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YouTube Must Give All User Histories To Viacom
psyopper writes "Google will have to turn over every record of every video watched by YouTube users, including users' names and IP addresses, to Viacom, which is suing Google for allowing clips of its copyright videos to appear on YouTube, a judge ruled Wednesday.
Although Google argued that turning over the data would invade its users' privacy, the judge's ruling (.pdf) described that argument as 'speculative' and ordered Google to turn over the logs on a set of four terabyte hard drives." Update: 07/03 18:05 GMT by T : Brian Aker, now of MySQL but long ago Slashdot's "database thug," writes a journal entry on how companies could intelligently treat such potentially sensitive user data.
Another company to purposely avoid.
hmmm, thats a nasty precedent.
Presumably, legal discovery is usually limited to the domain in which the lawsuit is operating. In a case like this, is it really appropriate for Google to provide such vast quantities of information, 99.9% of which is almost certainly irrelevant to the case? Shouldn't there be an appeals process Google can use that basically says "that judge doesn't know what (s)he's talking about, Viacom don't need this information"?
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
That must've been a hacker who got onto my computer who was searching for "bunny", "kitties", "puppies" and "babies".
I only search for "fire", "car crashes", "backyard wrestling" and "boobs".
*grunt*
>.>
I fail to see why they would need to know who watched the videos.. uploader? Maybe, but viewers?
The disappearing pencil trick. Let me show you it.
It seems likely that the Google expansion is an easy way to claim a ton of ground, and to then intentionally lose it.
//de ~ 9cimi
Isn't there some law that, unless you are a convicted monopolist, you can't be expected to help the competition ? I'm sure Viacom will do nothing with this data to help its own advertising business, no sirree.
Religion is what happens when nature strikes and groupthink goes wrong.
It would be a "shame" if they, say, dropped them on the way to the office.
Without the heads parked, of course.
And they just HAD to stop and get that loose grip looked at...in an MRI machine...
Check out my sysadmin blog!
Why would a company keep all of that information, especially when they know there is a high degree of certainty that they will be involved in some legal troubles later. Keeping this information is just asking for trouble. There probably are a few ways they use it, but it could easily be done without needing to keep a history. View counts, for instance, could just be incremented, and immediately the information about who viewed it could be thrown out. What about all of the related videos? Just create those links and throw out the information about the individuals that clicked between videos? It just doesn't make sense that when you will be offering a service that could come back to bit you in the rear, why would you keep information that could potentially show that you are doing something in a gray-area?
Viacom wants the data to prove that infringing material is more popular than user-created videos, which could be used to increase Google's liability if it is found guilty of contributory infringement.
So anonymize the data. Ask your friendly local CS student for instructions. You can get all your statistics from that.
Oh, that isn't actually the reason you want the data? Yeah, thought so. DIAF
Now that they gave out my private information to another company without my consent i can now sue google and become rich...I pitty the suckers that bought stock in google.
Who wants to be atleast 85% of the logs are for suggestive material or soft core porn?
People will find out about my Eddie Izzard fetish..."The death star must have had a cantina..."
Sheldon
The users need to intervene as a class and request a protective order. They probably can't get the subpoena quashed but they probably can get the judge to limit what Viacom can do with the data and who can see it. They should ask him to limit access to the data to outside experts sworn to secrecy.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
...it's hard to get excited about the prospect of our privacy being protected by having this data in Google's hands instead of Google's and Viacom's.
Finally modding someone offtopic when they rant about what "Begging the Question" means: priceless.
OK, no need to worry too much. Viacomm is a commercial organisation trying to protect its property. Now if it was the government wanting our private data, then there would be a problem.
Why would Google even keep this info. We seriously need to learn to stop tracking this kind of stuff. It's like the Patriot act and libraries. When the act passed and libraries found out that checkout records of their users could be used in court most libraries simply stopped keeping a record of them. Companies like Google need to start doing the same.
If there's no way for Google to appeal this ruling before Viacom gets their greasy mitts on everyone's personal data, Google should do the right thing (though obviously not the legal thing) and erase all of it. Better to take the punishment for that I say than to betray all of your customers on account of some dipshit judge who is clueless about privacy.
So, if google has taken down a video from some non-viacom entity, for any reason, viacom gets a copy, in violation of the original owners' copyrights?
Also, I wonder if google had to take down any kiddie porn vids ... seems we could get viacom for possessing child porn.
Kevin Smith on Prince
They're arguing that YouTube gets more viewership from copyrighted materials than non-copyrighted stuff, and they want the viewer logs to prove that. Then they'll go after Google and others for more money because they're profiting more from it.
I'm not saying that I agree with decision (I don't), but it's not like it's entirely unmotiviated.
On the other hand, I think people really need to start showing up outside the homes of the various lawyers, judges, and corporate executives involved and protest this kind of bullshit. They need to be followed into public places and shouted at about their behavior.
So, what is going to happen to me, since I watched dozens of clips of Family Guy and Robot Chicken?
What programs do I have to avoid, so that I don't watch any Viacom properties on TV or the Internet?
Who needs to win cases when you can receive millions of dollars in data simply by going through discovery proceedings?
Every single user of the Internet should be OUTRAGED about this judge's neglect of basic privacy statutes. I dispatched an email to YouTube about this order, urging them to fight it with all their power.
Colin Dean Go a year without DRM
I expect google to fight this vigorously. Maybe even all the way up. Yet if they end up violating user privacy in order to comply, this might have major effects on goggle's long run plans of compiling large databases of information on users.
In the end we all know what will happen: some poor sap who uploaded 5 minutes of a Simpsons episode because the through that Seymore's asking a gerbil to chew through his ball sack was insanely funny will get the book thrown at him while serial copyright infringers are smart enough not to be easily identified.
The "silver lining" - I'm hopping that even more extensions and programs get developed in order to further anonimyze your surfing habits.
-- All this knowledge is giving me a raging brainer.
Why is Google keeping such detailed logs? If Google had anonymised their IP address logs to begin with, they could have avoided this.
They should have taken the white house's lead and preemptively destroyed any computer records they didn't want coming out in court.
This is breaking european law. It is personal data (a log file with IP addresses is). So I really hope that Google do not have that sort of data in the US.
I will be reporting this to the danish data privacy agency. I suggest every other euopean reader here also contacts their local data privacy agency, or some EU institutuion.
Not much Google can do now if ordered by a court to turn it over, but I'm a bit (lot) creeped out by why they think they need to keep this type of detailed personalized history in the first place. Having the history means that a court/government/disgruntled employee/future employer/hacker may get access to it.
If Google really need to target advertising to what we're watching, searching for, etc, etc (big brother - yuck), then couldn't they at least do so in a more anonymous form - rather than storing "user Joe just watched Viacom's boobie-jiggle on YouTube on July 3rd", just do user[joe].interests[interest-class[boobie-jiggle]]++.
I guess Google don't consider being big brother incarnate to be "evil", but I think most of their user base do!
...so how long until this data leaks out and we have a repeat of the AOL search leak incident? Not that I think it's okay for Viacom to have it (or for any human eyes to have access to it really).
Also does this search info really need to be kept? Anyone familiar with these assinine data retention laws?
I'll use YouTube through a proxy from now on, and stay logged out as much as possible.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Only four tera-byte hard drives? Google should be handing over 4 rack's worth of machines with logs on.
...Furvert!
Genesis 1:32 And God typed
Here's the list of all the brands you now want to avoid because Viacom is being a bitch.
media networks,bet networks,bet,bet j,mtv networks, atomfilms, addictinggames, cmt, comedy central, gametrailers, harmonix, logo, mtv, mtv2, mtvn international, mtvu, mtv tr3s, neopets, nickelodeon - nick jr., nick at nite, noggin, parentsconnect, quizilla, rhapsody, shockwave, spike tv, the n, tv land, vh1, vh1 classic, vh1 soul, virtual worlds, xfire, filmed entertainment, paramount pictures corp, paramount pictures, dreamworks studios, paramount vantage, mtv films, nickelodeon movies, home entertainment, global reach, brand index
I wonder how far we could get saying that the **AA claims are merely speculative and expect anything besides a "So? And your point?"
Nothing like a living in a nation, ran by a government of it's people - for it's corporations...
The judge is a moron.
All they need is a count of views of each video. Something that is already available directly from the site!
OK OK, we know, Google is good and behavioral advertising is great when it's Google and the root of evil only when it's Phorm, and Google would never give out data to Chinese, Brazilian etc governments and especially not to the US - after all, if they're not allowed to reveal when they've done so, it must mean they haven't done it, right? Right?
I'll save you the trouble, my IP is 127.0.0.1
Anyone have some boilerplate forms and step by step instructions to file the necessary legal objections to this? I would sure do it and I'll bet enough other people would to keep the court busy just reading the stuff for quite a while.
Still not too hot?
You shouldn't underestimate the damage a large corporation can do with private data. Most of them are bestest friends forever with the government, and of those who aren't, few of them will stand up to the government. I'd say that if Viacom has this info it's as good as in US gov. hands.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Why do companies keep collecting every bit of data they can like this? Why does Google need to know the user name of the person watching the videos? Even the IP address is questionable. If they want to track people artificially inflating their views, wouldn't it be simple to keep one day's worth of views by IP address? What value do they get from keeping all the viewing history?
