Quote:
Originally Posted by squidge
On reading some other forums i am becoming increasingly worried that this is never going to go away. Even when Lawdit have written to DL on behalf of some of the accused, they have still not backed down, standing by their argument that an IP address is enough and that they will obtain a court order to go to the ISP and obtain more information.
I am going to write back today and tell them the truth in that I can't provide info about my router etc as I no longer have the same ISP or equipment....not even the same computer. God knows what they will come up with next, some people on the other forums have been corresponding for up to 2 years!!!
I'll give DL one thing....there bloomin persistant. Incidently my letters seem to come through quite quickly, I have had 3 since end of Jan, some people are waiting months between letters....not sure if this is of any significance.
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Welcome to the world of law.
As cook 1984 said, this is not a criminal matter, you will never get a criminal record from this business.
Davenport Lyons have certainly displayed quite a flurry of activity recently. This isn't that unusual behaviour. It's probably either to get everything in before the SRA complaint is completed, or to unsettle you.
According to UK law, they have 6 years from the date of the alleged infringement to take you to court. It is astonishingly unlikely that they will admit they are in any way wrong, preferring instead to let the 6 years lapse without comment.
It is also astonishingly unlikely they will take you to court if you have already replied and denied. Davenport Lyons take great care never to accuse you of doing anything - they have no proof of that. Their only evidence is an IP address which only identifies your connection. They state, with grand words and much lawyerly hand waving that they will hold you responsible for the infringement.
There is no legal method for them to do this (which doesn't stop them from trying). Unfortunately, you cannot take an internet connection to court. Try shouting at your phone socket to see if £500 comes out. I'm willing to bet it won't.
Look at it this way: If it were the case that the person providing the connection could be held liable for infringement (which they did not authorise), every ISP in the country would have been out of business a long time ago.
Relax. They have sent out letters stating "we are preparing court papers as we speak" to people. That was in 2007. Nothing has happened.