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RIAA Files 532 Lawsuits
Like2Byte writes "The RIAA is at it again. This time, Yahoo! News is reporting that 532 file sharers' IP addresses are being submitted to the courts instead of their names because ISPs decline to name people and the courts previous blocks. Music lawyers filed the newest cases against 'John Doe' defendants -- identified only by their numeric Internet protocol addresses -- and expected to work through the courts to learn their names and where they live."
I wonder how long most ISPs keep their logs linking usernames to IP addresses.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Hell just file against 192.168.0.0-255 and get it over with.
Then work on 172.16.#.#
You know they wanna.
I am Jack's complete lack of surprise. -Fight Club
identified only by their numeric Internet protocol addresses
TK-421! Why aren't you at your post?
"I only speak the truth"
Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
people yesterday. They said copying movies from the Internet costs them money and puts people out of a job. The ad was well done and would be understood by most anybody. The music folks are just an order of magnitude stupider than the movie people are. Instead of messaging combined with clear product value propositions and additional rewards for buying more product, we get lawsuits, attempts to fix pricing on CD media, media that does not work, trash artists and on and on and on.... No wonder these dumbasses are having such a hard time. Hope each one of those lawsuits cost them a bundle. Maybe they will think back to the early Napster days and a reasonable offer. If they had only taken it, things would be cast in a far different light today. You reap what you sow.
the newest cases against 'John Doe' defendants -- identified only by their numeric Internet protocol addresses
Your honor, my client, 216.250.128.12, is innocent. He was coerced to download those files by RIAA's public enemy number 1 - 127.0.0.1. There is also plenty of evidence to implicate his cronies, 192.168.1.1 and 10.0.1.0 as well.
Looking for hardware (Currently need: Large Etch-a-Sketch) Have one? See my journal!
He shared over 5000 songs!
192.168.0.0 to 192.168.0.255 is apparently missing ;-)
This is what they should have been doing from the beginning, instead of trying to weasel their way around the law and demanding proprietary customer information from ISPs so they can bully them with settlement offers. This gets the process into the courts where it belongs.
Sure the RIAA is still evil, but they're improving their tactics, and should be commended for that. Going after P2P sharing services is wrong, demanding proprietary information from ISPs is wrong, filing John Doe copyright infringement suits is NOT WRONG - it's EXACTLY what you should do if you find people sharing binary apps derived from your GPL'd project and you don't have a way to contact them yourself.
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
RIAA first tried to horribly abuse the (horribly abusable) DMCA and issue their own subpoenas.
Filing against John Does is the correct way to do it (from my armchair lawyer stance), if the ISP's won't voluntarily divulge the information.
That could be a scene in futurama. Especially if IPv6 was used:
"Your honor, we would like to file charges against 04ef:4326:33d6:13a9......"
I am 192.168.0.23, and I have a transcript of my network log to prove it. But as we are a DHCP shop, I am not always 23. Sometimes I am 17. Other times I am 9. I have even been 2 once. But never 200.256.49.3. That would be the gateway and nobody uses it. Locked down in the server room. No access. Verbotten. Very verbotten.
Thats irrelevant. ISPs will know who had what IP and at what times.
--- any post that takes longer than 20 seconds to write, isn't worth writing
"Judge, one of my neighbours grabbed an IP from my wireless router and was using KaZaa, not me, I swear..."
how are they going to address that???
there's no place like ~
You can also check the EFF subpoena datatbase, for existing subpoenas, it's not updated with the new IP's yet but I'd imagine that'll happen pretty soon.
You can check that here
Interesting, the ISP's won't give up their names, but try typing in http://128.111.80.86/ which is one of the entries. This leads you to the University of California - Santa Barbara's security we page. So they NAT all their users apparently, how helpful is that? :P
just = (My)Opinion.toCents();
Most of you claim to hate the RIAA almost as much (if not more) than Microsoft or SCO, but can't seem to live without their product!
Downloading the music for free (therefore depriving the RIAA of revenue from the sale of the CD) does nothing but give them ammunition for the press and clueless legislators.
If you really want to knock the RIAA out, stop listening to their music period!! Don't listen to the radio, don't download songs (of RIAA-signed musicians), and don't buy their CDs.
There's a Mercedes gap too. I want one and can't afford one, but it's not government's job to do anything about it.
You know, at my apt we have a Wireless Network which is shared by 3 other roomies.
Sometimes, my neighbours use it too when their net is slow. All in all, one DSL shared by ateast 5-6 peple.
Now, any one person could have used their system for P2P. Are the going to take all 6 of us to court just because one IP has been logged?
Has anyone had similar experiences? What would the RIAA do in such a situation?
These are not the IP Addresses you are looking for. Move along.
Mod Karma -1: I sed bad wurds. If I cep my mouf shut, I wud be at riyses.
In point of fact, I know most do. I know several people who work in support or engineering for several ISPs and keeping such logs is not unusual. The existence of a given set of logs can almost be taken for granted, what you can't take for granted is how long such logs might be kept.
