RIAA vs. IP:127.0.0.1
Written by Ernesto on August 01, 2006Is an ip-address enough evidence to sue a person for downloading copyrighted material? Recent cases suggest that the RIAA and the MPAA will need more evidence than that. And that’s certainly a good thing if you take into account how many people share the same ip, or leave their Wifi unsecured.
Just think about it, why should the RIAA be able to sue someone simply because he or she pays the bills for the internet connection? They need at least a little more than that.
And it looks like this defense is working:
“This month, the inability to prove who actually did the file sharing caused the RIAA to drop a case in Oklahoma. The same defense has worked in a California case as well. As soon as the RIAA realized the person was using this type of defense, they dropped the cases, rather than lose and set a precedent showing they really don’t have the unequivocal evidence they claim to possess.”
Anyway… just reset your wireless router if you receive a letter from the RIAA or MPAA….
Previously: The Past and Future of Filesharing
Next: Party With Pirates!
19 Responses (Add yours or TrackBack)
Id think if you live in the United States resseting ur router if u get a letter from the MPAA etc wont do a damn thing! Even if your address changes.. A good defence would be PEER GUARDIAN 2!!
resetting your router would mean that you can point the finger at your freeriding neighbours.
Peerguardian is fine, but I personally know at least 3 people who used it and still got a letter from their ISP that some movie company complained…
What would be the point of resetting the router?
Reset the setup? Erase any traffic logs?
Opening up your WiFi means that it could have been your neighbours who downloaded pirated stuff using your connection…
Resetting your router will assign a new IP, but not always.
What if your IP sets you with a static IP and no neighbors have wifi computers?
Still the same. Who says a neighbor’s friend with wifi didn’t get on, share, then get off. It’s a forest of “what-ifs” that no-one can answer.
These are Civil court cases, they only need to proponderance of evidence, not absolute proof; if it’s 51% likely, they win.
Well, suppose RIAA have log on their computer that (for example) ip 1.2.3.4 has shared something illegal. OK, so wheres the proof ? Isnt log file just a text file where any server administrator can put/edit anything ? Its just like if i said “hey, that man over there shoot somebody”… I cant understand, how any one can be so dumb to consider this as main proof ! Its clear, that those, who do this doesnt know anything about networking/computers/how things work.
Resetting you wifi thingy serves that:
a) the combination of assigned LAN IPs -> network card identifiers (MACadress) will be reset. So no chance to say which machine in the neighborhood got a free rideticket to infringe copyrights via the billpayers WAN IP
b) most wifi equippment is shipped per default without any WEP/WPA settings. So anybody can use it in range (THAT’S the defence against MAFIAA because IP != one specific sueable copyright infringing person)
Note that using an IP blocker with publicly known lists is not a protection but an identification tool for MAFIAA these days!
Read this explaination why:
http://neuron2neuron.blogspot.com/2006/05/blocklist-balderdash.html
what about using the software hide ip platinum?? nayone?
Resetting your router may give you a new IP address, but how does that protect you? It is certain that your ISP has data that tells them that “from Jan 26 at 11:36AM through Jan 29 at 3:14PM the IP address 1.2.3.4 was leased to “. And I bet they have this sort of data going back well into the past. So getting a new IP address doesn’t erase everything that happened in the past.
Anyone use Stunnel?
Even if you had received a new IP address most ISP’s keep track of when a IP lease has been given and when it expired and to who. Most of the time its historical so the RIAA asks who uses this IP at this time on this day and its over.
Most ISPs keep radius logs of provisioning that takes place with the public IPs that are assigned… if they subpoena the radius logs, the RIAA can determine at least down to the person who is being billed for the connection at the time of sharing.
In response to something someone mentioned, there’s no way they are using Mac addresses to prove their case. The ISP isn’t storing that kind of info.
As stated in the article, a knowledgeable forensic expert witness could absolutely OWN the RIAA….a defendent just needs to man up and spend the money.
The defense I would use, ” I must have had an incorrectly configured wifi router.” Zero out the HD 50 times and prove it was ever on my drive. Problem solved!
People saying “reset your router!” are idiots. Point blank. ISPs keep logs of who has what IP assigned to which router (MAC address and/or serial number) from the times the router is actually up and assigned an IP address. Past logs are what these letters are based on. Getting a letter and resetting your router later is the same thing as closing the door after you’ve left it open long enough for the killer to sneak in.
from what i’ve read re: stunnel, doesn’t the “thing i’m connecting to” akways have to “be in the same place”? As you may well tell, i’m not well up in the actual mechanisms which underpin the internet etc…
if not that, surely you cant use it to encrypt all torrent traffic due to it’s nature?
When ppl say to “reset your router”, they mean to bring it back to factory defaults, so the wifi connections is NOT encrypted, and you can say that “anyone passing by” could have used your connection.
In Italy you could be anyway sued for another law infrigment: you HAVE to keep your wireless network protected, because of terroristic activity in the previous years.
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