Meanwhile, Viacom gets user names, IP addresses, and the list of every video watched. If they are smart, they will realize this is way better then any survey or Nelson rating they ever get. And they got it nearly for free. You can be certain that other companies will be very interested in this data too. Can they just give Viacom a call and get it? Did the court put any restraints on Viacom sharing this data?
I hope you haven't watched anything on YouTube you don't want to be contacted about. Now excuse me while I go log out of my account. I don't think I've watched anything I don't want shared, but at the same time I would rather not risk having someone else come through and make decisions about me based on my random viewing habits.
If Google were to refuse to comply their cred would jump in my book. Plus it would make big news and I'm sure once the news got a hold of it and the public starts to hear en masse that Viacom would be forced to back down. Or at the very least Congress, which loves to grandstand would haul Viacom before a congressional hearing.
That judge is an ass.
As for saving that data, Google has long known that it was potentially trouble. The Feds tried to get their hands on it before, apparently just because "it was there". Of course the Feds had an excuse for wanting it, but I believe that is all it was... an excuse.
But yeah; as pointed out by another poster: it is looking more and more like a site to avoid, isn't it?
IAAL.
When someone asks for discovery outside any reasonable boundry, attorneys refer to it as a "fishing expedition". Here, they just want to see the user patterns, so that they can do a stat analysis and figure out new ways to handicap a service they don't control.
The overarching reason for all of this litigation is only secondarily about copyright. The primary reason is so that they can learn and when they ask the "series of tubes" know-little (but bought and paid for) congress for son of DMCA they know how to hamstring.
While the Viacoms and Sonys of the world don't like the internet and can't kill it, they can try to hobble it at every turn. This, HDCP, etc are all part of one grand scheme to control the pipeline. "child porn" is the excuse to filter at the ISP......
Think of 1978....they controlled your tv, and that's the way they liked it. That is the ideal.
It's not just "IP addresses", it's "IP addresses and user names", and user names *are* personally identifiable information, because they can be trivially cross-referenced with other public information to identify individuals.
Speaking of movies that have been taken down for any reason, I think one hard drive should be required to have the entirety of Goatse: The Movie, Goatse II: Revenge of Goatse, Son of Goatse, and the like.
Basically, anything to purposely annoy Viacom while garnering amusement at their expense. "Dear God, I just... ohhhh, he's gonna be feeling THAT in the morning..."
Who the fuck cares about if my YouTube viewing habits get into a data warehouse as a statistical data?
Maybe it is annoying a bit, maybe i get even some more spam due to it, but why would i want to avoid the site?
Patents Drive Free Software as Hurricanes Drive Construction Industry
What is viacom going to do with the user data? Start suing youtube viewers?
Way to copy RIAA and SCO.
RIAA and SCO should sue viacom for totally rocking their style.
Shameless plug alert: Game server control panel
Seriously, I really support the anonymize-crowd here.
Number the IP's randomly so that everything like times and number of hits from an ip on same video are kept, but the actual IP is hidden. Each IPs traffic can be identified, but no privacy information as such is "leaked".
I could live with this, could you? (Yes, I am talking to all you other Anonymous Cowards.)
Viacom wants the data to prove that infringing material is more popular than user-created videos, which could be used to increase Google's liability if it is found guilty of contributory infringement.
Rick Astley videos are undoubtedly copyrighted. There's no way user-created videos are going to be found more popular.
He was never as good after those shitty writers came back. He should have told them to STAY on strike.
.
So, sadly, it won't be hard to so goodbye to him. I will miss Colbert, though.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Quick, go search for videos of "Viacom executives and lawyers should be burned alive so we can piss on their ashes".
Meanwhile, by ordering Google to turn over copies of ALL videos that were taken down for copyright violations, haven't they been ordered, in fact, to knowingly violate copyrights?
Interestingly though, we now have a court finding that IP addresses are not personally identifying information. Bad news for the RIAA.
Does Viacom own "Two Girls, One Cup?"
What would be the purpose of this? If you watch a video on YouTube, even if its not there legally, you are doing nothing illegal. Or at least nothing provably illegal. The person uploading these copyrighted materials is doing something definitely illegal, but couldn't they do figure out who that is already by just crawling the site for their content and making a note of the username, and then pestering Google for the IP address?
Something doesn't make sense here. My guess is they more or less know who is pirating their content, but what they are really interested in is who is pirating their partners'/competitors' content, and they are going to try to sell that info on to their competitors. Just a guess.
Awesome. What right does Viacom have to my data? If they want access to individual data, they should have to request it that way. I could buy an argument for aggregated data but not this level of detail. It feels like we need some new laws to handle situations like this where companies own data of their uses like this to protect our privacy.. Ugh.
This is a dangerous thing indeed.
What would make more sense is to, in the future of course, come up with a methodology that does not store this information.
...since IANAL reading the ruling [wired.com] won't do me much more good than a lawyer reading uncommented source code.
This is a first! Just about everyone here believes that, since the law is written in English, you don't need a law degree to interpret, understand, and especially, comment on it. After all, it's not technical and therefore requires less intelligence than anyone here: engineers have superior intelligence above all.
Google's Blog claims that they started taking steps to anonymize their logs a year ago, keeping "only" 18 months worth of identifiable data, to be implemented "within a year's time".
It seems likely that this wouldn't have been soon enough for any of this material to have been anonymized before Viacom's suit, since it was filed the same month they made this announcement.
... could put "infringing" content over the top.
http://www.viacom.com/news/News_Docs/YouTube%20Myth%20vs.%20Reality.pdf
Although Google argued that turning over the data would invade its users' privacy, the judge's ruling (.pdf) described that argument as "speculative"
This must be some new use of the word "speculative" with which I am unfamiliar.
Hopefully Viacom get some money out of Google in return for the content that they had to invest in making. Google/Youtube should not be able to broadcast content which they don't have the rights to and profit from the eyeballs watching it. Sorry I know the fanboys will be angry but it is true. You are the same people that get up in arms when someone uses some GPL code against the license terms.. you can't have it both ways.
I read the article and then read the actual ruling. Here it is:
But defendants cite no authority barring them from disclosing such information in civil discovery proceedings, and their privacy concerns are speculative. Defendants do not refute that the "login ID is an anonymous pseudonym that users create for themselves when they sign up with YouTube" which without more "cannot identify specific individuals" (Pls.' Reply 44), and Google has elsewhere stated: "We . . . are strong supporters of the idea that data protection laws should apply to any data that could identify you. The reality is though that in most cases, an IP address without additional information cannot." Google Software Engineer Alma Whitten, Are IP addressespersonal?, GOOGLE PUBLIC POLICY BLOG (Feb. 22, 2008), http://googlepublicpolicy.blogspot.com/2008/02/are-ip-addresses-personal.html (Wilkens Decl. Ex. M).
Therefore, the motion to compel production of all data from the Logging database concerning each time a YouTube video has been viewed on the YouTube website or through embedding on a third-party website is granted.
It sounds to me like the judge is essentially saying that Google/YouTube didn't adequately demonstrate that privacy is being violated for such an order. Actually, from what I read I was fairly impressed with what the judge had to say and the rulings on some of the other issues involved (Viacom didn't get nearly as much as they were hoping for- source code), but it sounds like Google/YouTube did not do a very good job of demonstrating the privacy concerns.
Am I the only one that finds it ironic that we insist that an IP address is not sufficient for the RIAA but now we're terrified about YouTube giving out IP addresses? I guess the concern is that since the prevailing notion seems to be in the court that an IP address is a valid tool, that such will carry over to Google/YouTube as well.
In any case, I recommend you read the ruling for yourself.
Couldn't YouTube be considered a type of club?
Fight. Fight for all the reasons that make this country great. Fight for freedom. Fight for freedom of information. Fight for your right for privacy. Fight because one of the greatest inventions of our time, that regardless of any negatives impacts, its good has out weighed the bad,should not be used to set a precedent that will infinitely impact the future of our freedoms and our rights. WE ARE THE INTERNET. WE ARE THE PEOPLE. WE ARE THE BUSINESS, THE USERS, THE REASON. FIGHT!
I consider this to be outrageous and a major breach of everyones privacy. Now viacom will basically be able to mine the database and basically do whatever it wants that suits its fancy. Its another reason to boycott Viacomm. But as well, we should be asking Google to stop recording logs of what videos people use, or destroy them after a week. The view logging is not needed for other features, like comments, view count, ratings, favourite lists, and so on.
In response to the "Patriot" Act, my local library does not store any information about any books I have checked out, except for those on which I currently owe fines. Check out this page, on which the ALA describes its policies with regard to user information: http://www.ala.org/ala/oif/statementspols/ifresolutions/libraryusagerecords.cfm I think google, who does no evil, needs to follow that example, and then lead by example. If you know that some outside entity can force you to turn over personal data, then by storing that data you are aiding and abetting, and all your statements regarding 'privacy' are nothing but b.s.
Time for Google and anyone else wanting to protect their user's privacy to move the logs to another jurisdiction where wholesale handing over of logs would not be permitted...
Obviously it's too late for this judgement, but for someone not covered by this court's jurisdiction, and AFAIK never having watched any Viacom owned material on Youtube, I protest at having my viewing habits handed over in this fashion (yes, I know that quite possibly this has been done commercially by Youtube/Google - but it's generally indirect through their advertiser links or javascript, which I can block or disable).
