RIAA targets Usenet/Newsgroup Provider

[punky]

There have been weak, sporadic attempts in the past, but finally the RIAA hve launched a concertive attack on Usenet providers. It had to happen eventually.

Major record labels - Arista, Atlantic, BMG, Capitol, Caroline, Elektra, Interscope, LaFace, Maverick, Sony BMG, UMG, Virgin, Warner Bros. and Zomba have filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against Usenet.com.

...

The labels want Usenet.com to admit they are committing copyright infringement with a view to obtaining an injunction and damages. To date, Usenet.com has refused to remove content or discontinue offering certain newsgroups.

Source

Definitely watch this space and carefully review your own provider's privacy policy page.

[dilli-theclaw]

Indeed

[monkey2468]

I would guess that most would be similar.
http://www.giganews.com/legal/privacy.html
'Giganews holds personal information about you in the strictest confidence and does not sell or rent that information. Giganews will not release or divulge any customer information unless ordered to do so by a court of law. '

[dev]

Originally Posted by monkey2468

I would guess that most would be similar.
http://www.giganews.com/legal/privacy.html
'Giganews holds personal information about you in the strictest confidence and does not sell or rent that information. Giganews will not release or divulge any customer information unless ordered to do so by a court of law. '

any less and i'm sure it'll break some form of data protection law.

i don't think the riaa want the people downloading just usenet.com to stop supplying it, that in turn will stop those people using usenet.com. however there are a lot of usenet providers so removing copyright material from one (if successful) won't make any difference. It would however make it easier for it to get the stuff removed from the other providers.

The main problem is, they can't enforce a blanket block on alt.binaries.* due to that containing non-copyright material too, so they have to block individual groups but that is just like removing a domain name, ie another will just be created. Whatever the outcome, it wont be finished for sometime as usenet.com probably have enough money to actually have a court case and stand a chance of winning.

[brundles]

I suspect they may struggle with this.

As dev mentions, blocking specific groups won't help as new ones will pop up - or other legitimate groups will be hijacked for the content. Meanwhile I'm not convinced that the structure and design of usenet itself makes policing it possible in the same way that a tracker admin can monitor torrent tracker sites removing offending content.

The thing I'm curious about in the Ts&Cs isn't so much when these companies will share customer information but what information do they retain that could be shared? If all they retain is account details (name, address, card details, bandwidth usage maybe) then it's not much use to anybody but if they retain records of what is retrieved that's another story.

[Acathla]

for Giganews:

Giganews does not monitor or record your activities online. We do not monitor which newsgroups you post to or download from or what you put in news articles that you post.

http://www.giganews.com/legal/privacy.html

[Sirius]

Originally Posted by Jefferson T

Indeed

Very mucho indeed

Notice they have gone for Usnet and not someone like giganews. ?

Perhaps they want to hit someone smaller maybe to set a precident?

[Toto]

Originally Posted by zinglebarb

Perhaps they want to hit someone smaller maybe to set a precident?

Yes, good point. Any easy win could send shockwaves through the NG supply community.

[Sirius]

Originally Posted by zinglebarb

Perhaps they want to hit someone smaller maybe to set a precident?

Thats what i was thinking

---------- Post added at 17:49 ---------- Previous post was at 17:48 ----------

Originally Posted by Toto

Yes, good point. Any easy win could send shockwaves through the NG supply community.

I think it would as well

[Horace]

Originally Posted by torrentfreak.com

Therefore it’s no surprise that the lawsuit seems to hang on statements allegedly made by Usenet.com to their customers, claiming that they told them their service is “the best way to get ‘free’ music now that ‘file sharing websites are getting shut down.”

I'm not suprised at all if the service was actively promoting illegal activity. I doubt there's going to be any snowball effect from this. Usenet is pretty watertight, if the **AA had a chance of shutting down all the usenet servers based on the NSP/ISP being responisble for the content then they'd have started legal action a long time ago. Instead, they've just been poking ISP's trying to get their servers closed with minimal effect, unless you're with the ISP in question of course.

[Gareth]

Originally Posted by Acathla

for Giganews:

http://www.giganews.com/legal/privacy.html

*phew*

[Mr Angry]

Originally Posted by Gareth

*phew*

*un-phew*

I wouldn't consider that privacy statement on the part of Giganews to be in any way a form of protection for its users. They, themselves, many not "monitor or record" your activities on line but they do however undertake to provide "personal information or usage information" to "investigators, attorneys, or agencies" if directed to do so.

Furthermore they state, worryingly for anyone who thinks they are the good guys in this scenario, that they are "under a duty not to divulge the fact of the investigation to the customer."

