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Judge: Verizon has to tell the P2P user's name to RIAA

Written by Petteri Pyyny @ 21 Jan 2003 12:08 User comments (1)

Judge: Verizon has to tell the P2P user's name to RIAA A federal judge decided today that American ISP, Verizon Communications has to disclose the name of the alleged P2P user in its network to RIAA.
Judge John Bates decided that according to the controversial DMCA law, Verizon has to disclose the identity of the user who RIAA suspects of using P2P networks for distributing illegal MP3s.

Verizon had suggested an alternative route, where copyright owners, such as RIAA, would sue anonymous "John Doe" and if found guilty of charges, the ISP would then disclose the user's identity, not earlier.

Verizon will most likely appeal the decision.

Source: News.com

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1 user comment

13.2.2003 09:17

Verision needs to appeal this decision because if they let the RIAA dictate rather or not users names should be given to them, what the heck is to stop any organization from other countries from gathering up names from US internet companies that may say or do something that is considered illegal in their country. How can you say that the Internet is an anonymous way of free expression of culture when such acts as a federal judge supports this? I think we needs to have some tech oriented people in the US government before such a decision can be taken seriously. The fact that Internet security is an issue in the first place will be violated by the RIAA’s campaign to gather info about users. I know that the EFF will fight this tooth and nail. The fact that the Internet is very venerable to hackers should be at utmost importance and not the importance of some multi billion-dollar company that is worried about that song that might get out or that movie shared over the net. Instead I would not mind paying a couple of dollars more to support the artists who create this stuff. However I won’t pay $9 to a service. The ISP’s should pay maybe $2 per subscriber per month who Download from P2P. We have the right to explore our musical endeavors and to see what is out there. Radio is way too repetitive and does not play but that big hit from the album. This is why sales are low. The RIAA has seen a taste of what will happen if they really want to start a DDOS war. Microsoft was vulnerable to a huge DDOS attack, which slowed the entire Internet. What is to stop a disgruntle employee of the RIAA from using his or her technology to destroy someone they don’t like besides a P2P network? Also any government who is against the US and what it stands for could use the knowledge as well. Let me remind you that the UK hackers are dedicated to doing what they believe in. I believe they will destroy the RIAA before the RIAA can destroy P2P. The UK hackers were one of the first to infiltrate the phone companies and make FREE and illegal long distance phone calls. They fought a war against the high cost of Long Distance Calling. As a result we have wireless telephone companies in which allow unlimited night and weekends. The RIAA and NPAA will be fighting a war against people who can use y-5 communication to share files anonymously. By the time they trace an IP address someone can use another unsuspecting users wireless router. Thus making the RIAA’s attempts as useless as trying to buy a VCR with a $150 dollar bill. I cannot believe that these people are so dumb. Voodoohippi (Defender of FREE cyperspace)

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