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Is RIAA's Linares Affidavit Technically Valid?
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "In support of its ex parte, 'John Doe,' discovery applications against college students, the RIAA has been using a declaration by its 'Anti-Piracy' Vice President Carlos Linares (PDF) to show the judge that it has a good copyright infringement case against the 'John Does.' A Boston University student has challenged the validity of Mr. Linares's declaration, and the RIAA is fighting back. Would appreciate the Slashdot community's take on the validity of Mr. Linares's 'science.'"
I do not feel particularly qualified to validate Mr. Linares's claims. However, over the years I have 'forgotten' that the RIAA is just a trade organization, comprised of many different companies. It was interesting to read through the list of plantiffs and put a face on who the RIAA really is. Here they are if you did not RTFA:
- Arista Records, LLC
- Warner Bros. Records, Inc.
- Atlantic Recording Corporation
- Virgin Records America, Inc.
- UMG Recordings, Inc.
- BMG Music
- Capitol Records, Inc.
- Sony BMG Music Entertainment
- Motown Record Company, L.P.
- Maverick Recording Company
- Elektra Entertainment Group, Inc.
- Laface Records, LLC.
- Interscope Records
This may not be a good thing, as my hatred will now be dilutedRonald said nothing. He flung himself from the room, flung himself upon his horse, and rode madly off in all directions.
This sounds vaguely familiar...
The biggest mistake is that they're trying to imply that an IP address is tied to a specific person at a specific point in time.
It is not.
It may be tied to a specific computer. Or a specific router / firewall. Or even a specific UNSECURED wireless access point.
But it is NOT tied to a specific person.
Their second biggest mistake is claiming (without any evidence) that each file being "pirated" represents a lost sale. So the courts need to work REALLY REALLY FAST to stop the money being lost.
Their third biggest mistake is that the machine with the IP address, that is associated with the "piracy" is 100% under the conscious, knowing control of the person who is being charged. As opposed to your neighbor using your unprotected wireless access point to download files without your knowledge.
Anyone have any others?
It wasn't Linares. It's Ray Beckerman, aka NewYorkCountryLawyer.
Sheesh, if you won't RTFA, at least click the submitter's name before you go all conspiracy.
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
Note that, throughout his statements up to this point, Linares has repeatedly reasserted that MediaSentry doesn't use any techniques not enabled by the software and medium and not available to any other user of the system. It's obvious he wants to preserve for MediaSentry and, by extension the RIAA, that no "illegal" or unethical techniques were employed to gather data.
Right here, with this sentence, he contradicts himself. I think it's rather obvious that this sentence describes an activity that other P2P users cannot do, even if they chose to try. The very ambiguity of it, and his failure to clarify it, is noteworthy.
Dig deeper right there; "X" marks the spot, as Blackbeard might say.
IP addresses don't identify a person, only a junction point in the network (router).
To use their telephone analogy: If you dial a "1-800" there isn't a single telephone and single person answering it, there's a whole network of telephones and many operators to answer them. The Internet works exactly the same way, if anything this "routing" of connections is even more common than in the telephone network.
IP addresses are actually in short supply (there's only a few hundred million of them...) so most people don't even have the option of having single IP address = single computer.
Then there's WiFi.... most home broadband connections are supplied with a wireless router and these routers are unsecured by default. Anybody within a half mile radius can connect and use the internet connection. These people will have the same IP address as the legitimate owner of the router. This practice of using other people's connections is very common in highly populated areas (I personally know two people who do it...)
Even if password access is enabled, the standard "WEP" encryption can be broken in a matter of minutes using freely downloadable software (type "wep cracker" into google and you'll get you a whole list of them).
So...premise 12 is wrong. Without it the rest of the document is moot.
No sig today...