With the rise of ebooks, the issue of controlling territorial rights with booksellers — that is, making sure that booksellers are only selling books they have a right to sell within a given region — is becoming a hotter and hotter topic in the industry. At the center of the issue: Amazon, the international bookseller — except, often enough, it’s not supposed to be.

For example, after the British book trade’s leading magazine, The Bookseller, ran a story about how they lied about their address and so found it easy to buy US ebooks on Amazon, instead of the UK versions of the books, the British Publishers Association has complained that “Amazon should scrutinise and strengthen its e-book territorial controls” better.

In another Bookseller report, PA head Richard Mollet, says, “Online retailers should not ignore the territorial rights of publishers and this should be reflected throughout their websites. Their mechanisms to respect territoriality should be scrutinised and, where appropriate, strengthened to give publishers and authors piece of mind.”

He added, “Undermining territoriality goes against our copyright law and against the terms of the contract the UK publisher has with the author. Everybody loses out.”

Mollet says he is “keen to discuss arrangements with Amazon and other online retailers and we have an open dialogue with them to ascertain what would be the best solution for these online territoriality issues,” but the Bookseller points out that “no specific discussion between Amazon and the PA has been scheduled.”

Such talks could prove fruitless, though, judging by the initial Bookseller report about the magazine’s ease at buying US ebooks. It cites one publisher who “claimed to have broken territoriality for the same title 25 times.” According to that person, “Amazon aren’t inclined to do anything about this. It’s not really in their interest to aggressively go after their customers. Amazon makes money, after all, no matter where they are downloading from.”

At least the UK’s biggest bookselling chain has been more responsive to publishers: The Bookseller reports that “Earlier this week Waterstone’s halted the sale of e-books to customers outside the UK and Ireland to comply with the legal demands of publishers regarding the territories into which it can sell digital titles.”