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Court Rules Against TorrentSpy In MPAA Email Suit
mikesd81 writes "C|Net reports that a lawsuit filed by TorrentSpy against the MPAA, accusing it of intercepting the company's private e-mails, was tossed out of court this week. Even though a U.S District judge ruled that the MPAA broke no rules, the MPAA does admit it paid $15,000 to obtain private e-mails belonging to TorrentSpy executives. The MPAA's acknowledgment is significant because it comes at a time when the group is trying to limit illegal file sharing by imploring movie fans to act ethically and resist the temptation to download pirated movies. From the article: 'Ethically, it's pretty clear that reading other people's e-mail is wrong,' said Lorrie Cranor, an associate research professor and Internet privacy expert at Carnegie Mellon University. 'Being offered someone else's e-mails by a third party should have been a red flag.' TorrentSpy is appealing the decision." This is just not a good week for those guys.
So, according to US law, it's illegal to hack into someone's computer to read their private data but it's legal to pay someone else to do it?
.torrent files that are not themselves infringing is being called into question?
Yet the legality of hosting a site hosting
This seems very inconsistent to me. Is it or is it not legal to act as a proxy to potentially illegal material?
but some are more equal than others.
While we (the citizens) weren't paying attention, "they" have put in a two-tiered structure where the laws apply to the sheep, but not the wolves. That's why if you steal someone's SSN, you go to jail, but if you are an illegal alien, hey, it's ok. Or if the MPAA or RIAA breaks the law, harrasses and intimidates people, it's ok...they are a legimiate business interest (and we know this because of their campaign contributions). If Tyson wants to import a whole town from Guatamala to work in their chicken processing plant in Arkansas, that's ok too. "Steal" a DVD by copying it, and it's pokey time for you. All the while your Congressmen and Congresswoman are busy putting their hands in your wallets to pay for boondoggles like the $140 billion ($450,000 for every pre-Katrina man, woman, and child) for New Orleans relief, and various other Bridges to Nowhere.
You see there is this big fat legal distinction between the fact that a judge can order you to turn over your private emails and having some industrial spy steal them from you. The former is legal and a standard part of legal proceedings and the other is long established as a crime. The MPAA should get bitchslapped for this kind of thing. All parties involved should be raking them over the coals for this. The absolute LAST person that should be excusing this sort of behaivor is a judge. They are the sort of people that should be the first to object.
The judge should have been pissed that the MPAA didn't file a discovery motion.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
How the HELL is this not a felony?!
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Tampering and stealing physical mail is a federal crime...
yet theft of digital mail is A-OK?
I want to have what that judge is smoking.
TorrentSpy's case was based on the assertion that the MPAA violated the Federal Wiretap Act.
All that this ruling means is that in the opinion of this court they did not.
It does not grant carte blance access to industrial espionage. It does not mean that the MPAA violated no other laws.
For a group of people who are picky about minor details of technical arguments you all assume a lot about legal ones.
OK, so I can pay someone, who had already copied a movie before they talked to me, for a copy of a movie, right? I am getting the movie leagally, by purchasing it.
Just the cost of doing business. And to think when Valenti died there were actually some who thought the MPAA might start growing a conscience.
More Twoson than Cupertino