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US ISP operating three-strikes
By CMU Editorial | Published on Thursday 21 January 2010
Despite being late to the “target the ISPs” party, it seems the Recording Industry Association Of America might be making better progress than their European counterparts.
US internet giant Verizon has told CNET that they have already sent out warning letters to some of their file-sharing customers and actually discontinued the net access of more prolific, unrelenting illegal music sharers. A spokesman for the net firm was vague about the specifics of their three-strikes style programme, but confirmed “we’ve cut some people off”.
The RIAA announced it would follow the lead of its European counterparts and start lobbying the ISP sector to play a more proactive role in policing piracy in late 2008, after bringing to an end its self-harming campaign of direct litigation against individual file-sharers, a strategy that had led to thousands of file-sharers receiving legal letters from the trade body, but no noticeable decline in file-sharing in the US.
While some US ISPs cautiously agreed to work with the RIAA, albeit on undefined terms, Verizon said it would not participate. Those with longer memories when it comes to the file-sharing story will remember it was Verizon who fought the RIAA in the early days of the aforementioned direct lawsuit campaign.
They successfully disputed the trade body’s interpretation of the US’s Digital Millennium Copyright Act with regards the circumstances under which ISPs must hand over the identities of their file-sharing customers. And in doing so complicated the litigation campaign by requiring the record labels to take two sets of legal action against every file-sharer, one in reference to their IP address to discover a file-sharer’s identity, and then one against the actual copyright infringer.
But according to CNET, Verizon’s Bobbi Henson this week confirmed the company was now operating what record industry types like to call a ‘graduated response’ system to tackle file-sharers who use their network to share unlicensed music. She added that most of their file-sharing customers stopped dodgy file exchanges when they received the first warning letter.
Given Verizon’s past relationships with the RIAA, to have them operating a three-strikes style system – whether that be in alliance with the trade body or on their own back – is nevertheless quite a coup for the US record industry.
As previously reported, while six UK ISPs voluntarily agreed to send out warning letters to customers who file-shared in 2008, and Virgin Media have said they will start tracking file-sharing on their network, no British net firm has gone as far as committing to suspend or disconnect customers who infringe copyright, with some – TalkTalk most notably – moaning loudly about the government’s plans to force them to do so.
