Comments on: Anti-Piracy Scheme “A Scam & Legal Blackmail” Say UK Lords

By: Barun Thakur

Barun Thakur — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 07:47:00 +0000

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By: UK, nel mirino gli avvoltoi del P2P « YBlog

UK, nel mirino gli avvoltoi del P2P « YBlog — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 09:30:06 +0000

[...] si guadagna anche il giudizio sferzante dei Lord: i componenti della camera alta del parlamento britannico hanno accusato la società [...]

By: Nerin Online - Snippets 03-02-2010

Nerin Online - Snippets 03-02-2010 — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 19:47:47 +0000

[...] Torrentfreak [...]

By: Links 2/2/2010: Oracle/Sun Analysis | Boycott Novell

Links 2/2/2010: Oracle/Sun Analysis | Boycott Novell — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 04:23:18 +0000

[...] Anti-Piracy Scheme “A Scam & Legal Blackmail” Say UK Lords Several UK Lords have criticized the practices of law firms that send out warning letters to alleged copyright infringers demanding big payments. These schemes have been labeled a scam, and the lawyers operating them accused of “harassment, bullying and intrusion” and “legal blackmail” in the House of Lords. [...]

By: Riker

Riker — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 22:16:01 +0000

Hey Andrew you are spending a lot of man hours writing on here.
Why arnt you sending out your scam letters.
A mate of mine received one of your letters about a year ago, he is another person that I know for sure is totally innocent and didnt download army fuckers.
I must say I thought the letter was sent from some african country, as it was poorly written and on piss poor paper, and the text was barely readable.
Its not what you would expect from a high flying solicitor.

By: ACS:Law Solicitors

ACS:Law Solicitors — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 20:23:58 +0000

We are pleased with the results on the initial batches of issued claims, as we have found that 80% of all defendants opt for settlements outside of court, for amounts more than originally claimed.
Copyright infringers generally buckle when litigation is formally initiated. Our experience shows that most will seek an out of court settlement and offer to pay costs to date. It has always been our intention to set a favourable precedent and whilst it is disappointing that these settlements mean that a fully contested case has yet to reached the courts, our client’s have been successful in recovering monies lost to piracy. Based on these successes, we have been instructed to increase the number of claims we issue at court by at least 300% over the coming months. We are confident that we will be able to set a number favourable precedents to build on the existing case law in 2010.
The intellectual property department at ACS Law has been going from strength to strength. We have been in the news recently and as a direct result of the increased publicity, we are pleased to announce the acquisition of substantial new clients, including a number of well known songwriters and software companies. In order to fully service our new clients, we will be doubling the size of our team in the very near future.
Exciting times ahead!

By: ACS:Law Solicitors

ACS:Law Solicitors — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 20:22:01 +0000

Each creative industry invests millions of pounds annually in developing and publishing copyright works for the consumption of the general public, and recovers the monies invested by usually retaining the exclusive right to copy, distribute, publish and make available those works on the internet.
Without copyright protection, there would be no financial incentive for publishers and developers to invest in new titles and the UK would not be one of the leaders in fields such as computer games and music. UK law grants various rights to copyright owners, including the right to communicate or make such works available to the public (e.g. over the internet). Accordingly, anyone distributing copyrighted recordings over P2P networks without the copyright owner’s permission is breaking the law by infringing those rights.

By: ACS:Law Solicitors

ACS:Law Solicitors — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 20:20:47 +0000

The IP address of the internet connection of any person file-sharing on a P2P site is visible to our client’s investigators and is therefore in the public domain already.
The name and postal address relating to that IP address is held under a duty of confidentiality by the internet service provider concerned and is not normally disclosed without the copyright owner obtaining a court order against that ISP, known as a Norwich Pharmacal order. An ISP is legally obliged to provide this information, once a court order has been obtained. Please note it is perfectly legal for a copyright owner to obtain disclosure of personal data, provided it can establish that an infringement of its copyright may have occurred, under an exception set out in section 35 of the Data Protection Act.

By: ACS:Law Solicitors

ACS:Law Solicitors — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 20:19:47 +0000

Downloading is when an internet user obtains a digital file from an uploader. Unless such downloading or uploading is done with the consent of the copyright owner, it constitutes copyright infringement under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (“CDPA”) and is illegal.
Copyright legislation provides that a person must have the permission of the copyright owner to make a work protected by copyright available for download on the internet. Uploading without the permission of the copyright owner is illegal, irrespective of whether the copyright material was originally obtained legally or illegally by the uploader.
When using P2P file-sharing any files that are downloaded are usually stored in a folder on the user’s computer or NAS, known as the shared files folder. When a file or part of a file is stored in the shared files folder, the software normally makes these files or parts of files available for upload. The effect of each user making his or her own digital files available on the internet to other P2P users creates an enormous and potentially illegal library of digital files available for download using P2P services.

By: ACS:Law Solicitors

ACS:Law Solicitors — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 20:17:43 +0000

Ignorance of the law is no excuse, otherwise no-one could ever successfully be prosecuted if that was a valid defence. Recent research has shown that seven out of ten people are aware that file-sharing of copyright material belonging to another is illegal.
Most internet sites that provide details necessary to enable P2P file-sharing or provide P2P services do not appear to be adequately explaining to users that making files available to other users using P2P file-sharing is likely to be illegal if the work concerned is protected by copyright. The creative industries are working hard to raise awareness of this.