"Talk minus action equals nothing" - Joey Shithead, D.O.A.
"Talk minus action equals
Basically, our friends at the RIAA are more than happy if you'll keep buying your CD's at fifteen dollars a pop, then every few years they'll try to make what you already purchased obsolete by offering a new release with better packaging.
Sometimes I wonder if they are deliberately incompetent in issuing their first release. I remember back in 1991, I picked up Miles Davis' "Kind of Blue." Five years later, the record company had re-released it, along with the shocking announcement that one of the original CD's songs had been mastered at the wrong speed -- so the CD I owned had a song that was therefore in the wrong key and at the wrong tempo. And for this incompetence, on their part, I was supposed to shell out another fifteen bucks to get the fixed version.
Understandably, people are tired of this crap, so they've resorted to downloading music. That's where the RIAA's new revenue generating tactic comes in: they're using their legal department to send letters, coercing downloaders to pay up at about seven grand a pop. That's a lot of shiny CD's.
So buy CD's or download illegally -- either way the RIAA wins. Unless you decide to get out of the game.
If you follow the RIAA's tactics at all, you might have decided it's appropriate to not give these bloodsuckers another dime of your money. So here are a couple tips. Don't buy from labels that are affiliated with the RIAA -- and don't buy legally downloaded music from these labels just because they happen to be on the iTunes record store.
Second, check out sites like Magnatune. Read everything you can about their business practices. These people are cool, their artists' music is awesome, and they deserve our support.
I'm generally "Interesting," "Insightful," and even "Funny" here. What the hell happens to me at parties?
Go to http://whatismyipaddress.com/
and find out.
Of course IP addresses are rather pointless without a date and time. I switched from a 208.*.*.* to a 66.*.*.* address just this morning.
First three numbers - check.
Second three numbers - coming closer.
Third three numbers - danr! Lost once again!
Everyone is bringing up the question of how long the logs would be kept for. Remember back when the US govt. was (possibly still is) granting itself the power to check out what books you were reading at the library? Remember how the librarians decided to destroy the records because it was legal? How long until ISPs get the idea and follow suit? No records, no court. Remember, ISPs want to keep customers, one way is to have a strong privacy policy.
Next hurdle for the RIAA is to PROVE these people were actually offering or distributing actual content the RIAA members own the copyright to. A file name or a list of file names/or mp3 tags is NOT going to stand up in a real court. I would think they should have to prove that person was actually distributing an actual copyrighted file by downloading the whole thing or a major portion of that file from only that one person (not getting it from multiple users either) and have some type of timestamped logs or process of the file transfer to stand behind their evidence gathering. Metallica_-_Ride_the_Lightning_01.mp3 can contain anything. A file name is not a copyright violation and without evidence, you would have to assume what the content was. There is no provision in the DMCA to fall back on that can override actual evidence is there? IANAL but since these RIAA lawsuits are civil and not criminal, I don't believe they can obtain a search warrant to come for your physical equipment either. Who knows.
Bad boys rape our young girls but Violet gives willingly.
Like I said, what a joke.
(If you're interested, I've got the e-mail chain between my buddy and EMI.)
It is not our abilities that show what we truly are... it is our choices.
Every time there is a copyright related case, I have to take the time out of my day to explain to asshats like you that copyright infringement isn't theft. It is copyright infringement. They are different.
READ A BOOK!
Where's my lobbyist? Right here.
These are in the list twice
2 12.198.251.665 3.197.275 3.94
12.100.15.167
204.201.220.33
208.150.224.18
216.136.13.252
216.38.33.66
216.
38.201.184.162
63.199.63.218
64.132.1
64.242.223.111
65.105.125.126
66.250.69.1
210.73.74.200 is in 3 times
I count 518 uniques
Tom Brokaw: 127.0.0.1 was unavailable for comment.
I'm currently developing a new management system for our university network of ~4000 nodes. It has the ability not only to track every single IP address ever used by any student, but also what hub port/wireless AP they were connected to at the time.
As an internal debugging/security tool, this is *great* information. We can make sure that people aren't abusing the network. We can find and disable compromised machines with very simple tools. We can easily do tons of other useful administrative tasks.
However, I *really* worry that the information could be subpoenad and used against individual students by the likes of the RIAA/MPAA. I've been harping on upper management to let us purge the history after roughly a week (tops), which would give us plenty of debugging time, and at the same time not give the legal system enough time to issue a subpoena before the information is gone.
It's really a wierd situation for me. The tools I'm working on are extremely powerful, and will definitely save our network guys a lot of time. But there's a distinct possibility that the information we gather could be used in ways that I, personally, find abhorrent.
It makes me wonder about other developers working on software that's used for security: it's a fascinating job, and has tons of really good applications. But at the same time each piece moves us one step closer an Orwellian society becoming possible. Is this something I/we should really be persuing, given the potential outcome?