If I am an European user, can I sue the judge in the International court of justice for offering my private data to Viacom?
I used to think the same thing about paper. Then I realized trees are a renewable resource! I can say with close to certainty that the net gain in carbon from recycling paper (you need energy to run the recycling plant) is much more than growing a tree that...gasps -- takes carbon out of environment and creates a net loss in carbon. Environmental issue need to be given careful consideration and need to be thoroughly thought through.
Win a signed Stephen Carpenter ESP Guitar from the Deftones: http://def-tag.com/?r=0008781
I didn't RTFA, but I read the judge's order.
Viacom argued that Google should be forced to disclose "the computer source code which controls both the YouTube.com search function and Google's internet search tool "Google.com"." (quoting the judge, p.4 of the order) Apparently Viacom argued that Google/Yahoo had (or might have?) the capacity to determine whether material was copyrighted automatically, or that the algorithm was already making this distinction but wasn't prohibiting copyrighted material.
Lawyers advance even less plausible arguments, but it is hard to see this as anything other than an attempt to threaten google in a way money damages really can't. Luckily, the judge rejected Viacom's request.
Viacom also asked for the source to google's "Video ID" program, copies of all videos ever removed from youtube, google's "advertising and video schemas", all _private_ videos and data, and finally the individual info discussed in the summary. The judge denied Viacom's requests for advertising schemas, content of private videos, and the Video ID source. Saying no to four unreasonable requests doesn't excuse saying yes to three others, but it could have been much worse.
Obviously a step towards the New World Order. They will determine who has viewed 2012/NWO/911/UFO "conspiracy" videos to find out who is putting the pieces together/knows "too much". They will determine who is a threat to their plans and eliminate them.
Do as much research as you can on these so called "conspiracy" theories, ASAP.
Time is short.
For "fuck viacom." It yielded some interesting results. I also hope that someone at viacom catches it in the search statistics when the review the data that youtube has to hand over.
This I find to be very unconstitutional and threatens my civil rights. I reside in the US and watch you tube all of the time. I really don't care who knows what I watch but I do not feel the government should be able to have that information just because some huge corporation got some free publicity and now wants to capitalize on it in court. EVERYONE RISE UP AGAINST VIACOM and boycott them. Make em' suffer for this frivolous suite.
Long live Google!
Viacom wants the data to prove that infringing material is more popular than user-created videos, which could be used to increase Google's liability if it is found guilty of contributory infringement.
I don't see this happening. Youtube may have a lot of copyrighted materials, but user-created videos have exploded.
Just a few of the smaller but popular examples:
Chocolate Rain -- 25,053,011
Leave Britney Alone -- 21,145,310 (and most of Chris Crockers other videos have an average of 2 million views)
Charlie the Unicorn -- 25,680,981
And of course, the king... Evolution of Dance, with 90,944,416 views.
(From the Laws of Japanese Animation) Law of Inherent Combustibility -- Everything explodes. Everything.
How much of the copyrighted material would still be allowed to be watched because it is covered under fair use? Youtube has a lot of short bits that would almost certainly be covered by fair use, but I'm sure Viacom would claim wouldn't be.
The limits of fair use often require court cases.
How can Viacom get reasonable statistics if they can't determine on their own what copyrighted materials are allowed to be posted and watched legally anyway?
Not that Viacom should get the data to run the statistics. Hopefully this question helps prevent that from happening, since it undermines the usefulness of the data.
Why is it ok for the news, network and cable shows, talk shows, late night tv hosts, etc. to use clips from youtube but it's not ok for people on youtube to watch clips from their shows? Isn't this a double standard?
Google has NEVER fought to keep any of their customer's information private. The Chinese government made hundreds of arrests after Google handed over people's search patterns. If you want to keep something private, don't use Google.
Abolish copyright. End the insanity.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
Put each view in it's own .txt file. Let Viacom sort through the trillions of files.
Steve's Computer Service, Hobbs, NM
The legal system in this country is going down the drain. I think because the Constitution sits behind a ton of glass in a museum the legal system and Congress think it is an artifact that is no longer relevant. It is 4th of July so what better way to honor the founding of this country than to just burn the Constitution, I mean the only part of it that seems to be still seems to be enforced is the right to own a gun. Funny considering that the the article on owning a gun is usually the one that is called outdated. But apparently all of the parts on privacy, freedom and free speech aren't outdated, but we just ignore them. Viacom DOES NOT need to nor has any right to look at all of the Google logs.
Just because you are wrong and I called you out on it doesn't mean I am a Troll.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Hey, somebody had to say it.
Google has prevented govs. from seeing its direct user data (though google does help all govs to see derived data and of course, the feds (such as NSA) can ALL of the networks, so they already see who is making what request). And here in the USA, our courts have upheld that. But, assume that the feds want some set of data related to exactly WHO saw what (which the feds most likely can not see unless they know the IP of the person). Now, they can sic a company like viacom on Google and have the data be transfered. And yes, Viacom is all to happy turn over your data to the FBI, who also has access to the above data via W's patriot act.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Although Google argued that turning over the data would invade its users' privacy, the judge's ruling (.pdf) described that argument as "speculative" and ordered Google to turn over the logs on a set of four tera-byte hard drives."
Well, wouldn't tracing through 4TB of logs also be considered speculative?
A fair bit of people seem to worry that the data will be used for other purposes that the case where it is requested. It is my understanding that the material is confinded to that case only as it can't be sold or used by Viacom for its own buisness. Or does that work differently in USA law?
Carbon based humanoid in training.
Viacom finds out some 80yr old grandma without internet access has been watching their movies on youtube?
I have pretty regularly cleared my viewing history on YouTube. (Go to QuickList->Viewing History->Clear Viewing History on the YouTube interface).
Did YouTube keep a copy of it anyway? Are they turning that over to Viacom?
If so, I'd like to file a bug against the Clear Viewing History feature as it obviously did not clear the viewing history.
Stuart Eichert
Yep, I agree, Google does appear to now fall within the avoid category. It's a shame that the judge is ordering the turn over of this information, but this is easily foreseeable because of the Federal Civil Rules governing discovery, so the real question is why Google keeps this information at all.
Google has become the one-stop-shop for anyone (litigious companies, the government, criminals, advertisers) to get your personal information.
Data. Retention. Policy.
I don't approve of Viacom's tactics here, but f%$# you, Google, for HAVING this data.
More proof of Google's "oh, don't worry--we'll try and keep that private" policy simply isn't enough to protect users.
If this data were purged, it wouldn't be there to subpoena.
I'm not advocating purposely destroying evidence, but the number of logfiles here must be HUGE, and most reasonable companies would avoid retaining this much data.
I'll supply them for you, you lazy person you!
That must've been a hacker who got onto my computer who was searching for "bunny", "kitties", "puppies" and "babies".
I only search for "fire", "car crashes", "backyard wrestling" and "boobs".
*grunt*
Yes, that was indeed uncalled for. Especially the one about your mom. Sorry.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
Im shocked. I don't know how any judge could make such a stupid ruling, but even dumber from Google to actually track who whatches what. Unfortunately thats how today's politics work, noone cares about privacy(really!) or liberties. :(
Google should hand over the hard drives full of logs, as long as they are strongly encrypted with a "forgotten" key. Let Viacom suck on that for a while! Besides we wouldn't want those drives forgotten in the back of a cab and falling into the wrong hands or anything.
-AlPhAbEt
That's what you get when you let the prez wipe his ass with the constitution...
did any of the slaves bother to read the new law of the empire?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USA_PATRIOT_Act
Google could run a simple select * or equivalent, changing each name to a guid of some kind. This would allow analysis of all users, per user, if necessary (which is doubtful anyway), without revealing any identifying info.
That's a good point. To take it a step further, does the court order define the scope and format of the data Google must cough up? Do they have to make it easy to use? They could simply export a 2-column file with a pair of GUIDs identifying User:Video-View hits, then appeal ad-infinitum every additional bit of data that Viacom asks for.
"There, we gave you all of our users, along with their video watching data. Have a nice day."
Pi Ran Out
Cause the judge valued corporate well-being (to protect IP or make sure companies *make money*) than the well-being of its citizens' rights.
How ironic that corporations (as entities) are now valued above the people in the rule of law.
This was done by order of a judge in the united states district court, southern district of New York.
Bush had nothing to do with it.
Wonder if Viacom's lawyers will use Google Desktop to search the records they obtained from Google...
i\hbar\dot{\psi}=\hat{H}\psi
Google encrypted the drives before sending them over as a security precaution, ID theft and all, then promptly crushed the original drives and shot the man with the key. Oops, sorry assholes.
Si vis pacem, para bellum! For evil to succeed good men need only do nothing!
So since when has this one judge been appointed chief law officer of the entire Internet? American laws do not affect me since I live in the UK and this is a breach of European privacy laws. Perhaps I'll go and pull our troops from afghanistan and order the execution of Mugabe if it's now OK for one man to act on behalf of the rest of the world. This needs to be jumped all over by the EFF and privacy advocates, that judge should be removed for abuse of power.
Biomech
If Google must go through with this then I'm all in favour of supplying the >12 Terabytes (BBC) to viacom................ on floppy disk.
