Slashdot Mirror
Has RIAA Fired MediaSentry?
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "According to a tantalizing 'unconfirmed' report, it appears that the RIAA has jettisoned MediaSentry (now known as SafeNet) as its 'investigator.' MediaSentry has come under heat in a number of different states for the fact that it was 'investigating' without an investigator's license and invading people's privacy. Earlier this year it was found to have made diametrically conflicting written statements to two different tribunals within 30 days of each other, in one denying that it was an 'expert witness,' in another claiming that it was an 'expert witness.' If the report is accurate, the termination comes at an interesting time, since MediaSentry's investigator is the plaintiffs' only fact witness to prove copyright infringement in Capitol Records v. Thomas, which is now headed for a retrial on March 9th. If he does take the stand, the reasons for his company's termination will be fair game for cross examination. One also has to wonder if it's in any way connected to the puzzling enigma of the New York Attorney General's alleged involvement in the RIAA's recent Wall Street Journal announcement that it would be reducing its p2p file sharing cases to a trickle."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78r-fkZ2x8Q
They are putting all their eggs in the ISP enforcement basket. I'm sure that will do wonders.
...from a cannon, into the Sun!
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Eventually, companies must come to recognize their liabilities as liabilities, right?
DRM: Terminator crops for your mind!
If MediaSentry blinked out of existence tomorrow because of [lawsuit,lack of business,elvis], it wouldn't change anything. It's a company with perhaps fifty grunts, another 20 or so management personnel, and another thirty or so doing support or paralegal. It's a shell company, created by the recording industry for the recording industry. If MediaSentry implodes, they'll just setup another shell company and new personnel. To have any lasting impact, it's not MediaSentry that needs to go away, but the monentary incentive for it to exist in the first place.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
MediaSentry was in deep pile of shit for a long time. Every news about MediaSentry was about how much they fail. I have no idea how they were able to exist for so long. I dont even need to look far to find something bad about MediaSentry. Although, come to think of it, MediaSentry helped the pirate community alot by giving a bad name to all the companies that tried to "kill" piracy.
I'm confused, should I love or hate them?
It looks like the RIAA really are letting go of their epic battlez against the (probably more average than most people admit) consumer, but everyone knew they would have to give up on the litigation eventually. The fact is the RIAA succeeded in getting what they wanted; they made more people aware of the significance in copyright.
They might also have engineered the destruction for themselves, the MPAA and the BSA and SPA and all the other copyright alliances and associations. Now that people are aware of the threat of getting caught, they've improved on encryption, decentralization, legal disclaimers, and just good old fighting back.
This will be another lesson of history, the Trojan invasion taught us to not trust 30 foot horses (just 30 meg software), World War II taught us that it only takes a couple of nuclear explosions to end a war (that was already decided), and this has taught us that you shouldn't underestimate the enemy even when it doesn't involves swords and guns.
"Most people, I think, don't even know what a rootkit is, so why should they care about it?"
No doubt the RIAA hopes that when they walk away from MediaSentry that somehow all their problems with them will be left behind. Seldom is life so simple.
Now all we need is a disgruntled ex-MediaSentry employee to spill the beans on their entire Pay No Attention To The Man Behind The Curtain operation while we start picking apart MS's replacement.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
I predict that the ISPs who get smart and offer superior anonymity for their customers, will thrive in 2009 and beyond.
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
it's probably difficult for them to understand how we've been transformed into fear/hate units. better days ahead.
For two reasons.
Reason the first, it's an unconfirmed report. Could be as valid as a release date for Duke Nukem Forever.
Reason the second. The RIAA isn't going to give up. If they are ditching MediaSentry that just means they have some other idea that they think will net them better results. What replaces it might be worse. So celebrating at this point would be a lot like the people of Hiroshima in WWII rejoicing that the US has stated they have halted their conventional bombing campaign.
