University of Kansas Adopts 'One Strike' Copyright Infringement Policy

NewmanKU writes "Eric Bangeman at Ars Technica writes that the University of Kansas has adopted a new, and very strict, copyright infringement policy for the students on the residential network. The university's ResNet website states that, 'Violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act is against the law. If you are caught downloading copyrighted material, you will lose your ResNet privileges forever. No second notices, no excuses, no refunds. One violation and your ResNet internet access is gone for as long as you reside on campus.' According to a KU spokesperson, KU has received 345 notices in the past year from organizations and businesses regarding complaints about copyrighted material downloading."

Comments

Due Process

[Anonymous Coward]

Is there any clause to protect the due process rights of students?

Re:Due Process

[SamP2]

Tough luck pal, due process only applies in court. They'd have to follow it if they decided to sue you, throw you in jail for whatever, or something like that.

Cutting you off the campus net is an entirely private decision, no due process required by law.

Think of it like getting banned from a forum because the admin thinks you are a troll.

Re:Due Process

[Darkon]

Think of it like getting banned from a forum because the admin thinks you are a troll.

On a free forum to which you have paid nothing this makes sense, but I'd imagine the students pay some quite hefty fees to the university in the expectation of receiving full access to all services for their money.

Re:Due Process

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure, as agreed upon and detailed in the plethora of documents they sign - which now include this notice.

Just because you put something in your TOS does not make it legal or enforceable. IANAL, but I am an admin on a university network and we are frequently reminded that the students are paying customers with rights and as such we cannot arbitrarily ban them from using the system. Without some kind of watertight right of appeal someone probably will get caught as a false positive by this policy, sue, and win.

Re:Due Process

[vertinox]

Cutting you off the campus net is an entirely private decision, no due process required by law.

I dunno... Let's say I have this jock room mate that I hate because he always gets the girls (and brings them to the top bunk when I'm trying to get a good nights sleep) so lets just say I theoretically put P2P software on his unpassworded computer and share out some Boy George songs.

Not only will he get booted off ResNet without recourse, but all the girls will think he's gay now when they look at his MP3 collection.

Re:Due Process

[Evilest Doer]

This is just a first draft. The University's policy is still evolving.

Well, this policy certainly wasn't intelligently designed.

Re:Due Process

[ShieldW0lf]

Clearly, this is a great place to begin a multi-year commitment towards higher education.

They clearly place the interests of their customers first and foremost.

I'm going to send that university a letter telling them I'm not hiring any of their graduates because of their asinine behavior.

Re:Due Process

[Khaed]

So you're planning on punishing the students for the University being dicks?

Seems like you're just adding to the pile of crap the students have to put up with.

Re:Due Process

[Anonymous Coward]

"paid for by tax payers, in the case of public schools"

I didn't realize tuition was free.

No seriously, I wonder why copyright infringement was singled out. If you park illegally on campus, do they remove your parking privileges forever? If you take more than your fair share in the dorm cafeteria, can you no longer eat on campus?

Sounds just alleging copyright violations at KU carries one of the harshest penalties. I wonder if you don't properly attribute your sources in a paper if they break your fingers? Anyway, if I was on the internet at KU, I'd try to encrypt all my traffic. Some idiotic letter comes from an RIAA lawyer, and the next thing you know, you might as well leave school.

Oh crap...

[FrostedWheat]

From the universities page: (which I downloaded into my browser...)

If you are caught downloading copyrighted material, you will lose your ResNet privileges forever

And further down, on the same page! (Which my browser downloaded, remember)...

Copyright © 2005 by the University of Kansas

Wow, that is harsh! I guess that's me banned then :-)

Re:Oh crap...

[NickFortune]

Yep. In fact, as a signatory to the Berne Convention, in the US copyright exists in every work not explicitly released into the publci domain. Which makes it a particularly stupid thing to say. I mean it is fairly obvious that they mean "no unauthorised downloading of copyright material", but if they really plan to implement a "no excuses, no appeal" policy, you'd think they'd take the 30 seconds or so it needed to phrase the thing correctly.

Even then, it's still way OTT. Half the papers on Citeseer (for instance) are there in technical violation of the copyright of the journals where they were first published. The journals turn a blind eye, which is why the site can keep on, but I can see a lot of sudents getting banned, which considering how widely used citeseer is as an academic resource, is a but ridiculous.

I suppose the only other way they could implement the policy as expressed is to rely on the word "caught". That way, if they don't look for downloaders, they don't find them, and selective enforcement becomes the order of the day. I suppose it might be useful if the they forsee needing a pretext to silence unruly students.

Re:Oh crap...

[Karellen]

No, someone isn't violating copyright by viewing your page, but the rule doesn't talk about *violating* copyright, it talks about *downloading copyrighted materials*.

*All* works, unless they carry a notice explicitly putting them into the public domain, are automatically copyrighted by the author[0]. They do not need a copyright notice for them to be copyrighted.

