Educause Security Discussion mailing list archives
Re: New Video Educates Students on Illegal File Sharing
From: "H. Morrow Long" <morrow.long () YALE EDU>
Date: Wed, 23 Aug 2006 22:15:51 -0400
I'm no lawyer either, but that has never stopped me from playing one... 1. Generally DMCA complaints cite IP #s which are distributing material on the Internet, naming the copyright titles of works & ask for the material's distribution to cease. As Alan said, complaints under DMCA are generally made against illegal distribution (e.g. by someone without the permission of the rights holder). It would also be much more technically difficult to go after downloaders than distributers (you can just search for distributers on most P2P filesharing nets) and the most efficient and effective method would involve entrapment (set up your own P2P node/hub serving real copyright titles -- you couldn't serve fake 'honeyd' titles to trap downloaders as it would not be illegal to possess titles which did not have real content). Or you'd have to have access to sniff network traffic or interject and spoof remote P2P network nodes/hubs/ directory-servers. 2. When individuals have been sued for copyright infringement the amount they've usually been sued for is calculated based on the # of infringements (others who have downloaded from the individual (or John Doe at IP #) being sued under copyright law. Such penalty amounts can add up quickly depending on the # of copies downloaded and the individual(s) does/do not have to profit from the distribution. 3. There has been quite a lot of debate surrounding the making of personal copies of commercial DVDs (both the legality and morality) -- primarily settling on the question of whether or not it is "fair use" under the Copyright Act, ripping DVDs you own would or could appear to be illegal under many interpretations of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) of 1998 as it "prohibits the circumvention of technical measures used to protect copyrighted works against theft" (as most methods of copying also use software which reverse- engineers or breaks the lock on the DVD standard CSS encryption used for DRM - digital rights management -- rather than performing a strictly bit-by-bit copy of the original DVD). - H. Morrow Long, CISSP, CISM, CEH University Information Security Officer Director -- Information Security Office Yale University, ITS On Aug 23, 2006, at 9:46 PM, Chris Green wrote:
On 8/23/06 5:45 PM, "Alan Amesbury" <amesbury () OITSEC UMN EDU> wrote:that *downloading* copyrighted material without the copyright holder's consent may be *legal*.I ain't a lawyer either ;) People make copies, not computers. If you download something, one could view it as you are instructing the copy to be made. Do people that get busted for making copies end up paying fees on the copies others got from them or from the ones in their possession? I believe it's usually the latter. -- Chris Green UAB Data Security, 5-0842
Current thread:
- New Video Educates Students on Illegal File Sharing Rodney Petersen (Aug 22)
- <Possible follow-ups>
- Re: New Video Educates Students on Illegal File Sharing Brad Judy (Aug 22)
- Re: New Video Educates Students on Illegal File Sharing Cal Frye (Aug 23)
- Re: New Video Educates Students on Illegal File Sharing Alan Amesbury (Aug 23)
- Re: New Video Educates Students on Illegal File Sharing Rizzo, James (Aug 23)
- Re: New Video Educates Students on Illegal File Sharing Chris Green (Aug 23)
- Re: New Video Educates Students on Illegal File Sharing Chris Green (Aug 23)
- Re: New Video Educates Students on Illegal File Sharing H. Morrow Long (Aug 23)
- Re: New Video Educates Students on Illegal File Sharing Nate Johnson (Aug 25)
- Re: New Video Educates Students on Illegal File Sharing George C. Russ (Aug 25)
- Re: New Video Educates Students on Illegal File Sharing Jordan Wiens (Aug 25)
- Re: New Video Educates Students on Illegal File Sharing Jordan Wiens (Aug 25)