Geeker himself wrote a lengthy entry on Filesoup about his ordeal on July 27 and his time spent in a police cell. We contacted Avon & Somerset Police for comment but the force has not responded so far and the force confirmed a 50-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of breaching the Copyright Act on Monday and released on police bail.

SEE ALSO: Video Nasties Gallery: 15 Years Of Anti-Piracy Warnings

The case is being led by anti-piracy group FACT, which confirmed that an investigation is under way but refused to give any other details, such as the man’s name, because “the case is ongoing”. The site doesn’t host copyrighted material—nor even provide a search facility for Torrent files as do trackers like The Pirate Bay—it simply provides several messageboard forums for people that do download content, some of them illegally.

We’ve seen many P2P crack-downs across Europe in recent months, most notably in Sweden, Spain, Italy and the Netherlands, but it’s been some time since a UK case was launched. UK Torrent-tracker OiNK was shut down in 2007 after evidence submitted by the IFPI and BPI.

This arrest shows the move away from FACT targeting physical counterfeit DVD and CD sellers (though it is still busy stopping them) to focusing on online P2P copyright abuse. But it’s not just going after the people that upload content to video-hosting sites, or even the people that download content: it’s after people it suspects of assisting others in breaking the law too.