my sister got an email from her ISP stating that she was involved with the unauthorized distribution of copyright protected materials (she downloads a fuckload of stuff, but not THAT much, as her bandwidth is limited). She also lives in Canada here, and the company that emailed her ISP is from the USA.
the email she got was:
the next part of the email is a PGP Signed Message, stating:
oh yeah, she got busted for:
anywhere u see XXXX’s i just hid info I thought could be sensitive to my sister.
So, what are her options, and how deep in shit is she? Can she threaten back to the ISP for harassing her, or should she just ignore them? The DVD she downloaded isn’t released until June 22, so she can’t claim she owns it (which would thus make the download legal due to copyright laws). Can she just claim that many people use her computer, or what?
Sorry for this lengthy message, I just don’t wanna give her bad advice, and figured people here would know what to do.
We hereby request that you immediately remove or block access to the infringing material, as specified in the copyright laws, and insure the user refrains from using or sharing with others unauthorized Paramount’s materials in the future.
My friend got caught downloading Superman Returns before its theatrical release and got a similar message. He removed it and never heard back from them.
Not sure if it applies to this situation but I figured I’d share.
Cease and desist type stuff like this is a message that the free ride is over. Stop downloading illegal shit and do some research to encrypt/protect yourself better.
She’s in Canada? They can’t do anything to her. It’s happened to me before, my roomate just called our ISP and the “threat” was removed. Canadian ISP’s get pressured into doing shit like that by American companies since the law is more lax here.
As for the “threatening” letter, don’t worry about it. The letter didn’t say she was getting her interwebs canceled or that she owed money to avoid going to court. Unless she is still sharing this torrent (unlikely) neither Paramount or Rodgers ISP could know if she deleted the infringing file or not. I would HIGHLY recommend you teach her how to find her TV/Music/Movies from non-sharing sources like torrents and p2p programs though to avoid this in the future.
I got something from rogers saying that for a split second I was downloading Quantum of Solace and I should stop… or something. Didn’t pay attention, nothing happened. You’ll be fine. Move out of Hamilton.
They pretty much just gave her a free pass, delete that shit (or not) and forget about it. Trying to warrant some kind of argument with them will make the situation worse. You should be over the moon they just asked her to co-operate, people have been getting fined left, right and centre here.
I forgot to add that Canada (and maybe Australia, but their caps are so low they can’t really download anything lol) has some of the most lax copyright laws among english speaking nations. While they are in the middle of making things tougher for situations like this, the chances of any real legal trouble for file sharing is close to nil right now.
You know what, changed my mind. The best defense is a strong offense.
Step 1 - Start cultivating a menacing persona. If you are going to start threatening back then you want to look like just the type of man ready to jump at the opportunity to do so. ( Nervous ticks, tired eyes, sweat beads, unshaven face, messy hair and perhaps a touch of gin will all score big. )
Step 2 - Scope out security first. You want to make sure you bring enough heat to these mothers. Nobody writes a worded letter to your sister. Nobody.
I second this and add that you drive around their offices with Straight out of Compton blasting. people don’t fuck with NWA, people won’t fuck with you.
I know that. What I was trying to say was that she should realize that torrents and p2p programs are absolutely not safe for TV/Music/Movie downloads, and that she should find an alternate source for downloading that stuff.
she got an email from her ISP who are forwarding a message from the company they got about the offense… where is there a threat? these threads pop up often, so forgive me if i missed the line that is threatening by mistake, but these emails are for the sake of your ISP saying “ok we’ll be nice” and letting you know they got a notice about someone on their service downloading shit illegally. so in other words, they are looking out for you while looking out for themselves.
at least, that’s how those are in the states, we don’t have to tell customers when we get those notices. so if we didn’t let someone know they got busted downloading shit and kept doing it, they could be fucked after x amount of notices.
tl:dr - not a threat. also, quit using torrents for shit you’ll get popped for if you don’t take precautions against said shit.