The good news is that maybe the "better idea" referenced above is the RIAA is shifting focus to cooperation with ISPs. Granted, it's another doomed idea but at least this way they won't be sending subpoenas to printers and deaf grandmothers. Hopefully.
Another good thing that may come of it is maybe someone will finally bring suit against MediaSentry for privacy violation and investigating without a license. If the RIAA cuts them loose they won't have the financial backing necessary to defend. And if we're really lucky, they'll get nailed for it. And if we're really really lucky, their employer will be found liable as well. Just because you cut ties with someone doesn't mean that your legal responsibilities are cut as well. IANAL though, so take that with a grain of salt.
Still though it's an interesting development and one I hope turns out to be true.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
as long as the mafiaa continues to use illegal investigative techniques, they can't get a clean case to try. that's why they want to try and make the ISPs squealers, try and get out from under the stain.
won't work, we see the shoes behind the curtain clearly now.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
In other news, a new company (name yet to be decided upon) has sprung up. This new company offers big media corporations investigative services for online "crimes". Applications for employment are being reviewed but, at this time, this new company is not looking to hire staff as all positions will be filled by experienced individuals who have conducted similar work for "another" company in the same field.
Totally new company. Honest. New name to be announced real soon. New. Completely new. Totally different.
Would we lie to you?
The media companies are slowly crumbling, looks like the lawyers will have to go back to chasing ambulances or suing over christmas trees.
Requiring some sort of private investigator's license to perform any sort of "investigation" of computers is a really, really bad idea. This has been implemented in a few states and I don't think it is having the desired outcome.
Read Bando v. Gates - it is all over the Internet. It is a very interesting read about someone completely unqualified performing an digital forensic investigation. This is what the "licensing" is supposed to prevent. It also virtually eliminates the possibility of someone being able to perform investigations in multiple states because of the absurd licensing requirements. You see, this is done on a state-by-state basis. Texas may require firearms traning for all licensed investigators while some other state does not. This doesn't help the quality of digital investigations. It only hurts.
I would consider the possibility of someone actually being prosecuted for an unlicensed investigation when they never set foot in the state to be very low. Having their expert witness status rejected is another matter but not one to be taken lightly. If expert witnesses must be licensed, then do not expect to be allowed to testify about your own computer in a licensing-required state.
What this sort of licensing is supposed to do is increase accountability of computer forensic examiners. What it in fact does is restrict the pool of such examiners to a very small group and says nothing about the quality or abilities of those people. Other than their ability to put up with completely unrelated requirements, such as firearms training for a computer investigator. The result of this is certainly going to be that you are not qualified to provide any information about your own computer in any sort of legal matter without such a license. Sure, the license may only be required to perform an investigation when it is a paid service, but that says nothing about expert witness qualification.
After losing their largest revenue source, SafeNet announced that it will shutter it doors. In a separate news conference, the RIAA announced that it will be hiring a new startup firm named MediaSafeSentryNet as their new investigative unit and that "big changes" are in the works...
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
Anyone else get the hilariously ironic "Report Software Piracy" ad banner? Apparently the potential earnings are up to $1,000,000. And I thought it capped out at $100,000 only a year ago...
Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure everything I just said is completely wrong.
I figure if it works for the Highway Patrol, it can work for the RIAA. Their business model is to harass the states consumers (citizens) to achieve the kind of behavior that they want. Which is exactly what the RIAA gets though MediaSentry or any other company they hire to do their dirty work. The reality is that their direct activity stops maybe very very few violators a year per capita; but the fear they create due to the fallout of getting caught does 100 or 1000 fold. The CHP costs California $1.9 billion annually, which funds 11,195 positions, which is 1 trooper for every 3000 or so citizens. (2007 est 36,553,215) so your chances of getting caught are rather slim, but the risk (fines, harassment, taking off work for court) is enough to detur some from speeding, and most from recklessly speeding (20+ over the limit).
