Britain's six largest ISPs and BPI join forces to attack illegal filesharing

[Toto]

Originally Posted by Pedro1

As far as i go, if i am denied my downloads and stuff then VM can ram there 20MB.

And go where?

BT?
Sky?
Tiscali...?

The big six are doing this, to prevent the possibility of government intervention or possibly an expensive court case. They are not trying to prevent you from D/Uloading, re-read the title of this thread.

[Fatec]

Originally Posted by Toto

And go where?

BT?
Sky?
Tiscali...?

The big six are doing this, to prevent the possibility of government intervention or possibly an expensive court case. They are not trying to prevent you from D/Uloading, re-read the title of this thread.

Read the p2p report, it's not just about sending warning letters out, those 6 isps are having meetings on how to stop downloaders completely (through application throttling, speed throttling or just a total download cap)

So yes, they are

[Toto]

Originally Posted by traxdata2

read the p2p report, it's not just about sending warning letters out, those 6 isps are having meetings on how to stop downloaders completely (through application throttling, speed throttling or just a total download cap)

so yes, they are

lol, ok

[Bonglet]

Then people will realise why the hell cant i access stuff to download or why can i not use my 100mb connection to the full when im capped to 10k i feel ripped off, then all the isp's loose customers in droves as will be the case in a couple of months .

[Toto]

Originally Posted by Bonglet

Then people will realise why the hell cant i access stuff to download or why can i not use my 100mb connection to the full when im capped to 10k i feel ripped off, then all the isp's loose customers in droves as will be the case in a couple of months .

Albeit that may have been a tounge-in-cheek comment, but its a wildly speculative.

[Barton71]

Originally Posted by foreverwar

My daughter has VM in Leicester, and it is usually one of the tenants whose name is on the contract, rather than the landlord.

And on this VM T&C page (re your comment about the other "sharers" in the flat/house

"You are responsible for the way the services are used. You must not use the services to do any of the following acts or allow anyone else to use the services to do such acts:

1. Send a message or communication that is offensive, abusive, defamatory (damages someone's reputation), obscene, menacing or illegal;
2. Cause annoyance, nuisance, inconvenience or needless worry to, or break the rights of, any other person;
3. Perform any illegal activity;
4. Break, or try to break, the security of anyone else's equipment, hardware or software;
5. Deliberately receive, use, own, post, transmit or publish obscene material (including, but not limited to, child pornography);
6. Upload, post, publish or transmit any information or software that is protected by copyright or other ownership rights without the permission of its owner;
7. Copy or distribute any software or services we provide (but you may make a backup copy of the software we provide for your personal use); "

and

"You agree to take responsibility for all liabilities, claims and losses which are in any way connected with misusing the services supplied to you under this agreement"

Also, in VM's AUP (section 3)
3.2. You must not use the Services in any way that is unlawful or illegal or in any way to the detriment of other Internet users. You also must not allow anybody using your connection to use the Services in any way that is unlawful or illegal or in any way to the detriment of other Internet users.
3.3. During an investigation, if we believe that a violation of this AUP or our Terms and Conditions has occurred, we may take immediate remedial action. Such action may include temporary or permanent removal of material from our servers, the cancellation of newsgroup postings, warnings to the User responsible, and the suspension, restriction or termination of the User's account. We will determine what action will be taken on a case-by-case basis. Please note that we have a policy of open co-operation with all relevant authorities and regulators.
3.4. In addition to and without prejudice to your obligations pursuant to our Terms and Conditions, you agree to comply with (and ensure that others using the Services comply with) all applicable laws, statutes and regulations in connection with the Services. As the User of record, you are responsible for all use of your account, irrespective of use without your knowledge and/or consent.

Yeah, but that is only VM's terms and conditions, not the law of the land. As the BPI can only provide the IP address to the ISP's, which can only lead to the ISP's finding the name and addess of the account holder, the question remains, is an account holder responsible for what passes through his or her network, or is the account holder, like the ISP's and the Post Office, just a conduit through which the information passes? In other words, is an IP address sufficiant enough evidence to secure a proescution against an individual? If it is, and the BPI are going to use IP addresses as evidence to sue people, then i would argue that the BPI arent interested in suing file sharers, but that they are more interested in the publicity which surrounds suing someone for file sharing, whether that person was actually the person file sharing or not.

I was only referring you to VMs T&C - how you wish to interpret them is entirely up to you.

Although VM (and all other ISPs, who seem to have fairly similar T&Cs) may have taken some legal advice, don't you think? (and this Policy Proposal has been raised by HM Government)

[Kymmy]

Barton71 though does have a point...

According to VM's T&Cs the account holder is responsible for what goes through the modem, but if the action brought by the BPI is a legal action then does VM's T&Cs matter as then it'll be upto different rules and nothing to do with VM...

In simpler terms you can use the "it was someone else on my connection" excuse with VM but you probably could in a legal case...