--Jeremy
Jesus was a liberal
As a former ISP manager, I know that by the time a lawsuit would have come about our DHCP assignment logs would have been rotated out of storage. Any reasonable sized ISP would have far too much data to keep on hand to store something like that.
Yes! Stop producing anything! That'll show those nasty pirates!
Sorry, but being denied something that hasn't been created is less of a problem for me than being denied something that was created but is now inaccessable because of draconian copyright laws.
because people break the social contract that is copyright and steal. It's a shame really.
The social contract was broken a long time ago... by the content producers. When copyright was extended long past absurd lengths the writing was on the wall. The present day piracy was predicted way back in 1841. Here's a quote from that link (Thomas Macaulay speaking against copyright extension): Seems to sum it up quite nicely.
I almost fell off of my chair:
http://128.111.80.86/
Points to....wait for it.....
"Asset Protection at UCSB"
Too good to be true!!
ATH0 Bitcoin: 1DnwFLXczVZV8kLJbMYoheUrpqHesjxrSi
When I first got my Verizon DSL, I was annoyed that I didn't get a static IP address. But now I realize the advantages of a dynamically-assigned IP address. Everytime my DSL connection reconnects, I get assigned new IP, and because my connection crashes regularly, I go through up to 10 IP addresses per day. Thank God for Verizon and their crappy connections. Try finding me now, RIAA! Nyaaah Nyaaah!!
Cyde Weys Musings - Scrutinizing the inscrutable
I think I spotted several SCO IP addresses in there. Maybe the best thing to do is let RIAA know that SCO is using their servers as major music sharing hubs and at the same time convince SCO that RIAA has been running unlicensed copies of SCO Unix (what's it called this week?) for years. Let the clueless losers battle one another to death while the rest of us get on with our lives.
I searched for mine .... 127.0.0.1
Couldn't find it in that list!
Good thing too - I'd reallly get busted!
---- "Logoff! That cookie shit makes me nervous!" - A. Soprano
Do you 24.68.123.57 swear to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth..
Actually, that is a far worse plan than dealing with the RIAA.
An ISP can be held responsible in situations where it does not keep records like radius logs. Since the ISP would be unable to prove they didn't do it (they being the ISP), presented with evidence that shows the illegal activity came from their network, it would almost be an automatic loss for them in court. Don't expect any compassion from the court, once the judge points out that your irrisponsibility is borderline deceptive and unethical business practice, you'll probably get either a maximum fine or harsher term.
This is much like loaning your car to a drunk stranger. You automatically become legally liable for anything he does behind the wheel due to your own irrisponsibility.
People forget that the Internet is a communications service. It's not like the phone company doesn't keep a log of all the phone numbers you dial, times dialed, duration of call, the date/time in GMT, etc.
IANAL, of course, but I'm not sure this is right. As far as I know, under common law principles, ISPs cannot be presumamptively liable for the actions of their users...and I doubt the DMCA changes things in this regard.
Is there someone who actually knows with certainty the answer to this point? It is important for how this whole story will play out, methinks.
I see a lot of confusion over the way files are identified and whether this will stand up in court or not.
If you think they are using a method as trivial as "they responded to a search for name label_muzak.mp3" you are mistaken. This would definitely not be credible evidence in court (anything could be in the file) and it's not how the RIAA is going about tracking illegal uploads.
The method they are using has been described in some of the articles concerning the subpoenas issued to users of the networks and it works as follows:
1. The RIAA employs modified nodes in the various networks (KaZaa and Morpheous seem to be the big two) to search for known song names or groups.
2. When they find a match, they attempt to download the entire file from the user. This point is important: if they can't prove you actually uploaded a copyrighted file in its entirety, they don't have a case.
3. When the upload is complete they perform an MD5 sum on the content and verify that it matches a database of known copyrighted files. If they didn't do this step, they would have to have someone listen to it to be sure its actually what they think it is.
Given the nature of peer networks, there are a number of common rips (i.e. identical) of songs widely shared among many users. Thus the MD5 sums will match for the same file among many users.
This is all the information they need to bring a suit against your. They have an IP address and time/date associated with the upload, they have a verified MD5 sum for the upload that matches known copyrighted files.
This information was covered in a previous article here: Innocent File-Sharers Could Appear Guilty? and the techniques they use are explicitly designed to withstand the scrutiny of a legal proceeding.
All of the cases of mistaken identity to date (the mac user sent a nasty gram, the grandmother, etc) appear to be mistakes by the ISP correlating a given IP + date into the right account holder, and not a flaw in their methods associated with identifying infringing content traded over the networks.
Last I checked, IP-addresses were not legal ID, like ID cards or passports are. As far as I know, you can only sue legal entities, like people or businesses. Not abstract concepts (if I could, I'd sue some Back Propagation Algorithm for grievous mental harm)
So they're bringing lawsuits against unidentified IP-addresses, which could be anything from a NAT router to a university network, a government agency, or whatever. Many of these lawsuits will therefore be against companies which are not liable for their customers' actions.
This is ridiculous.
(IANAL, as if it wasn't obvious)