation in lieu of legal actions. The recipients were asked to contact Odex within one week and pay settlement fees from S$3,000 to S$5,000 or face legal action. The recipients also had to sign a non-disclosure agreement, promise to destroy all copies of the downloaded anime, and stop downloading the copyrighted material.
Some alleged offenders decided on litigation. The lawsuit ended in 2011 with the Singapore Subordinate court ruling in favour of the copyright owners and penalty being SGD$5,000 per episode damages to be paid to copyright owners for every episode caught for illegal download, totalling SGD$125,000. Interest of SGD$15,095.58 and legal costs of SGD$12,263.76 was also awarded in favour of Japanese copyright owners.
There was speculation from the online community that the company would collect approximately S$15 million from 3,000 individuals from out-of-court settlements, but Odex responded that it did not require each of them to pay a uniform S$5,000. The main factor it considered when deciding the level of compensation to demand was the amount of downloading by each individual. Odex confirmed that more than 3,000 IP addresses had been disclosed as a result of the court orders, but estimated that the amount collected would cover less than 20% of its enforcement costs. The company's director, Peter Go, subsequently revealed that most of the compensation payments had been paid to BayTSP and to ISPs for the retrieval of their subscribers' personal data. He justified his company's actions by stating that, according to BayTSP's statistics, Singapore had one of the highest rates of illegal anime downloads in the world and that Odex wanted to reduce this by 85%.
On 3 September 2007, Odex's director Stephen Sing announced on his company's internet forum that Odex would no longer send letters of demand to Internet users who had stopped their illegal downloading since the beginning of the enforcement drive. Two weeks later, Odex installed an online warning system developed by BayTSP that generated cease and desist emails intended for the alleged downloaders. The company relied on ISPs to forward such emails to their subscribers who engaged in illegal download activity. Sing states that Odex under the instructions of copyright owners would rely on weekly reports generated by BayTSP to continue the anti-piracy drive, and if necessary would resort to legal action if illegal downloading activity escalates.
On 29 January 2008, the High Court handed down its ruling on Odex's appeal that the earlier documentation of Odex as representation of Japanese copyright owners is not sufficient and further documentation of Power of Attorney and Warrant to Act is required. The court upon receiving the additional legal documents from copyright owners ordered Pacific Internet had to release the names of the alleged illegal downloaders details. This ruling does not change Odex's role as Japanese copyright owner's representative to act on their behalf in Singapore.
Reactions The company's actions attracted national media attention and were harshly criticised by the Singaporean anime community as "sudden and severe". Anime fans were outraged by the issuing of legal threats to children as young as nine years old, as they believed children were unable to differentiate between legal and illegal downloading. There were widespread calls in online blogs and forums to boycott Odex's products.
Odex blamed the approximate 70% fall in its Video CD (VCD) and Digital Video Disc (DVD) sales in 2006 and 2007 on illegal downloading. The response of anime fans was that the fall in sales was because Odex's products were inferior, inaccurately translated, and released later than the online versions. Odex subsequently attributed the inaccurate subtitling on censorship laws against mature themes (such as yaoi) and on fansubbers—anime fans who had translated the Japanese dialogue—whom they had hired. In response, the Board of Film Censors said that it did not ask for subtitles to be changed, that it merely classified content, and that the onus was on distributors to ensure accurate subtitles. In addition to problems of quality and scheduling, criticisms were directed at Odex's litigious strategy and poor public relations. Odex received support from the Anti Video Piracy Association of Singapore (AVPAS) in making its demands for compensation.
Stephen Sing was mocked and criticised after posting comments to an online forum which many considered to be gloating. Messages posted by Sing under the nickname "xysing" included "Me too busy suing people" and "Hahahahah! I double-6-ed so many downloaders serve them right!" Sing was labelled the "most hated man in Singapore's anime community" by members of the blogosphere, a wanted poster with his face circulated online, and he was taunted openly in his office. Sing asserted that threats of arson, assault and even death were made against him and filed a police report. Although he expressed regret over the remarks because they were a "PR disaster" and "very wrong", he said that he had written them while feeling frustrated and did not apologise. He dismissed his "double-6-ed" remark, an expression of joy at the threats of lawsuits, as having been made "two months ago", but it was revealed that they had been made only three weeks earlier. A Sunday Times article condemned these online responses as "propaganda" spread by "lynch mobs" and noted that some of these netizens had revealed the home addresses of Odex employees. Odex placed a quarter-page advertisement in The Straits Times on 22 August 2007 to explain its actions.
Members of an online forum expressed their unhappiness by selling "anti-Odex" T-shirts. Another netizen created a video parody, entitled Xedo Holocaust, and uploaded it to YouTube and other video-sharing websites. A website was established giving details of an "Odex VCD recycling drive", where those who joined could exchange their Odex VCDs for a black awareness ribbon to wear. A protest by a few people with several action figurines took place on 25 August 2007 under intense police scrutiny, which was considered by Western observers to be a rarity in Singapore. (Also published in The Brunei Times, 16 September 2007) An online group, Xedo Defense, was set up to provide support for the downloaders facing legal action. It raised funds to hire a collective lawyer from Infinitus Law Corporation to represent two of the downloaders when suits were filed against them in November 2008 by the anime studios.
There were assertions that Odex had charged 10% interest for settlements paid through an instalment plan, but a press release by the company denied that it had required any such interest payments. By September 2007, 105 out of the 300 SingNet subscribers who had received letters had negotiated with and paid Odex, although, in a news conference, Odex said that it had neither forced payment from nor fined anyone. The company explained that it would not profit from the enforcement process and intended to donate to charity any excess amount received. It would also release a financial audit of all the money collected at the close of proceedings. On 31 August 2007, in an attempt to address criticisms of late releases, Odex began to offer video on demand (VOD) on its relaunched website. Users could legally download and unlock a digital rights management (DRM)-protected anime episode at S$2 for seven days.
In mid-November 2007, the cease-and-desist emails initiated by Odex and BayTSP reached several users in Japan, France, and the United States, some in the form of Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) notices from their ISPs. Although Odex and BayTSP announced shortly afterwards that the emails were sent out in error, Japanese commentators suggested that the enforcement action was "a step in a right direction". On 21 November 2007, Odex's website was hacked and defaced and the VOD service put out of action. Its main page was replaced by an angry message against the company's legal actions, and experts interviewed by representatives of the local media said that the perpetrator likely was from Singapore.
Odex v. Pacific Internet
Subordinate Courts' decision On 16 August 2007, Odex initiated legal action against a third Internet Service Provider, Pacific Internet. Odex sought to have Pacific Internet disclose the personal information of about 1,000 subscribers. The closed-door hearing was held on 23 August 2007 in the Subordinate Courts, where District Judge Earnest Lau ruled that Pacific Internet did not have to reveal its subscribers' personal information. Lau believed that Odex was not the correct party to make the application, despite having permission to prosecute on behalf of the Japanese anime studios. The decision came as a surprise to many, and Odex quickly announced its intent to appeal. Although Lau denied Odex the court order, he warned that the right to privacy was no defence for copyright infringement.
In light of the decision, the ISP StarHub, represented by Drew & Napier, said "[we are] assessing our options, given the different decisions rendered by the court". Meanwhile, it was revealed that SingNet had consented to Odex's application, had not instructed its lawyers to attend the hearing, and the two-week deadline for appealing against the application had passed. SingNet's failure to contest Odex's application, perhaps even expediting it, was perceived by some of its subscribers as a voluntary breach of privacy. SingNet later declared that it neither "gave consent" nor assisted Odex in its application for the release of subscriber information, and that its customer subscriptions remained unaffected.