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Comcast Sued For Giving Customer Info to RIAA
maczealot writes "The first legal missile has been fired at ISP collaboration. Comcast, the top U.S. cable TV network operator, is being sued by a Seattle-area woman for disclosing her name and contact information, court records showed Thursday." From the article: "...no court authorized Comcast to release names and addresses of its customers, or notified his client that her information had been given to an outside party..."
Well, car rental companies kept writing into their service agreements the right to track you via GPS and fine you for speeding, but courts have repeatedly ruled against the rental companies. You can't enforce an unconscionable contract.
-- Don't Tase me, bro!
You expressly authorize Comcast and its suppliers to cooperate with (i) law enforcement authorities in the investigation of suspected legal violations, and (ii) and system administrators at other Internet service providers or other network or computing facilities in order to enforce this Policy. This cooperation may include Comcast providing available personally identifiable information about you to law enforcement or system administrators, including, but not limited to, username, subscriber name, and other account information.
Sounds like the subscriber doesn't have a chance, once the copyright cops get involved.
"I'm not impatient. I just hate waiting." - My Dad
You can, and in fact companies do this all the time. I've had it done to me on several occasions. But the collection agencies are all bark and no bite (unless, of course, they've really got a solid claim against you, that's a different story.) All you have to do is just send the collection agency a nice certified letter back demanding all of their detailed records showing how they have a valid claim against you within 30 days so that you can begin your lawsuit against them, and they back right off. More info from the FTC
I called the Comcast service department (1-800-Comcast) and ask about this story. They have denied ever hearing about it, but they did mention I could be put on a non disclose list (which I then added myself to). They are also sending me their contract and policy concerning disclosing my personal information to any outside 3rd parties. Lets all call and crack the whip!
Directly from their website:
" Important Note: Comcast may revise this Acceptable Use Policy (the "Policy") from time to time without notice by posting a new version of this document on the Comcast Web site at http://www.comcast.net (or any successor URL(s)). All revised copies of the Policy are effective immediately upon posting. Accordingly, customers and users of the Comcast High-Speed Internet Service should regularly visit our web site and review this Policy to ensure that their activities conform to the most recent version. In the event of a conflict between any subscriber or customer agreement and this Policy, the terms of this Policy will govern. Questions regarding this Policy and complaints of violations of it by Comcast customers and users can be directed to http://online.comcast.net/contactus/ "
And this...
"Copyright Infringement Comcast is committed to complying with U.S. copyright and related laws, and requires all customers and users of the Service to comply with these laws. Accordingly, you may not store any material or content on, or disseminate any material or content over, the Service (or any part of the Service) in any manner that constitutes an infringement of third party intellectual property rights, including rights granted by U.S. copyright law. Owners of copyrighted works who believe that their rights under U.S. copyright law have been infringed may take advantage of certain provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 (the "DMCA") to report alleged infringements. It is Comcast's policy in accordance with the DMCA and other applicable laws to reserve the right to terminate the Service provided to any customer or user who is either found to infringe third party copyright or other intellectual property rights, including repeat infringers, or who Comcast believes in its sole discretion is infringing these rights. Comcast may terminate the Service at any time with or without notice for any affected customer or user. Copyright owners may report alleged infringements of their works that are stored on the Service or the Personal Web Features by sending Comcast's authorized agent a notification of claimed infringement that satisfies the requirements of the DMCA. Upon Comcast's receipt of a satisfactory notice of claimed infringement for these works, Comcast will respond expeditiously to either directly or indirectly (i) remove the allegedly infringing work(s) stored on the Service or the Personal Web Features or (ii) disable access to the work(s). Comcast will also notify the affected customer or user of the Service of the removal or disabling of access to the work(s). If the affected customer or user believes in good faith that the allegedly infringing works have been removed or blocked by mistake or misidentification, then that person may send a counter notification to Comcast. Upon Comcast's receipt of a counter notification that satisfies the requirements of DMCA, Comcast will provide a copy of the counter notification to the person who sent the original notification of claimed infringement and will follow the DMCA's procedures with respect to a received counter notification. In all events, you expressly agree that Comcast will not be a party to any disputes or lawsuits regarding alleged copyright infringement."
However, nowhere does it say that they may give away your personal information. It just says that they can shut off your service. You can read the entire TOS here: http://www.comcast.net/terms/use.jsp
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
"...The RIAA referred all of the Drexel cases to the Settlement Support Center, a group of lawyers who specialize in settling."
"...recieved calls from the "RIAA Settlement Support Center". A disgusting attempt at making themselves sound like the nice-guys they are known to not be."
This probably won't be seen by anyone but...
This is a complete misstatment of the law. For a definition of "prior art," please see 35 U.S.C. 102(b).
If person A recieves a patent, person A cannot be sued by person B because person B holds "prior art." Rather, person B can attempt to have the patent held by person A held invalid through a declaratory judgment.
-BB
I just wanted to remind everyone that passing one's bill onto a debt collection agency is often tantamount to immediate punishment. Once the agency gets an unpaid bill, they often register the uncollected bill with the credit agencies. Once that happens, all sorts of strange things start happening -- your APRs on the credit cards go up, loans become more difficult to get, etc'.
This "negative information" having to do with your debt being assigned to an agency *stays* even after you had paid your bill. IN fact, it takes quite a bit of work to have them remove it for you. So even if the RIAA eventually turns out to have made a mistake, or the debt agency turns out to be wrong, simply starting the process corresponds to immediate punishment.
According to the article, in this occurence "no court authorized Comcast to release names and addresses of its customers, or notified his client that her information had been given to an outside party"
The "collection agency" is called Settlement Support Center. I thought that was an unusual name and wondered if it is a company set up for the RIAA lawsuits. I guess it is and it has a bunch of lawyers which can pursue lawsuits if someone doesn't pay.
You forgot the third option, that she was using a system like bittorrent where her activity in downloading the file was publically broadcast, and could easily be tracked using the tracker (well, what else would you call it? ;) without approving or otherwise participating in the transfer, or tapping her wires or anything.
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.