Obama under fire for British student extradition from US over TVShack accusation

American president, Barack Obama fielded questions from people across the US, who were given the chance to grill the Commander in Chief during a live web chat through the social networking site Google+ Hangout.

Thanks to an internet campaign, a question regarding the plight Sheffield Hallam student Richard O'Dwyer, 23, who is facing jail in the US if found guilty of copyright infringement, was the most frequent submission.

Anti-piracy legislation critic Michael Mozart asked the president directly: “Why are you personally supporting the extradition of British citizen Richard O'Dwyer for solely linking to copyright-infringing works using an extradition treaty designed to combat terrorism and to bring terrorists to judgement in the USA?”

Obama palmed off questions about O’Dwyer’s case as an issue for the Department of Justice.

Speaking more generally about copyright infringement, the president said: “We want to make sure that the creative works of people in this country aren't expropriated but we want to do it in a way that's consistent with internet freedom.”

O'Dwyer created the now defunct website TVShack, which did not store copyrighted material but provided links to places that did.

Despite not facing charges in the UK, a British court ruled last month that he could be sent to face trial under US law.