Now, as the author, you may make your work (web page) available for people to download for free; that is your right. And because you, as the copyright holder, are the one who has made the work available, the end users aren't breaking copyright by downloading it.

*However*, they are still *downloading copyrighted materials*. They may be doing so legally, but that is not what the rule cares about. The rule states that merely downloading copyrighted materials is grounds for account termination.

[0] Or, if it is a work-for-hire or similar, the work might be copyrighted by an entity other than the author. But it is still copyrighted.

Lack of Caring

[Bios_Hakr]

If the students care enough, they will all cancel their accounts. When the University sees a drop in revenue, they will have to decide.

Pulling authoritarian crap like this in a place where people are naturally rebelling against everything and anything is a good way to get egg on your face.

Re:Lack of Caring

[neoform]

Nah, students wont cancel the accounts because they need them, instead what needs to be done is someone file copyright infringement claims against *every* student, and since this rule applies to claims and convictions they will all be required to lose their accounts.. showing how stupid this sort of rule is.

Re:Lack of Caring

[OverlordQ]

If you check the wording properly you'll notice a rather large problem. Almost every web page you visit has copyrighted material in it that you automatically download just by visiting the site. So by definition what you're saying is basically "Don't use the Internet".

This is typical slashdot behavior. Take everything out of context so everybody can get riled up about it. Sure the front page says 'copyrighted material', you think they'd put the full legalese on the frontpage or just a blurb saying "Its Bad, mkay"?

But if anybody would take the time to actually *READ* the subject at hand, you would find this paragraph:

If the University of Kansas receives notice of a copyright violation (downloading or uploading copyrighted material including music, movies, games, software, etc.) tied to the IP address registered in your name, you will receive an email and written notice that your access to the ResNet Network has been temporarily suspended for 5 business days, during which time you may appeal if you believe the copyright infringement notice was received in error. You have 5 business days from the date of notice to provide written documentation supporting your appeal to the Office of the Vice Provost for Student Success, describing the nature of the error. If your appeal is denied, your ResNet service will be permanently deactivated for the remainder of the time you live in KU's residential housing facilities. The ResNet fee is primarily a connection fee and not a usage fee. If your service is permanently terminated, there will be no subsequent refund of the ResNet activation fee, regardless of when the violation occurred.

And even if you fail your appeal, you just lose your ResNet access, you can still use computer labs on campus.

Re:Lack of Caring

[Ash Vince]

I think the slashdot needs similar policy to the uni of kansas:

One stupid moderation of a valid point gets your moderation privelidges removed forever.

But lets face it, if you were too stupid to make a valid poitn wouldnt you just hide behind the moderation system by using it to disagree with other people too?

Re:Lack of Caring

[Volante3192]

Ahh yes, because somewhere along the line "guilty until proven innocent" became the de facto standard.

We get riled up because of all the kneejerk reactions that create more problems than they solve. Sure, it might superficially seem ok, but the potential for abuse is so high, it's patently absurd.

Baby Meet Bathwater

[iluvcapra]

TFA mentions that Stanford and other schools charge high "Reconnection" fees after they block your MAC for sharing files. Why don't they just do something like that and make a load of money?

"Zero-tolerance" is all about moralism, and rarely about correcting behavior, or "teaching" people anything. It'll have a good effect statistically, but the people who get their privileges pulled won't have their attitude changed, they'll just conclude the "RIAA-Nazis" blackmailed his school into screwing with his education.

It doesn't matter how true it is, rules must give the appearance of fairness in order to be respected.

Re:Baby Meet Bathwater

[ajs318]

Bollocks. Rule by fear always breaks down, sooner or later, because fear can be overcome. This is something that authoritarians don't seem to get. Fear of getting caught is not what demotivates the majority of people from committing crime. That's just a Tory oversimplification. If someone is really determined, they will analyse the balance of probabilities purely in terms of a favourable vs. unfavourable outcome with a cool head.

Once you force someone into a corner, where the choice is "do something that you fear or die", they will choose to live, because they're more afraid of dying than of whatever you were going to do to them. In fact, the whole "overcoming fear" thing is how cave-men evolved into us. Oh, wait, you said Kansas .....

How will they know?

[taxevader]

Will they kick out students simply because the MAFIAA sent them a strongly worded letter? It would be the simplest and cheapest thing for them to do, and it wouldn't surprise me one bit.

Even if they are 'guilty'.. what if someone downloaded a ROM of a NES game he has in his basement at home? A track from a CD that doesn't play anymore? A no-cd patch for a game so he can play it on his laptop wherever he goes? According to their draconian proposal, all of these would mean you are cut off from the internet.. forever. Is it me or is that f&*king crazy?

A University should be fighting the powers that be, not aiding and abetting them.

Typical Slashdot Sensationalism

[OverlordQ]

Typical Slashdot sensationalist story about the DMCA and people get all uppity before checking the facts of the case.

