Two of the largest Internet providers in the Netherlands clashed in court with the local anti-piracy outfit BREIN today. The ISPs argued that blocking The Pirate Bay would be useless, even dangerous, as it could take down the entire network. In addition they feel that this type of censorship violates basic human rights such as freedom of expression. BREIN disputed these concerns and said that the ISPs want to keep The Pirate Bay online because they profit from the site.

After the Dutch anti-piracy outfit BREIN lost its preliminary case against the ISPs Ziggo and Xs4all, the group started a full trial to demand a blockade of The Pirate Bay.

Today the case was heard before Court of The Hague

BREIN wants the largest ISP in The Netherlands to implement a DNS and IP address block of The Pirate Bay, with any future domain names and IP addresses of the site blocked within 24 hours of notification by BREIN.

The anti-piracy group argues that the ISPs can easily block the site with simple technical measures, and that as a result millions of people would be prevented from sharing files via the notorious torrent site.

The ISPs on the other hand claim that these measures are not as simple as BREIN claims, and that their implementation could have disastrous results.

Rebooting network services after adding DNS and IP-filters “could shut down the entire network,” the defense noted.

In addition the defense argued that such measures would be useless because the public can easily circumvent them by using alternative DNS servers and proxy sites. BREIN didn’t refute this, but noted that the blocks are “dummy proof” and that the majority of people wouldn’t jump through hoops to access The Pirate Bay.

Aside from the technical objections the ISPs also said that this type of censorship would violate basic human rights such as freedom of expression. Xs4all lawyer Milica Antic said it would turn the providers into the “Internet police” and that copyright holders should turn to the people who host the site itself.

BREIN countered these arguments and said that freedom of expression is “not that relevant,” and pointed out the copyright holders also have the right to protect their property. The fact that The Pirate Bay also hosts links pointing to legal content doesn’t take away these rights, BREIN’s lawyer said.

BREIN went even further and claimed that the ISPs don’t want to block The Pirate Bay because they “profit” from it. Millions of people in The Netherlands use BitTorrent, and blocking the Pirate Bay would drive people to other providers.

The case between the ISPs and BREIN brings up many of the censorship issues that are also being discussed in the United States at the moment. The pending SOPA legislation would make DNS and IP-blocks standard procedure, something BREIN can only dream of at this point.

The verdict in the case is expected to be announced early next year.