Biomech
The statement that Viacom getting every individual user's history, regardless of any individual's actions (whether they even viewed a Viacom-originated clip) will invade each user's privacy is not "speculative". It is a 100% guarantee that those millions of people's privacy will be invaded, though assured protection by Google's privacy policy.
The 4th Amendment says our privacy right will be protected by due process. A judge who rules that 100% certainty is "speculative" is not the process we're due. Google should fight this tyrannical ruling. And that judge should be forced to retire.
--
make install -not war
This, just like the Grokster ruling, is the kind of logically flawed garbage that could only be generated by a board of elderly men that don't understand the technology that they are ruling over. You do not sue the owner of a public venue when someone in the venue does something you don't approve of. You sue the offender. This is like suing a phone company, because a corporate spy gave away internal company secrets over the phone lines.
They should present all the logs on floppy disk, something like 8431599616 floppys! that'd teach them
Viacom: All your database are belong to us.
Step 1: Collect user data
Step 2: File lawsuit
Step 3: ???
Step 4: Profit!
In Soviet Russia, Viacom watches you!
Did I miss anything?
The judge making this senile ruling is Louis Stanton, who was born in 1927, 81 years ago. He was appointed by Ronald Reagan, 23 years ago.
Most Americans have to retire when they're 65. This guy is still sitting there, ruling on American activities that were invented only when he was already past retirement age.
Let him rule on whips & buggies. He's obviously unfit to rule on Internet privacy, and has even forgotten the 4th Amendment.
--
make install -not war
Boycott Viacom. Lets show them exactly what we think of them getting our personal data. What busines is it of theirs what videos I watched? Perhaps posted, they may have some claim, But not the watched videos. I am super peeved about this, and of course Google© and YouTube© are going to take the heat from the public. We need to get the word out "down with Viacom" Lets burry them in the internet graveyard along side all the failed .coms of the internet. If anyone knows how to contact the person who's idea it was to tell the judge that they needed ALL the users data, I want that email address posted on every tech site on the net.
In the PDF it sais that the logs contains what a specific 'login ID' has watched, at what time and so on. If a user isn't logged in while watching videos, does it get logged anyway? Is each viewed video, your IP, etc. logged even though you don't have an account on youtube?
Here's the five million pages of completely irrelevant information you ordered. ...and if I was Google I would deliver it in the form of printed hard-copy.
the irony is overwhelming
All that money you were making from it, have fun paying it all and then some to the hundreds of lawyers you are going to have to put on the payroll to defend it.
Here's a little secret for you guys, you can't turn over what you don't have. Stop tracking every thing we do and it'll be amazing how many lawsuits will stall before they even get started.
April fools or something? A judge rules the invasion of privacy as "speculative"?
This is invasion of my privacy.
I don't want Viacom to have my YouTube history. This is awful news.
>You could post your own flash videos on your own web site.
How will that help when the reported problem is that Google is being ordered to turn over the *viewing* histories of its users?
YouTube Must Give All User Histories to Viacom and after that Viacom gives this information to Big Brother, but we American sheep trust Big Brother, just as the Patriotic Germans trusted the Nazis. It is a matter of national security and we are only sacrificing our civil liberties to keep America safe from terrorist. . Sieg Heil & Hail to the Chief.
Here's a quote I like, written by Rose Wilder Lane way back in 1943:
Let Viacomm learn that lesson, Good and Hard!
Judge: Hon. Louis L. Stanton
Address:
Daniel Patrick Moynihan
United States Courthouse
500 Pearl St., Room 2250
New York, NY 10007
Courtroom: 21C
Chambers Phone: (212) 805-0252
Deputy Phone:
(212) 805-0123
they just added themselves to my permanent shit list. never watching any shit from this corporate behomoth again. fuck off and die viacom!
The order also requires Google to turn over copies of all videos that it has taken down for any reason
So does that now basically mean that Google has to infringe on other copyright holders by "distributing" these videos to Viacom?
...that someone in the states could create their own video, have a friend post it to YouTube, have the creator demand it be taken down, and then when Viacom get a copy of the taken down videos as they request in TFA they be sued for copyright infringement? Of course it may be that they only want videos taken down that belong to them, but I'm not so sure reading the article.
I'm sure it's one of those things that'll simply never work because there's no doubt some legal protection covering them if it's been handed over as part of a court order but just intrigued to know if anyone can answer for sure?
/me looks for another email provider before all my mail is sent to Fox Media or something like that. Damn, I don't even watch shitty Viacom stuff.
. . . and maybe what Viacom is after is the personal information, to help their marketing demographics effort (or just to sell to spammers).
...can they expect to analyze this data for their intended purpose (telling copyrighted stuff apart from the rest)? What kind of amazing technology do they have that can automatically and (even somewhat) accurately find out if a certain video belongs to them? I mean, unless they've got humans watching every and all youtube videos to classify them as "copyrighted by viacom", or even as "copyrighted-infringing"?
It seems to me that anyone with such a technology would be making a killing selling it to the likes of the RIAA associates. In short, I don't think viacom could ever possibly do what it states it wants to do with the data.
Or is Google going completely open-source? JGG
...there's some law that prohibits Viacom from using this data for purposes outside the scope of this lawsuit.
"Because the judge said so" means rather little to the corporate world. If mommy says no, you go ask daddy.
This ruling was recently overturned
http://biz.yahoo.com/paidcontent/080703/1_325113_id.html?.v=1
Viacom: We are here for the logs.
Youtube: Ok ley me copy them to your disks.
Viacom: Come on we dont have all day.
Youtube: Ok ok now what was the copy command, rm -r. Hmm damn it I always get cp and rm mixed up. Was there anything else
Here's the original article from Slashdot. Does this mean that I can now sue Viacom, and have a judge order YouTube to give me its user history too so that I can see how many times Viacom viewed my own videos? Or is that kind of law for big corporations and not "little people"? theknightshift.blogspot.com
ceooffice.viacom.com - - [20/Feb/2005:16:38:35 +0100] "GET /MidgetPorn.html
HTTP/1.1" 200 445 "-" "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 7.0; Windows NT 5.1)"
Non-Linux Penguins ?
While the user name turned over is your fictitious YouTube login name, your IP address is real. As the RIAA has already shown us far too well, an IP address and a timestamp plus one ex parte discovery subpoena will reveal the ISP account holder. All the pieces are there for an Absolute Invasion of our Privacy.
The judge was a moron and Google should appeal this decision on the basis of all of us!
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
IANAL, but the order required turning over copies of the video's and log's. Google apparently could comply by providing thousands of VHS tapes and reams of printouts of the log information,(all in nice 8pt font).
Compliance, at least according to the lawyer at my last company, does not mean we have to make it easy to find the needle in the haystack.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Google keeps our history in the hope that one day they can make some money from YouTube. They want to know what we watch, when we watch so they can target ads to specifically us. As for Viacom, I don't see them actually hunting each and everyone down who viewed one of their videos. Viacom will do the same exact thing that Google was planning on. When your ip address visits any of their sites, they will already know who you are, what you like and they will be able to sell better advertising. In the end, it will only make you a little bit more likely to click on one of their advertiser's ads.
"DO NOT BE ASHAMED"
by Wendell Berry
You will be walking some night
in the comfortable dark of your yard
and suddenly a great light will shine
round about you, and behind you
will be a wall you never saw before.
It will be clear to you suddenly
that you were about to escape,
and that you are guilty: you misread
the complex instructions, you are not
a member, you lost your card
or never had one. And you will know
that they have been there all along,
their eyes on your letters and books,
their hands in your pockets,
their ears wired to your bed.
Though you have done nothing shameful,
they will want you to be ashamed.
They will want you to kneel and weep
and say you should have been like them.
And once you say you are ashamed,
reading the page they hold out to you,
then such light as you have made
in your history will leave you.
They will no longer need to pursue you.
You will pursue them, begging forgiveness.
They will not forgive you.
There is no power against them.
It is only candor that is aloof from them,
only an inward clarity, unashamed,
that they cannot reach. Be ready.
When their light has picked you out
and their questions are asked, say to them:
"I am not ashamed." A sure horizon
will come around you. The heron will begin
his evening flight from the hilltop.
Now everyone is going to know that all I ever do on youtube is: "hot college girl dance webcam"
*clicks search*
*faps*
They don't look that healthy. Why doesn't Google just buy Viacom and "Do No Evil"?
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bs?s=VIA
This is outrageous.
SUPPORT THE UNITED STATES BILL OF RIGHTS! I DEFEND THIS LAW WITH MY LIFE.
Fourth Amendment (Amendment IV) to the United States Constitution
"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."
Google has to start NATing the logged IP addresses to hashed IPv6 FC00::/7 local addresses.
There is no right to feel safe thru security vaudeville at the expense of everyone's freedom, privacy and tax money.
Will they be using four hitachi Deskstar 7k1000
My Blog | Badsh
Viacom and the courts have invaded my privacy without any cause or agreement. These is a serious error on their part, and I would be more than willing to participate with anyone willing to come forward as well.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
If there were no copyright these lawyers would not have the excuse of stolen IP to invade our privacy. Let's not parry their thrust -- let's cut them off at the knees. Abolish copyright and this problem and many like it just go away.