That being said, the only two differences I see, is that consumers have a little bit (though not much more than) citizens of a government; and secondly, that public opinion could really harm the recording industry... well, the CHP has guns and everyone already hates them.
That being said, since they've instilled enough fear, and no amount of press is going to convince the technical illiterate that they don't still have that one guy doing his computer voodoo that causes them to figure out who you are and take your house away; there really is no purpose in keeping them around. If the state didn't have the ability to demand taxation, I can sure bet they'd try to find a way to instill the maximum amount of fear for the customer for the least amount of postions they could.
Forgive my spelling from time to time. I'm often posting during short breaks.
I'd like to put the little bastard in a sack, and toss the sack in a river, and hurl the river into space.
I say we copyright a recording of repeated agonizing screams, get a woolly mammoth to stomp them in the balls, and sue them for copyright infringement.
America Against Greed.
If you build it, they will come.
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
"Like granny said: 'If you want a box hurled into the Sun, you got to do it yourself!' God rest her zombie bones."
If you are thinking of loving them for giving a bad name to the companies that tried to kill piracy, then consider that it is only because they are so hateful that this bad name was given.
If you loved them, then wouldn't they be giving a good name to those companies?
Oh, be nice! I cannot see what kind of crime that river commited to suffer such a fate.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
1. Set up a company hunting pirates for you.
2. Push the envelop 'til the company gets in trouble with the law itself.
3. Take note where you pushed too far.
4. Continue 'til company loses any credibility even in court.
5. Make company go poof and found a new one.
6. Let new company do what old company did and stop pushing JUST before overdoing it. Use notes from step 3 for reference when this is the case.
7. Profit?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
So, has the "content" industry's strategy of enforcement through oppression, FUD, and deception finally developed enough cracks to let the real light in?
Looks like their one chance at a court win is seriously on the rocks... and they have been trying to get the ISPs to do their police work, for lack of better alternatives...
For the most part, the ISPs won't do it. It costs too much money and helps their competition. So it looks to me like the RIAA (and by proxy, MPAA) are very rapidly losing ground in this whole battle.
About time.
Maybe repeal of DMCA is next? One can hope.
To what extent are you able to gain visibility into what the NYS AG is doing through FOI requests? If the NYS AG is purportedly acting in the best interests of the public, then surely the public has a right to know what's going on (down).
Seriously... are Slashdot publishers so desperate for hits on their blogs that they can't link to anything correctly anymore? I'm sure your elegantly summary on blogspot post was much more relevant than it's Wall Street Journal source. Stop wasting your reader's time and just link the original fucking stories.
Its been pretty evident that they (RIAA litigation teams) have been soiling in their own yards for some time. Unfortunately this is going to have undesired consequences to many of us that were not foreseen. Such as the bit where in Texas, you cannot work on a PC for another person without a Private Investigators license. Last I heard, they're still fighting this one. I don't want to have to carry a 4 year degree in criminal justice just so I can fix PC's for clients at some ridiculous low price just to compete with the dumb geeks at Worst Buy. There are others unintended consequences as well.
Who's to say that the RIAA didn't decide in a corporate meeting recently that; "Hay team, it looks like we've gotten as much as we're going to get out of this cash cow. All that we've made thus far has been safely squirreled away in Swiss accounts now so I think it is about time we consider disbanding starting by dropping Media Sentry. We don't want to pay those buffoons any more of our money anyway."
All content in this message is copyright (c) 2008. All rights reserved. RIAA is prohibited here.
Given that we're in principle talking about illegal activity and the beneficial use of such activity, is there any chance of followup? Or will both MediaSentry and the RIAA get away with it again?
Insert
In a regrettably "subscribers-only" story, the Wall Street Journal online edition notes that they have received confirmation of the RIAA's having dropped MediaSentry.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
I'd like to put the little bastard in a sack, and toss the sack in a river, ..
O the irony. That used to be the punishment for not ratting out your "customers"...