Verizon Determined to Expose BitTorrent Copyright Trolls

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Wow, even Verizon hates copyright trolls. Go get em' Verizon!

It’s now apparent that Verizon is fed up with the avalanche of mass-BitTorrent lawsuits and is determined to put an end to copyright trolls’ extortion-like practices. The Internet provider is asking a Texas court to grant discovery so it can expose how these companies operate. According to Verizon, copyright trolling practices don’t belong in court and the ISP equates the companies involved with “schoolyard bullies who push and shove until firm opposition is met when they shrink away.”
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I'm glad to see these bigger companies stepping up for the consumer. They can see that the tactics aren't right... Now, if we can get enough of them together to expose the paychecks that the copyright holders are sending judges and politicians to "look the other way", that be even better. Obviously the tactics used aren't right. Many people and companies have come out and said that. But, for some reason nothing has been done about it.

I don't mind companies going after copyright infringement. It's their product and they need to protect their investment. However, you don't go the mafia route when doing it.Or even if they went after the originator of the files (ripper, first uploader, etc.), I could see it. But, going after thousands of end users that downloaded a file (could be because their legal DVD got scratched) with the "pay us and we'll go away without court" that gets me.
 
Good for them!

Granted, this probably isn't all about protecting their customers, but more about protecting themselves against the ancillary costs generated by patent troll hitting their bottom line.

But hey, doing the right thing is still good.
 
Chas said:
Good for them!

Granted, this probably isn't all about protecting their customers, but more about protecting themselves against the ancillary costs generated by patent troll hitting their bottom line.

But hey, doing the right thing is still good.
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Not quite. I say they are looking out for the customers. True it has to be about the bottom line. But the bottom line that there are a handful of companies that have resisted giving customer information to these troll. Verizon is trying to be one of those companies because being one of those companies means that they get more users from ones wanting to stay away from ones who hand that information out. Specially with them considering Comcast a competitor. I don't know about post Universal purchase but they had been one of the biggest pains in AA's side, even going to court and lobbying for the end to the John Doe subpoenas. Which if you get a letter from Comcast. That is/was only internal and no actual information was given to the group requesting your information.
 
Topweasel said:
Not quite. I say they are looking out for the customers. True it has to be about the bottom line. But the bottom line that there are a handful of companies that have resisted giving customer information to these troll. Verizon is trying to be one of those companies because being one of those companies means that they get more users from ones wanting to stay away from ones who hand that information out. Specially with them considering Comcast a competitor. I don't know about post Universal purchase but they had been one of the biggest pains in AA's side, even going to court and lobbying for the end to the John Doe subpoenas. Which if you get a letter from Comcast. That is/was only internal and no actual information was given to the group requesting your information.
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If they really care about their customers they wouldn't be nickling and diming them to death with their data plans and taking away grandfathered plans.

I think they're protecting themselves because patent wars are getting out of hand these days, especially among cell phone manufacturers - which is Verizon's bread and butter.
 
The thing is the law is such a fucking grey area for this

Its not technically illegal, but its about as close to illegal as you can get

By filing these "Group" lawsuits, it saves companies seeking litigation -MILLIONS- of dollars to file these claims, and they always make back the costs in filing these lawsuits.

The grey area problem is this, these group lawsuits can only apply if the people who are together in it are -KNOWN TO BE WORKING TOGETHER- for it, as in this is a pre-meditated crime ring etc.

They argue that its pre-meditated because they "All work together to download the files" etc, but the problems are this:

A) This isn't a "Crime ring", this is people who are stealing media. People who buy stolen media on the street are not subject to such scrutiny, nor are they forced to pay tens of thousands of dollars for stolen media if caught on the street.

b) 99.999999999999999999999999999% of the time stealing media is considered petty theft since the media is less then $500 in value (This goes for states -AND- canada) which makes all these lawsuits where they sue people for -MILLIONS- of dollars when they are brought too court illegal, since they have committed petty theft, and not grand larceny. At that, the fines for breaking copyright -ONLY- apply to those who -MAKE MONEY- off piracy, there is actual clear fines for copying a tape you don't own an giving it to somebody else who doesn't own it for example. Why this has never been brought up in court baffles me.