We have the power to fix all these problems at a stroke.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
Data disposal has gotten much better in recent years so let's see how commited Google is to user privacy...
Google should just say "ok" and deliver the information, conveniently printing out in ones and zeros (on dot matrix printouts, if possible), in 14,000,000 shipping containers in front of their corporate office.
That'll learn em.
The question has to be asked, why oh why are they storing this data in the first place. No data nothing to hand over.
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
The sad thing is the people that are able to start this "civil war" are the same people who dont give a fuck about anything except their first world comforts. These people also elected bush -TWICE-
Americans love to pretend that they are not the government and have no control over the government. To everyone else in the world this state of reasoning is a joke, for who else can effect american policies but americans? Its simply a case, as cartman said (youtube video omited), of them having their cake and eating it too.
As a potential lottery winner, I totally support tax cuts for the wealthy
If google gives in they are in violation of a number of countries privacy laws and could face serious regulatory punishment.
In Japan for example the personal information protection act åäæf...å±äèæ protects such data. Korean and taiwan have similar legislation. EU law has already been mentioned and there are other countries with statutes on privacy as well.
I think google has the sheit lawyers from hell if they could not explain this to a judge.
I'll bet VIACOM learns TONS from this data! Not for the lawsuit, of course, but for how to sell its products better. The GOOGLE data is just precious.
Notionally there is a billion dollars at stake:
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080311-judge-to-viacom-no-punitive-damages-in-youtube-case.html
The judge said that they could not get their billion dollars in punitive dollars...
Before that YouTube/Google did not take down the 100000 videos that Viacom asked them to take down.
If you think about it, the 'spooks' already know what you watch. There is no conspiracy to get you, this is beef between Viacom and Google. The latest twist is that they want to know who is uploading their shows. If you watch something that just so happens to theirs then you have only committed a small thoughtcrime, maybe unwittingly.
It is a big day on the cyber-frontier, it's getting all 4th generational though. I think it is time for the citizenry to take back the net, with a wi-fi peer to peer 'darknet' that uses no centralised infrastructure.
Sounds like a great way to get four free one terabyte drives! count me in!
Does anyone have a list of Viacom properties? I would go a long way to know what to avoid and to start contact with companies that advertise on Viacom productions.
Turn the tables and assert that Viacom has been using illegal legal and accounting practices to fund their extortion and other money-making schemes over the years.
Please hand over all your legal records and accounting books back to the creation of the corporation so that we may prove our case.
Who's more popular? Google vs. Viacom. Google's market cap is $169 BILLION; Viacom's? A paltry $19B. Google should just buy them and fire all the execs.
Are you...Are you some kind of genius?
No, ma'am, I'm just a regular Slashdot reader.
Turn the log files over in electronic form as three 4TB .txt files.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
How can the log files which you've kindly asked (not got by the SWAT guys) from the suspect (not the third party) could be the evidence of anything!? It's not the fingerprints - just a bunch of strings. U know there's the stuff like sed and so..
Why not just hash the IP and username with a random salt, it can then be uniquely identified but it makes it hugely difficult to actually identify somebody from it.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
FTA:
Defendantsâ(TM) âoeLoggingâ database contains, for each
instance a video is watched, the unique âoelogin IDâ of the user who watched it, the time when the user started to watch the video, the internet protocol address other devices connected to the internet use to identify the userâ(TM)s computer (âoeIP addressâ), and the identifier for the video. Do Sept. 12, 2007 Dep. 154:8-21 (Kohlmann Decl. Ex.
B); Do Decl. Â 16. That database (which is stored on live computer hard drives) is the only existing record of how often each video has been viewed during various time periods. Its data can âoerecreate the number of views for any particular day of a video.â
We'll have none of it here.
I like to place meaningful quotes in my sig, so people will know that I know what meaningful quotes are.
Here is a simple idea... we are a web community, lets put a video on youtub that is simply one minute of the words "Fuck Viacom" and every one just has to go there once and "watch" it. We can make it one of the most popular video's on youtube and viacom will certainly want to check one of youtub's most popular videos for infringement.
( I will be posting the vid tonight when I get home if some one does not link to it first. )
If google really cared about not being evil they would go the extra mile to anonymize the data without compromising its integrity. They could assign meaningless unique IDs to names and IP addresses (and any other identifying information) and hand that over along with the judge's consent.
But, hey guess what, Google is just as evil as Viacom so that won't happen.
Two questions for legal experts, armchair or otherwise. One for the American system, the other for the Canadian (I'm Canadian).
First, if the data ends up becoming evidence, is it then a matter of public record? I think this is standard practise, but is there any way to avoid it? I, for one, only log in when required to (i.e. for mature videos) so that could be rather damaging...
Second, can I as a Canadian make a complaint to the Privacy Commissioner if Google complies with the order? After all, they're handing my personal data to a third party with no lawful purpose (in terms of Canadian law). Also, if a complaint it possible, what is the likely punishment for Google?
But this judge is a fucking catastrophe for allowing them to rape the viewers privacy.
It seems this wouldn't be an issue if Google wasn't collecting the info in the first place, claiming said information is anonymous and not a violation of your privacy, and then turning around in court and changing their story.
I wonder what would be tougher for Viacom's people to work with, 1 single text file that is 4 terabytes big, or 4-quadrillion 1k files.
I watched a Ghostland Obsrevatory video, a girl dancing in her panties and a boil being lanced. There!
I also uploaded a few video of a rock band 'concert' we had.
http://www.youtube.com/Rondog
Problem solved.
~ Ron Fitzgerald
this is a very bad sign.
Bush was elected because a relatively small group of idiots felt that gay people getting married was the most important issue during the election. Not the economy, not the war in Iraq/Afghanistan, not social security, not government spending, but what two consenting adults they'll never meet are allowed to do half a country away. And it was still a close call.
I agree America is going to hell in a hand basket, but trying to place the blame on Bush and the Republicans is a cop out.
Maybe not
If anybody wants to call to make their opinion known to Hon. Louis L. Stanton, his office can be reached through :
Daniel Patick Moynihan
United States Courthouse
500 Pearl St., Room 2250
New York, NY 10007
tel.:(0212)805-0252
fax: (212) 805-0389
( data from FindLaw.com
if someone has an email address .. jsut post it here. He definitely said that private information are worthless anyway
"World's cutest kitten," I think I'll be okay.
From TFS:
Speculative? IANAL, but isn't the disclosure of personal information without that person's knowledge or consent the pretty close to the very definition of a violation of privacy?
As has been pointed out elsewhere in this thread, stop using Viacom product. There's more to life than the crap Viacom and its subsidiaries like to feed people. Just because they make it available doesn't mean you have to consume it. Let the general public (your neighbors and friends who struggle with email) know what's going on. They get spoon-fed the news and haven't stopped to think critically. Maybe you can be the first crack in the armor of ignorance.
I realize that getting people to turn off their TV and stop listening to commercial music is a tough call, but that's what it boils down to. I stopped watching television twenty years ago, and I haven't purchased a CD from an RIAA-member publishing house for almost as long. Thanks to the 'net, I really don't need to sit through thirty minutes of advertising so I can watch a talking head read me the news from a script; I can read the same thing online in a few minutes, and I can actually find the source of the story to see how badly my "news" provider has skewed the facts. Thanks to YouTube, I can see an entire security cam video and find out what happened, not just the part that the network news wants me to see.
As for Viacom, there are a lot of ways to get their attention. Contact the EFF (which has more political clout than individuals). Send snail mail in large envelopes (so they don't get tossed immediately) to Viacom's legal department. Buy a share of Viacom stock and hold it for a while, then get in touch with investor relations at the company. Above all, make it clear that the goal is to impact their business negatively by encouraging others not to purchase their product.
The Slashdot community as a whole is a little smarter, a little better informed and a little more activist than the general population (think you'll ever see xkcd in a newspaper any time soon?). Time to let Viacom know -- and other companies like them -- that screwing us is not a good idea.
Seriously. Viacom is another dinosaur on its' way out. I hope they become insolvent sooner rather than later.
My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my Father! Prepare to die!
While this might seem off topic, I would like to remind everyone that half or more of Viacom's board of directors is made up of Scientologists.
Coincidental? Maybe. Maybe not.
I'm Rocco. I'm the +5 Funny man.
What if every does:
* login in their youtube account
* click the Quicklist link on the top right of the page.
* Click Viewing history
* Click Clear viewing history
Off course it is possible to just set a deletion flag to the history records, but I'm guessing it really removes the entries.
I remember my friends and I making jokes when we were kids in the early 90's that Viacom ruled the world. Whenever Viacom came up we would always act paranoid and pretend they were listening and watching us at that moment... sad that we were almost right!
hmmmmm, you're right. this could get out of control.
hmmmmmm. why did you start this?
We need a jurist who understands that video preferences are a private matter. Justice Clarence Thomas and Judge Robert Bork come to mind. Remember when this was funny?
Some interesting details from the case (summarized from the linked pdf document in the Wired article)
Note: The English Premier League is a co-plaintiff in the case.
