Details leaked of Sky customers alleged to have infringed copyright

[CuteStaffsGuy]

Excellent, glad I have Virgin!

The way I understand this though is that they can track it down to an IP address and therefore a physical address. So if more than one person inhabits a residence then how can they prove that it was the subscriber and not their spouse, children etc. which allegedly downloaded the porn. In fact their prosecution is literally worthless, surely?

Have a look at the very good PDF in my post further up (#4).

A letter from one accused persons lawyer and part of the defence is that they cannot prove who did the downloading.

An IP address is rarely all that accurate, sometimes yes it does trace back to one particular ISP account, which they could then get the address from, presumably if its a single family residence the adults would be held responsible, I don't know where the law would stand on that, however often an IP can only be traced back to one area/town etc in which case they don't have a hope of catching you. Also it's worth bearing in mind that a lot of ISP's do not use what are called static IP's and thus your IP can change regularly.

 

[Gramaisc]

Also it's worth bearing in mind that a lot of ISP's do not use what are called static IP's and thus your IP can change regularly.

Indeed, mine seems to change all the time..

 

[tek-monkey]

They should have a record of who had what IP when, but the beauty of virgin media is that cloned modems are so rife that its remarkably hard to prove it really was you, even if it was. A claim of 'Its BS, my modem was cloned' will require them to prove it wasn't, as this is a common thing, and will require a lot more effort than most anti piracy outfits will give to a case. With ADSL they can prove a connection, tied to a phone line, tied to a physical address. No such thing on the virgin network, from what I can see your IP is merely a sub address of the router for your area.

 

[CuteStaffsGuy]

No such thing on the virgin network, from what I can see your IP is merely a sub address of the router for your area.

From memory when Virgin used to be NTL most peoples IP address would actually show as the local proxy cache and I think for stafford that might have been birmingham, so thats a big area.

 

[tek-monkey]

Certainly an IP trace always showed as brum, but thats because IIRC there were 2 huge lines to Brum from Stafford ntl that we all used. Thats why an IP alone is useless, you need the ISP to say who had what address when.

 

[CuteStaffsGuy]

I think part of this crackdown is the fact that legal downloading is becoming workable and popular and they want to try and scare/force people into using it. People were downloading and sharing music illegally long before services like iTunes, has music piracy decreased in recent years? It's not hard to see that sooner or later your media options will be 'pay-to-stream' or 'pay-to-download', I'm resistant to the end of physical media but even I have paid for music and a movie online now.

 

[Gramaisc]

My IP seems to say that I'm in Bristol. It was Leicester when I last looked..

 

[tek-monkey]

Possibly why you can watch Irish websites that we can't?

 

[Gramaisc]

Possibly why you can watch Irish websites that we can't?

Zombie Bashers is all on YouTube now - for the genetically impure..

 

[Wookie]

I believe that the relevant clause of the Digital Economy Act makes the person whose name is on the bill responsible for illegal downloading on that connection.
I may, of course, be wrong, in which case please correct me.

 

[tek-monkey]

Surely you can't be proved to have done it though, merely facilitated its happening by having teh interwebz? If there is a criminal case to answer to, it should be CPS handling it rather than a dodgy law firm?

 

[Wookie]

I think in 21st century Britain, the lawyers will try to nail whoever is around to the wall. And if the only name they can find is the one at the top of the bill...
Of course, this means that ISPs should do all they can to help people secure their WiFi to prevent unauthorised usage. This includes the default shipping state being "as-near-as-unhackable-as-they-can-manage".
Anyone who runs a business that offers WiFi: what help is available for you from the ISPs about keeping it secure? I'd *hate* to lose the public wifi networks.

 

[Gramaisc]

I believe that the relevant clause of the Digital Economy Act makes the person whose name is on the bill responsible for illegal downloading on that connection.
I may, of course, be wrong, in which case please correct me.

Surely you can't be proved to have done it though, merely facilitated its happening by having teh interwebz? If there is a criminal case to answer to, it should be CPS handling it rather than a dodgy law firm?

I believe that something along those lines does apply to motoring penalty points and fixed penalty notices. If the keeper can't tell them who it was then the keeper gets the fine/points.

Same thing applies to a house of multiple occupation full of students. If one of them drops off a course and becomes ineligible for the full-time student discount, then the landlord becomes liable for the Council Tax...

Go for the easy target.