Kymmy

[Toto]

Originally Posted by Barton71

Yeah, but that is only VM's terms and conditions, not the law of the land. As the BPI can only provide the IP address to the ISP's, which can only lead to the ISP's finding the name and addess of the account holder, the question remains, is an account holder responsible for what passes through his or her network, or is the account holder, like the ISP's and the Post Office, just a conduit through which the information passes? In other words, is an IP address sufficiant enough evidence to secure a proescution against an individual? If it is, and the BPI are going to use IP addresses as evidence to sue people, then i would argue that the BPI arent interested in suing file sharers, but that they are more interested in the publicity which surrounds suing someone for file sharing, whether that person was actually the person file sharing or not.

The IP address would have appeared to be sufficient in previous cases where the BPI have taken civil action, what I can't seem to find is a recorded civil case where the defendant has argued that whilst they are the account holder, they are not responsible for every piece of traffic through their network, and won. Anyone know of any?

Currently ISP's can claim "mere conduit" under EU law, but as far as I can tell, not the end user.

It's an interesting point though, and one that could have serious implications, and probably why there has never been any criminal action to date due to the burden of prove.

We should remember that the ISPs (not just VM) are requesting that account holders stick to the T&Cs and AUP, and will then throttle/disconnect if these T&Cs are not adhered to (which include managing what happens at your end of the IntraWeeb pipe) - it will only become a legal issue if an account holder fights against being throttled/disconnected, and then wouldn't the account holder have to prove that the ISP was in the wrong in a civil case?

[Berealwith]

Originally Posted by Marloe

I fully admit my whole music collection has been downloaded illegally, being from the slightly older generation I started my collection by buying records (a rather large collection)

They then had this great new invention called the walkman. I saved my money and replaced all my records with tapes.

Then to my surprise an even better way to listen to music came out called the CD. Again I had to pay for exactly the same music which I had already paid for on Record and Tape so I could upgrade to CD.

Now they have this even better way to listen to music called MP3. Basically the buck stops here. I’ve paid for the same music three times. Why should I have to pay for the same music again? Yes I could convert the CDs to MP3 or record the Records to tape but at the end of the day for me it’s the same thing making a copy of music I already have.

I’m just waiting for that letter to tell me that I’ve been illegally downloading and I will be happy to take my large collection of LPs Tapes and cds to prove that I have actually more than paid my dues to the artists.

Rant over.

what a comment so true......I have loads of LP's and tapes

and sorry to go of topic.

these days on this forum the slightest so called duplication or just a bit of topic gets crushed. i hardly feel the rigth to post anymore. It must be the "VirGrim" virus

Originally Posted by Berealwith

what a comment so true......I have loads of LP's and tapes

and sorry to go of topic.

these days on this forum the slightest so called duplication or just a bit of topic gets crushed. i hardly feel the rigth to post anymore. It must be the "VirGrim" virus

YOU are always free to start a thread of your own..on a topic of your choice PROVIDED it is not against the site's T&Cs.

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by Berealwith

And doesn't channel 4 use p2p for it tv ? would you get a letter for that ?

Channel 4 does. As does Sky and the BBC's iPlayer download service (the web streaming service doesn't). They use a P2P system licenced from a company called kontiki, who specialise in P2P services for commercial distribution. It is unlikely the BPI are montoring this network, as the users cannot use it to download stuff not from these companies

Also, the files are protected by DRM, so even if you did manage to download something, you would still require a licence from the relevant broadcaster to play it.

Finally, it's worth noting that P2P itself is legal. As long as you only use it to download stuff that is not copyrighted.

[Horace]

Originally Posted by Marloe

I fully admit my whole music collection has been downloaded illegally, being from the slightly older generation I started my collection by buying records (a rather large collection)

They then had this great new invention called the walkman. I saved my money and replaced all my records with tapes.

Then to my surprise an even better way to listen to music came out called the CD. Again I had to pay for exactly the same music which I had already paid for on Record and Tape so I could upgrade to CD.

Now they have this even better way to listen to music called MP3. Basically the buck stops here. I’ve paid for the same music three times. Why should I have to pay for the same music again? Yes I could convert the CDs to MP3 or record the Records to tape but at the end of the day for me it’s the same thing making a copy of music I already have.

I’m just waiting for that letter to tell me that I’ve been illegally downloading and I will be happy to take my large collection of LPs Tapes and cds to prove that I have actually more than paid my dues to the artists.

Rant over.

If you're downloading those MP3's from P2P sites then you're also sharing the same MP3's with the world and his wife. You'd be better off ripping to a lossless format such as FLAC from your own CD's anyway if you care about quality, quality of MP3's on most P2P systems is dire to say the least.

[dev]

Originally Posted by Toto

The IP address would have appeared to be sufficient in previous cases where the BPI have taken civil action, what I can't seem to find is a recorded civil case where the defendant has argued that whilst they are the account holder, they are not responsible for every piece of traffic through their network, and won. Anyone know of any?

Currently ISP's can claim "mere conduit" under EU law, but as far as I can tell, not the end user.

It's an interesting point though, and one that could have serious implications, and probably why there has never been any criminal action to date due to the burden of prove.

i expect the ISPs can get away with it because of the number of people involved, they themselves don't use the connections and they have a database of what connection belongs to who. now if you're a landlord and provide your tennants with a connection from VM (and so landlord is account holder) it would be up to them to show who was the culprit, and i would expect them to be let off