What the plaintiffs want produced:
a. All the source code for both youtube.com and google.com (lol)--because they think the search is optimized to find copyrighted content first. --> Result = DENIED
b. All the source code for google's new VideoID search algorithym (search by content rather than tag) -> Result = DENIED
c. Copies of all videos that have been previously removed, so that extent of prior violation can be ascertained --> Result = GRANTED
d. Contents of youtube's logging database (some 12TB of data) --> Result = GRANTED. Note Google was sited as a refutation by the plaintiffs! -- Google Software Engineer Alma Whitten, Are IP addresses personal?, GOOGLE PUBLIC POLICY BLOG (Wilkens Decl. Ex. M).
e. Contents of Video Meta information databases- tags, comments, flags etc. --> Result = DENIED
f. Database Schema --> Result = adsense schema = DENIED, Video schema=GRANTED
g. "Private" videos and meta data --> Result = DENIED
If Viacom wants to know the 'responsible' parties for posting copyrighted material. Why do they get their hands on *viewing* records and not just posting records. [Disclaimer: yep, didn't RTFM or every single comment to make sure this wasn't redundant.]
The stuff will only be seen by Viacom's lawyers and experts who, at $500/hour, can stand it. Besides, Goatse might be a refreshing change after a few hours of cute kitties and dancing three-year-olds.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
'cause there is some hacker stealing my air and bandwidth from around the street, and he likes those things similar to your likes, just he can't find any thing limited to boobs :-\
Somewhat true, but you also forget the "TERROR" argument, and how it isn't good to switch leaders in the middle of a (perpetual) war, at least for the second time around.
The line of reasoning went something like this, John Kerry was a coward, and if he won the terrorists would win, forcing us all to convert to their religion, while eating our babies, and using the bible for toilet paper.
Pretty much the same thing we will hear from McCain in a couple months.
The wedge issues seem to be losing some clout, thankfully, though. With the economy tanking, gay people seems like less of a threat, it seems. That and Bush succeeded in killing the republican party. We can see this by having McCain being the nominee, and not the fundamentalist (king of all values/wedge issues) Huckabee.
I agree, though, on the whole American voters seem to be idiots. Either that, or it is easier to motivate people using moral outrage, over using logical (and sometimes technical) arguments. Of course fear is the universal motivator, both parties are equally adept at playing that card.
This is what happens when half of our country views education as a bad thing ("he's too educated!"), and almost altogether lack it themselves. We are functionally illiterate (even if we can read, on average, at the 9th grade level, we choose not to), and yet are expected to make decisions that affect the whole world, this isn't a good condition. Our founding father expected an "informed populace" as the grease lubricating democracy, and we pretty much fail on this.
Also, the fourth estate has completely failed us. Most "news" isn't, these days. We get a stream of idiotic commentators, equally from both sides of the (illusionary) spectrum, to give us the guise of "balance". When actual reasoning doesn't work like this, nor does the political map actually look like this (look at the actual margins in the red/blue states the last two elections, it hardly leads to the idea of polarity), so now we have to deal with some moronic idea of "us vs. them", which leads to the wholesale adoption of partisan dogmas in the spirit of neo-tribalism.
Sadly, this line of reasoning makes the problem nebulous, and thus almost impossible to assign blame, or actually FIX anything. The universal answer is "more education", but I'm beginning that this will actually work. Our government may be too corrupt to ever actually be corrected. We need a Constitutional reset button.
A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. -edward abbey
If I am in my own home, using my own internet access, then I could have a reasonable expectation of privacy - I would not expect a typical person to have access to a router or pipe between me and the server, or even a wireless scanner if I were on a router without WEP.
Youtube is a publically accessible website, same that a phone booth is. You would not expect that Viacom could stand outside that phone booth, listening in to see if you quoted too many lines from their latest movie or song or whatever it is they do.
Uploading a video to share it is quite different from being a user who watches that video, some South Park or Colbert Report, something on whatever medical issue you are currently having, and "how to overcome shyness" or "increase p3n15 size" videos. Just because I watched something that my friend sent me, now Google has to send my personal information to Viacom "just in case" there was a bit of copyright in there.
There should be no discussion of what content producers are putting up there - it has nothing to do with the judge's decision. The decision should be about whether your private transaction with a company is reasonably expected to be shared or overseen by third parties. In the case of law enforcement, I'm sure those logs are fair game. But this is a private third party getting data that most people 1) don't even know exists 2) would not expect a third party to have 3) provided they even understood what this was all about.
Use Tor.
Just saying. What sort of class action suit could a few million people initiate against Google for exposing them to the liability of feeding them illegal material without notice?
As long as they don't do this with youporn as well, I'm good.
Ignoring that even home videos are by default copyrighted, obviously clips of tv serials and football games will be more popular than someone's home video of his kid falling off a bike or something. Viacom probably wants to show a high viewership of its serials, and claim that rampant piracy is reducing their profits.
Why doesn't Google (or any sued party) countersue them for all revenue earnings of their movies and serials? The justification would be to 'compare the profitability of piracy popularized movies against non-piracy popularized movies' (to paraphrase Viacom's claim). There should be a similar correlation where people are more likely to watch good movies, and the real flops are never even pirated much.
When Viacom claims that MPAA videos are more popular, and hence Youtube et al. are enablers of piracy ... counterclaim that these services are helping popularize the same videos and increase their sales, hence actually deserve compensation rather than fines.
Of course, this is a specious argument similar to the one that Viacom is trying to make; but this way either the Viacom suit fails and this does too, else maybe using similarly flawed arguments ask for compensation for popularizing their videos. Also will be good to have Viacom give up their jealously guarded data, they'll probably think twice before asking for others' proprietary info.
Where is the oversight in this country?
This is nothing more than a proxied attack on communications. With FISA right behind, all constitutional rights will be gone.
This is FASCISM.
The point of the GPL is to ensure the code remains free. If all code is free the code needs no such protection.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
The Judge is Louis Stanton, contact information: 500 Pearl St., Room 2250 New York, NY 10007 Chambers Phone: (212) 805-0252 Deputy Phone: (212) 805-0123 http://www1.nysd.uscourts.gov/judge_info.php?id=31 It'd be nice if someone could find his home phone number or that of his daughter or wife (Susan Helen Stanton is the daughter, Phoebe R. Stanton is the wife). Let's see how he likes his personal information spread around. Repost. Stanton, Phoebe R Age:65+ 1021 Park Ave, Apt 2C New York, NY 10028-0959 (212) 876-1751 Doesn't anyone remember the writer's strike? They were striking for compensation for internet released videos. Companies like Viacom were against paying writers for internet material dubbed simply as "promotional." Now they want sue Google for lost revenue of online video clips?? Oh the irony of it all. Philippe P. Dauman, CEO/President/Director of VIACOM 1515 Broadway New York, NY 10036 Phone: (212) 258-6000 411.com gives us this number for him too. (212) 258-6639 Enjoy, and make his life a living hell. Here's the list of all the brands you now want to avoid because Viacom is being a bitch. media networks,bet networks,bet,bet j,mtv networks, atomfilms, addictinggames, cmt, comedy central, gametrailers, harmonix, logo, mtv, mtv2, mtvn international, mtvu, mtv tr3s, neopets, nickelodeon - nick jr., nick at nite, noggin, parentsconnect, quizilla, rhapsody, shockwave, spike tv, the n, tv land, vh1, vh1 classic, vh1 soul, virtual worlds, xfire, filmed entertainment, paramount pictures corp, paramount pictures, dreamworks studios, paramount vantage, mtv films, nickelodeon movies, home entertainment, global reach, brand index
War is Peace refers to to the fact that while a country is at war, it can get away with murder on the home front, on the pretext of "rooting out traitors." A good example of this is the Espionage Act passed by Congress and signed by Woodrow Wilson in 1917, which had little to do with spies, and a lot to do with allowing the feds to round up anyone who criticized the Government's actions during a war. (Fun trivia fact: Since the United States has officially been in a state of emergency since the Korean War, the Act is still in force). Ignorance is Power means that as long as you believe what you are told, the state has the power to justify whatever it wants. Example: in 1998, Clinton ordered tomahawk missles to be fired at a Sudanese Pharmaceutical plant. His rationale was that it was being used to construct bio-weapons. Six months later, the government quietly admitted that it had no conclusive evidence of this. http://everything2.com/?node=War+is+peace%2C+Freedom+is+slavery%2C+Ignorance+is+strength
"Well Mr. Richards, your qualifications look good, however there is one issue. While doing a background check we came across a video of you as a child receiving a gift. We believe that your inability to control yourself in this circumstance shows weakness for a man in your position, a man who would be subject to bribes from outside influences seeking state secrets. As such, we have decided to go with another canditate. The worst we found on him was a video displaying his singing prowess ."
Georgia Tech, the leader in Chia(tm) technology.
Only on slashdot would a comment like this get modded "insightful".
Yeah, regardless of the example making any sense or not if it has Viacom and sue, mod up.
"I like ponies. I should sue Viacom because they hate ponies." (+5 Insightful)
Well, that would be "non-Green", and that would be mean.
Maybe Google has carbon offset credits to sell to Viacom on TOP of charging them for the paper/post/packing. Yeah, add insult to injury...
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
What exactly are the intentions of Viacom having this information in the first place? Do they plan to hunt down and sue every user who watched a Viacom owned entity and sue them? Because I don't think they'll go very far alone.
I understand Viacom has a right to protect their Intellectual Properties but this is too far. And the judge is brainless for allowing this.