In other words they'll happily pass on whatever information they have on you from a personal / usage point of view and not bother telling you that the RIAA or whoever is beating a track to your door.

It's a business which charges money for a service and profits directly from facilitating the illegal distribution of copyrighted works.

The RIAA are emboldened by their recent success against Jammie Thomas, a single mother downloading for her own use, not for profit.

Quite why anyone would think that Giganews and its customers are not in the RIAA's sights, or that its users are safe from prosecution, is beyond me.

[Toto]

Originally Posted by Mr Angry

*un-phew*

I wouldn't consider that privacy statement on the part of Giganews to be in any way a form of protection for its users. They, themselves, many not "monitor or record" your activities on line but they do however undertake to provide "personal information or usage information" to "investigators, attorneys, or agencies" if directed to do so.

Furthermore they state, worryingly for anyone who thinks they are the good guys in this scenario, that they are "under a duty not to divulge the fact of the investigation to the customer."

In other words they'll happily pass on whatever information they have on you from a personal / usage point of view and not bother telling you that the RIAA or whoever is beating a track to your door.

It's a business which charges money for a service and profits directly from facilitating the illegal distribution of copyrighted works.

The RIAA are emboldened by their recent success against Jammie Thomas, a single mother downloading for her own use, not for profit.

Quite why anyone would think that Giganews and its customers are not in the RIAA's sights, or that its users are safe from prosecution, is beyond me.

But there is a huge difference

Those with massive fines and payouts awarded against them have been those sharing the media. P2P works by sharing and its the making available of copyrighted material which carries the heavy fines. Now I realise downloading of such media is also illegal and would carry heavy punishment its not like your actually distributing. Unless of course you do upload to use net

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jammie_Thomas (highlighted and underlined point)

Thomas was sued by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) for music pirating by illegal sharing of songs in Duluth, Minnesota. She was represented by Minneapolis attorney Brian Toder.[1]
On October 4, 2007, the final day of her trial, U.S. District Court Judge Michael J. Davis and the jury charged her with $222,000 worth of damages, which came to $9,250 per song.
At the trial, jurors decided that Thomas willfully violated the copyright of 24 music files consisting of such bands as Aerosmith, Green Day, and Guns 'N' Roses on Kazaa, under the username of tereastarr@KaZaA.[2][3]
The hard drive containing the copyrighted songs was never presented at the trial. The hard drive Thomas owned at the time Media Sentry recorded the infringement was replaced under warranty. She turned over a new hard drive that contained neither Kazaa nor the infringing files to the RIAA attorneys.[4] There was no evidence showing that the Kazaa account had allowed others to effectively download the files,[1] but jury instruction 14 instructed the jurors that the act of "making available" and not the plaintiff demonstrating that the file had been downloaded, constituted an act of infringement.[5]

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post...-wraps-up.html more here

uk law http://www.jisclegal.ac.uk/cybercrime/cybercrime.htm

3.6 Intellectual Property Offences - Copyright Crime

Copyright law provides for criminal sanction in certain situations. In the UK generally civil remedies provide compensation to wronged intellectual property rights holders and most of the copyright criminal offences contained in the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998 (CDPA), are concerned with commercial activity.
Sections 107, 110 and 198 of the CDPA create criminal offences in relation to the making, distribution, importation, sale or hire of ‘infringing copies'. There is also a criminal offence of infringing performers' rights (s.198(1A)).
Specifically, one of the offences covers the act of ‘distributing an article otherwise than in the course of business to such an extent as to affect prejudicially the owner of the copyright'. In addition, encouraging the copying of software for sale online could lead to the criminal offence of incitement.
According to s.107 CDPA a criminal offence is committed if a person knowingly sells an infringing copy of a protected work without the permission of the copyright owner. In the UK, criminal penalties for companies and their directors can include unlimited fines and up to two years in prison.
Section 107 has also been amended to create a criminal offence (as well as a civil offence) where a person knowingly infringes copyright in a work by communicating the work to the public in the course of business, or in a way that prejudicially affects the copyright owner.
Further information on intellectual property crime, including counterfeiting and piracy, can be found on the UK Intellectual Property Office website at - http://www.ipo.gov.uk/crime.htm.
Sharing and Downloading Music

Music or other file-sharing can be unlawful under the CDPA and students or staff who trade, swap or share music files illegally over the internet open themselves up to the possibility of a civil legal action.
FE and HE institutions are vulnerable to the extent that office holders and those responsible for compliance must not knowingly facilitate the commercial abuse of copyright law.

few interesting points there on civil and criminal differences