The UK is being called to tackle illegal downloading with the “three strikes” policy by Jean-Bernard Levy the CEO of a French Broadband provider and content maker, Vivendi.

He also says that if the UK do not clamp down then we will damage our economy because of it.

In France, a law has been passed that illegal downloaders will receive two warnings about their activity and if these warnings are ignored then they could have their Internet access cut off for up to a year.

In the UK, broadband providers such as BT Broadband and The Carphone Warehouse don’t believe that it is their job to police  the Internet or their customers.

Jean-Bernard Levy told a British government sponsored forum on creative industries:

At Vivendi, we are in the content business, we are in the telecom business and there is no internal debate,”

“The priority is not to grow … traffic on the ISPs. The priority is that creators, people who develop content, should find a way (to be rewarded).”

Back in June the Digital Britain report done by Lord Carter it was suggested that repeat offenders should have their broadband speed reduced although no Lord Mandelson is looking at taking this further with temporary disconnection of broadband services for these offenders.