It's obvious Viacom doesn't want just information pertaining to them. They will use this information for marketing, clearly it's a free data-mine for them.
We could do a little more than file a bug. We could file a lawsuit, since apparently that's how the game is being played. Of course, they could be keeping IP logs separate from the user account system, but that is another issue.
Some judges are just clueless. Turning over IP data and ALL client logs is outrageous - Orwellian even. I only grant access to Youtube, per license agreement, to use my data within the (reasonable) privacy limits set. I do not grant access to the whole fucking world to know my personal information, under the pretense of the POSSIBILITY that this info could reveal me to be a "viewer" of "illegal" material. That idea - that I MAY be violating some obscure law - is what I call speculation.
I'm going to send this judge an email, if he has one. I don't want my facebook page (and the marketable data therein) to be released to Corporation X, next.
Ah, so google hands over 16 terabytes of text (your average thousand page novel is 200 megs.. in WORD FORMAT.), and they'll just be nice and honest with their findings right?
No third party, court appointed expert?
I smell an increasingly large, steaming pile of pertinent reasons for appeal here. Google should have no trouble getting this to the USSC.
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
What YouTube/Google does is blatently illegal and wrong on many levels. Tons of the content on YouTube is copyrighted material and can't legally be hosted without paying a royalty to somebody. Why should Google be allowed to do this when I can't? I'd love to put up a site where people could log in and view my library of classic concerts, but I'd get busted and go to PYITA prison. "Watch yer cornhole" (not youtube)!
Yes, it does. See, the Constitution doesn't allow the government to invade our privacy, ergo, that right is reserved to the people.
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
Bah. I should have said the Constitution doesn't explicitly allow government to invade our privacy. There are also the Third and Fourth amendments, which further protect American citizens (theoretically) from government intrusion.
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
If Google provides these logs in paper form.. just converting it into something that they can develop into accurate statistics would be a huge undertaking..
waiting for ad.doubleclick.net
Print them up, bound them: and send them the the 12 million books.
I'm really surprised that no one else has picked up on this...
Taken directly from the court's decision, Page 13:
While the Logging database is large, all of its contents can be
copied onto a few âoeover-the-shelfâ four-terabyte hard
drives (Davis Decl. Â 22).
All that YouTube needs to do is wait until there are actually "over-the-shelf" FOUR-terabyte hard drives in production.
The largest available at retail today is ONE-terabyte.
It's seriously beginning to get on my nerves...
Hi, I'm a (group of) big business(s), I don't personally think I'm making enough money... Where can we possibly get more money to line our pockets? Oh I know, lets start suing everyone! And to make it easy, lets start with customers - they're an easy target as they didn't fill our coffers enough in the first instance... Then move onto everyone else, for simply not offering to worship us...
1) Start a business
2) Cry piracy
3) Piss off everyone by slapping lawsuits on them
4) ????
5) Profit!!!
Put all of the information on 12,000 laptops and send it through the airport system...poof!
4 terabytes of logs you want, a truck full of crappy hard drives you get.
http://ask.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/06/13/2154211&from=rss
I would put them on floppies, the old 9" kind or maybe some old tape format that no one knows how to work...
Now now there is nothing to get upset about. I am sure google lawyers must have assumed everyone including the judge was as tech savvy as the googlers they hang out with day after day. I am sure the google lawyers just failed to notice the grey hair of the judge which is always a sign of wisdom in every area... except technology.
Google just forgot to point out that an order like this is the digital equivalent of turning over the library and video rental records of many many millions of people. At least everyone with an Internet link in the US. Records that can be cross referenced with the IP`s in the e-mails of.... well everyone.
This is just a small mistake, right? I mean if the judge knew what he was ordering he would have set limits... right? He would make sure viacom knows that if even a single of the entries in those logs leaks to anyone outside of the small group at viacom that gets access then they can kiss their case goodbye and expect a nice criminal suit over messing with peoples privacy. The lack of limits clearly means the judge thinks this is about some anonimized aggregate statistics or doesn`t realize the scale or something. I mean, why would a judge (say 70 years wise) understand what a terabyte is and that this includes what website with embedded youtube videos (every major blog) people visited? There is no shame in being a little tech illiterate.
Just let any geek explain this to the judge and it will be sorted out. There is no need for the judge to admit a mistake, google can turn over aggregate visitor stats to viacom and we can all pretend that was what the judge ordered in the first place. Or maybe the order should just target specific youtube users which,according to viacom which has been wrong before, messed with viacoms copyrighted material. Whatever specific evidence viacom needs google can deliver.
Then we can all have a laugh at viacom for clearly missing the boat here because by now it should have hired someone smart enough to realize they could just have a crawler gather the number of youtube viewers themselfs. (hint its all published on this site called youtube.com) And than we can all enjoy our political, religious, sexual, personal and downright embarrassing youtube videos again.
Come to think of it, do you have to be a multi billion multinational to get access to this data?
I mean I didn`t manage to buy the most valuable public property of our time (radio spectrum) for mirrors and beads. Public property that could be used for anything from radios of firefighters to community broadband to radioastronomy... and instead was plastered with head-on ads for 1/3th of the time. I cant say that I ever tried to convince investors that I am entitled to keep making money by putting up head-on ads on public property for ever and ever. I cant say that I am part of the reason why elected politicians have to raise hundreds of millions to have a public debate on public property. But I am sure I can find something I own the copyright to on youtube. And I am getting really curious what my friends have been browsing! Lets all have a look!
In one of the bittorrent related court cases (was it piratebay?), the defendent claimed that they couldn't provide the requested log information because they didn't record (or keep) it.
The judge asked if the software could be configured to do so - answer yes - and thus told them to keep the data.
The problem is, we often want this kind of feature enabled for testing/debugging... and so long as the capability is present, the information will either be requested or the defendant will be told to enable it and comply.
That is unless you want to risk contempt of court.
What the fuck does Viacom think they're going to do with a 12 TB database? They can't exactly load up MS Access on a spare computer at the law firm. Who, besides Google, has the capacity to actually manipulate that much data in any meaningful way? Go ahead. Give them the 12 TB. Better yet, give them 24 TB. I can't wait to see Sumner Redstone at the next stockholder's meeting try to explain the millions it will cost to analyze this data.
and searched for Videos entitled 'F.*k Viacom'. I watched as many as I could. Let's them put that in their database. Show them how you feel.
Then deliver 3 trucks worth of 8pt ip addresses to Viacom HQ.
Viacom has their data, and sometime in 2050 when they finish scanning and OCR-ing it back into usable data they can progress with the case.
Maybe you could even vary the font someway to kill OCR :)
Would someone explain exactly how simply viewing a video on youtube is a violation of copyright? I can understand why uploading a copyrighted video is wrong, but why is viewing it? I don't know whether what I'm viewing is legally there or not. I don't really care. And what I view is certainly NOT any of Viacom's business. Maybe I should hire a lawyer to sue *them* for violating my privacy?
Unfortunately . . . .
Google only shares personal information with other companies or individuals outside of Google in the following limited circumstances:
[...]
We have a good faith belief that access, use, preservation or disclosure of such information is reasonably necessary to (a) satisfy any applicable law, regulation, legal process or enforceable governmental request, (b) enforce applicable Terms of Service, including investigation of potential violations thereof, (c) detect, prevent, or otherwise address fraud, security or technical issues, or (d) protect against imminent harm to the rights, property or safety of Google, its users or the public as required or permitted by law.
Some idiot who uses statistical profiling improperly will decide that your viewing habits mean that you are a pedophile... and turn you in.
Seriously: IMPROPER use of the data is both more likely and scarier than if responsible people were at the helm. Today, nobody is.
This is IH from isohunt.com. I've went through this same process with our lawsuit brought by the MPAA so I thought I'll share some of my thoughts on the issue.
As unreasonable as I think these lawsuits by Viacom/MPAA may be, in order for the legal process to work, plaintiffs are entitled to evidence in order to prove their case. However, user privacy should be a large concern in disclosing of data (logs) as evidence, and in neither Youtube's or our case, there's no reason for turning over data that would expose your personal identify (such as your IP address). From glancing the order against Youtube, the reason they were ordered to turn over user histories is to prove user infringements, and inclusion of IP's in such logs is to uniquely identify users who may have signed up multiple usernames/accounts. I call bullshit on that. If someone uses multiple usernames, he can as easily login with multiple IP addresses, disclosing IP's would not help the plaintiffs in proving copyright infringements. I expect Google/Youtube to appeal the order (at least I sure hope so).
As for us, we successfully argued in our MPAA case that we don't need to turn over your IP addresses as it is a violation of user privacy with no evidentiary value, and only turned over .torrent access logs in anonymized form. You may not like to hear that .torrent logs are being turned over, but the truth is we were ordered to do so and that the MPAA does need anonymous logs to prove their frivolous lawsuit.
More at http://isohunt.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=134054
VIVA1023.com | Political Fashion.
Can I (as an Australian YouTube user) take any legal action here in Australia that would restrain google from providing my entries in the logfile to the US court?
Can any particular user anywhere in the world take similar action in their oown country, or would it need to be taken somewhere in the US?
this judge gives me a strong urge to exercise my 2nd amendment rights. Am I kidding? Eh, who knows.
Happiness does not come from having much, but from being attached to little.