Let's take a look shall we:

If the University of Kansas receives notice of a copyright violation (downloading or uploading copyrighted material including music, movies, games, software, etc.) tied to the IP address registered in your name, you will receive an email and written notice that your access to the ResNet Network has been temporarily suspended for 5 business days, during which time you may appeal if you believe the copyright infringement notice was received in error. You have 5 business days from the date of notice to provide written documentation supporting your appeal to the Office of the Vice Provost for Student Success, describing the nature of the error. If your appeal is denied, your ResNet service will be permanently deactivated for the remainder of the time you live in KU's residential housing facilities. The ResNet fee is primarily a connection fee and not a usage fee. If your service is permanently terminated, there will be no subsequent refund of the ResNet activation fee, regardless of when the violation occurred.

1) You get a notice
2) You get a 5 day suspension
3) You have those 5 business days to submit an appeal if it was erroneous
4) If your appeal is denied (or you didn't submit one) your ResNet access is terminated.

It's the end of the world . . . oh wait . . .what's this?

You will still be able to use computer labs on campus and will retain the use of your KU email account.

So you lose your dorm access, but can walk down to a computer lab . . .

So I guess the moral of the story is, don't get caught, or don't use the schools network to download your movies

Did they think this through?

[BillGatesLoveChild]

> The university's ResNet website states that, 'Violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act is against the law. If you are caught downloading copyrighted material, you will lose your ResNet privileges forever. No second notices, no excuses, no refunds.

We've already seen that anyone outside the U.S can send a bogus DMCA takedown notice without penalty. Not often the US passes laws that prosecute Americans and give non-Americans free reign but there you go. Here are two recent cases showing how easy it is:

http://www.australianit.news.com.au/story/0,24897, 21563838-27317,00.html
http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/2007/pulpit_200 70329_001882.html

Now Kansas University has said they'll shut down students account if *anyone* sends a DMCA notice, with right of appeal. So if someone outside the US was to take the University's mailing list and generate a bogus DMCA notice for each one, the
entire University would voluntarily shut itself down. This hole in DMCA has been suggested before, so it's hardly new.

Who dreamed up this nonsense? Didn't they think it through to its logical conclusion? Don't Universities teach critical thinking? I mean, Double Duh.

Policy could affect research and study

[Cheesey]

Students often need to download copyrighted material to support their work. I wonder if Kansas U has considered the implications of their policy: if the RIAA can get you disconnected instantly for downloading an MP3, surely other publishers can do the same.

In my own work, I often have to fetch journal and conference papers from digital libraries, e.g. a good one. Often I will find a paper is not available to me because it isn't covered by my University's subscription, like many of the papers here or here. That situation is supposed to force a trip to the brick-and-mortar library (if it has the document), but sometimes you can find the paper online anyway, using a search engine. It might be on the author's website or Citeseer. Sometimes people seem to "accidentally" leave copies of papers where a search engine can find them. This is extremely helpful for a researcher, saving much time, and it is known that online articles are more likely to be cited.

However, except in special cases (e.g. the author has retained the copyright and distributed it for free), this is technically copyright infringement. The publishers want you to get everything through their paywall. That would be fine if everything was accessible, but the exhorbitant fees charged for full access by some organisations prevent that. Therefore, copyright infringement actually helps scientific research by allowing information to flow. At my University, nobody seems to notice (or care about) students digging up papers from elsewhere. But if the Kansas U management style spread here, a publisher could presumably get students instantly disconnected for "bypassing the paywall". You might lose your Internet connection -- for studying.

Is this close to a situation where research is actively inhibited by greed?

"The content you requested is not part of your subscription, please pay $30 to download this 10 page article".

IT policy at U of Kansas is generally clueless

[ibn_khaldun]

The IT "services" at KU are clueless in general, not just with this, and they consistently appear to have mistaken their windowless cubicles for Olympus/Valhalla. Over the last ten years they have periodically gone through phases of issuing draconian policies, only to find them unenforceable. My favorite (though by no means only) example was a policy that anyone caught writing down a password (passwords, of course, were required to be changed every 42 minutes, contain Mayan glyphs, etc) could be fired. Never enforced, much to the disappointment of local lawyers. They went through another phase of barging into faculty offices and imaging disks, except they would get the office numbers incorrect and leave the faculty member with an inoperable machine. And sometimes really picked the wrong office... The individuals involved are no longer in our employ, as the saying goes (and were last seen staked to the ground near an anthill, I believe...)

Two or three mistaken enforcements of this -- yes, that will happen with near certainty given past experience -- and the effect of this will be simply to drive students out of the dorms. Someone with an ounce of clue (necessarily, outside of ITS) will figure that it is a whole lot cheaper to stonewall the RIAA on most cases than to deal with the cost of empty rooms, the policy will be quietly dropped, and IT will go in search of something else they can screw up.