Last time I checked, the biggest "off-the-shelf" drive is 1TB. 1.5TB drives will probably be available later this year.
Does this mean Viacom won't get access to the data until the drive companies catchup to the judge's order?
Did the decision specify in what format they need to turn over the logs? Print 'em out and deliver them in a dump truck. That'll show viacon.
1. Viacom has no right to the data. Sorry, it is in their right.
2. I don't want Viacom to have any info about me. Then don't visit YouTube and leave your dirty trails all over Google's database.
3. Why does Google keep data about me? That is what they do. The sell targeted pageviews to advertisers. Sorry to break your heart about the company you love.
4. This judge is a moron! When you finally turn 15, you will see the world with more mature eyes.
5. Shouldn't we boycott Viacom? Viacom includes Paramount, which makes Star Trek. OMG WHAT WILL YOU DO???
If Google would not save the data it simply could not give them away! Viacom is surely not suing because of Copyright infringements. They sure want the Google-Gold: user patterns! Another day to show how much more sensible we should be with our data tracks and personaly identifieable information when ever we "trust" a company that is good today. What if it bought by an evil company tomorrow?! Or sued?
how IT is changing the world - http://max.zamorsky.name
Another technicality to considder is, Users who view movies on Youtube aren't exactly aware that the link they are following or the embed they are clicking are COPYWRITEN MATIERALS.
Even if you recognize the material as a copyright protected media and close the video, you're still logged as "having watched".
It's completely unjust to count us as users accountable for that kind of viewing AND let's not forget... this kind of analysis will likely skew the results of VIACOM's findings in thier favour.
1) MTV put up their entire backcatalogue of music videos on their own website. These are not videos they own. Rather just videos that were serviced to them from record labels throughout the years. They did so without obtaining any further permission or any renegotiation with the record labels. They sell advertising on these sites that don't go to the respective record labels in any way.
2) Word on the street is that MTV actively runs inconspicuous accounts on YouTube in order to publish their own material as part of viral campaigns. Is one hand not talking to the other??
Let's mob YouTube. Imagine the long days spent by Google just to download the info, then package it and the transportation costs to truck it to court and Viacom. That should raise the price of gas another couple bucks!
Yes they should do this but on paper... starting with the oldest first... not searchable
then
email each individual log entry to them (to make the decision on each if it is a violation of privacy. cc to Judge for this determination.
I will donate a few reams of paper for this endeavor.
Quit complaining here and send a complaint to Viacom. If they get a few hundred thousand angry letters you can bet they will back off, this time.
The Judge is Louis Stanton, contact information: 500 Pearl St., Room 2250 New York, NY 10007 Chambers Phone: (212) 805-0252 Deputy Phone: (212) 805-0123 http://www1.nysd.uscourts.gov/judge_info.php?id=31 It'd be nice if someone could find his home phone number or that of his daughter or wife (Susan Helen Stanton is the daughter, Phoebe R. Stanton is the wife). Let's see how he likes his personal information spread around. Repost. Stanton, Phoebe R Age:65+ 1021 Park Ave, Apt 2C New York, NY 10028-0959 (212) 876-1751 Doesn't anyone remember the writer's strike? They were striking for compensation for internet released videos. Companies like Viacom were against paying writers for internet material dubbed simply as "promotional." Now they want sue Google for lost revenue of online video clips?? Oh the irony of it all. Philippe P. Dauman, CEO/President/Director of VIACOM 1515 Broadway New York, NY 10036 Phone: (212) 258-6000 411.com gives us this number for him too. (212) 258-6639 Enjoy, and make his life a living hell. Here's the list of all the brands you now want to avoid because Viacom is being a bitch. media networks,bet networks,bet,bet j,mtv networks, atomfilms, addictinggames, cmt, comedy central, gametrailers, harmonix, logo, mtv, mtv2, mtvn international, mtvu, mtv tr3s, neopets, nickelodeon - nick jr., nick at nite, noggin, parentsconnect, quizilla, rhapsody, shockwave, spike tv, the n, tv land, vh1, vh1 classic, vh1 soul, virtual worlds, xfire, filmed entertainment, paramount pictures corp, paramount pictures, dreamworks studios, paramount vantage, mtv films, nickelodeon movies, home entertainment, global reach, brand index If this doesn't show up well, copy and paste into a word processor..
The President is named Sumner ROTHSTEIN. TV just for Perverts... Summer Redstone CBS/Viacom owns over 40 TV stations, 187 radio stations, Paramount Studios, Blockbuster Video, cable channels like Nickelodeon, VH1, MTV , Comedy channel, Spike TV, Country Music TV, Nigger channel BET (Black Entertainment TV), Showtime and more. Also: Simon-Schuster Book Publishing, over 2000 movie theatres, theme parks, magazines...The monster called Viacom is the world's largest distributor of all syndicated Television programming. Regular meals of degenerate poison are cooked up by Jewboy CEO Summer Redstone, AKA Murray Rothstein. Roach Redstone holds 71% of the voting interest on the Viacom board. This hooked-nosed swine can do whatever he wants with the second largest media conglomerate in America. LOGO is the all-gay basic cable television channel! Created by the race-mixers at MTV, Logo website: http://www.logoonline.com/ Why does America need A channel sponsored by the Jews that encourages perverts to have sex with little boys? What will they come up with next? YOUNGBUTT: The Gay Priest Channel? NAMBLA: the Anal Rape Network? Hang on to the vaseline America, with the Jews are running our media your children are sure to get screwed!
The Law and Your Privacy
As you may have seen in the news, YouTube received a court order to produce viewing data from our database, including usernames and IP addresses. In order to protect our community's privacy, we strongly opposed this motion when Viacom and others filed it.
The court felt differently and ordered us to produce the data. Viacom said that they need general viewing information to determine the proportion of views on YouTube of copyright infringing content vs. non-infringing content.
Of course, we have to follow legal process. But since IP addresses and usernames aren't necessary to determine general viewing practices, our lawyers have asked their lawyers to let us remove that information before we hand over the data they're seeking. (You should know, IP addresses identify a computer, not the person using it. It's not possible to determine your identity solely based on your IP address. Rather, an IP address can reveal what geographic area you're connecting from, or which Internet service provider you're using.)
Why do we keep this information in the first place? It helps us personalize the YouTube experience, getting you closer to the videos you most want to watch. We have many features on the site that help users discover and share compelling content, and we're improving the video experience through recommendations, related videos, and personalized directories that help you find meaningful videos.
We'll continue to fight for your right to share and broadcast your work. The court did impose some encouraging limits -- they agreed with us that Viacom should not have access to private videos or our search technology. Also, the information we provide will be designated highly confidential under court order and only Viacom's outside counsel and experts will have access to it.
Legal matters aside, our focus remains on providing you with the best possible YouTube experience and we continue to be committed to protecting your privacy. Every day, millions of creative people from around the world are posting new, original content. You, our community, are creating the YouTube experience now and tomorrow.
Sincerely,
The YouTube Team
I'm going to ignore this like we DON'T live in a society where it's okay to hand over people's personal information to underhanded, money-grubbing companies who would use that information to solicit us.
Oh wait, I can't ignore it, because we DO live in that type of society, and that's exactly what thi sis going to turn into. The corps. are going to all start suing for the same reasons, get all of our personal information, and DROWN us in either lawsuits, ads, promotions, etc., or other.
You know, part of privacy on the internet is not sharing what's asked. Sometimes a fake mailing address is a smart thing. Don't keep your browsing data on youtube, etc etc. Frankly, I'm not worried, because I never reveal anything too personal on the internet, especially youtube.
Also, what the hell is viacom going to use our info for anyways? What a stupid thing to sue for.
what are they gonna do... you watched this video now we are suing you?? to hell with Viacom and to hell with Google if they dont at least appeal this decision. I mean really is it hurting anyone what the jew exeutives bitching about making 6.5 billion instead of 6.7 billion
This goes beyond copyright. This is a siege.
Let's let the conglomerates and governments install surveillance cameras in every private home, too. Might as well, we've let them get this far.
How are the good people of the world going to conspire against the ever-growing tyrannical global surveillance when it's seizing control of all online traffic?
To celebrate this event I am unsubscribing my Rhapsody account (owned by Viacom). I had this acct from 2 years....
I'd be rich. Maybe I can make a video, copyright it, and have someone post it on youtube - then sue them for their logs too.
I am extremely outraged to hear this. Collecting IP addresses and user agents are understanding, as I built my own social networking site that does the same as to protect users from others who may abuse the service. But at what point does it become necessary to gather information on what videos users are watching? Not to mention, this is a gigantic amount of data to collect.
I think that people, the users, along with Google and You Tube should fight against this ridiculous lawsuit. One thing I would like to point out is, the users who are posting videos, that of which are copyrighted by Viacom, are promoting their content for free. Free advertising, not to mention, some videos receiving over 2 million views, greatly help the company into getting more viewers for their television programs.
I think the courts should see that, there is no controlling the internet. It's a global phenomenon and it should only be regulated based on the fact that people's personal information and security are at risk. And of this lawsuit, they are doing the exact opposite; collecting that personal information and giving it away to a corporation.
I can also get Viacom for having a copy of my copyrighted videos. I did not give Viacom permission to have a copy of my videos... here comes the money :D