C) They have zero interest in pursuing these cases too court, they just send out tens of thousands of threatening letters to people they -THINK- downloaded these files, and give tell them "Give us $5000 and we'll make this lawsuit go away"

The problem with this is, yes, its legal to settle out of court a lawsuit etc, the thing that -ISN'T- legal is that the person who is being accused of stealing -IS NEVER ARRAIGNED OR SUMMONED TO COURT- in order to deny/accept the charges. He's never been formally charged in a courtroom, so he's never gotten the chance to -SAY HE WAS INNOCENT OR GUILTY IN THE FIRST PLACE-, he's just been -ACCUSED- of being guilty, and if he doesn't "Pay up" then they'll "Take you to court". This is flat out illegal, and again, this is a grey area that the court system refuses to plug up.

D) They can't prove you were acting in the faith of spreading said material etc. Just because you and somebody else use the same torrent, doesn't mean you were actively working together to spread such material. This would be akin to having two friends who want to have say Batman Arkham City, and they go their separate ways, and by chance they both steal the game from two different stores and get caught. In this case being friends would be considered inconsequential because even though they both worked to steal said media, they did not work -TOGETHER- to commit the crime because it took place in different area's. This is the same as one person being in New York and another in Vegas being accused of "Working together" yet they have never met, they have never talked, all they did was share in downloading a file, they can't prove that they had "The same mindset". One of them could be downloading it cause he doesn't want to pay for it, another could have been downloading it to -TRY IT OUT- before buying it.

E) Validity of proving the person attached to the IP is the person who committed the crime. Its been -FIRMLY- established in the states now that the home owner that a IP is attached too is -NOT- responsible for the crime, as too many variables have been attached to it such as multiple people in the house, or a insecure router.

An example of this is having 4 drunk friends in a car, and they get into a car accident. They flee the scene and run away. Later on when they are found, because there isn't enough evidence, they can't prove who drove the car, because all four of them deny driving the car, and with no evidence to prove who was driving etc, nobody can be charged.

This is the exact same thing with IP's, they can't prove that the crime took place in that house by a specific person, because its like the police finding the wrecked car at the residence, but can't prove who was driving it.
 
ShamisOMally said:
Sorry for all the text, I took law for two years
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It's fine. I read the whole thing. Makes a lot of sense. But, at the same time, these big companies can manipulate the law using some rare and obscure laws or ride the line of the law...

Sure, downloading a program or video that you did not purchase is wrong. But, they are trying to get people for basically 'selling' the media by having an upload seed going for an hour. I don't get that part. There is no intent on the end user to distribute the media, nor are they making copies, etc..
 
You guys are missing the most obvious reason here,

What if the Verizon CEOs are rabid porn addicts?
 
Mivoc said:
No offense, I hate your use of emphasis on words. Makes the read feel like a roller coaster ride where actions are screaming at me.
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I was taught this in law actually, its a two fold reason

A) When writing out your case, it allows you to clearly mark and emphasis points to the court room, such as raising your voice at a specific time. If you "Yelled" your point to a jurty the whole time, it would loose impact quickly and key points they might fail to understand

B) By writing out your documents like this, not only does the judge see you have outlined your main argument, but your opposition does as well, and they can't take things you have said out of context etc because its clearly outlined in your documents what your key points and issues are, meaning that when they attempt to undermine your comments (And they will) when you object you point out you have clearly marked and emphasized what points you were making. Because you have your points outlined clearly, when the judge is thinking over your objection, its clearly visible what points you were trying to make, and not what the other lawyer is trying to put words into you or your clients mouths
 
Or you can be a lawyer like Jose Baez, who is actually quite terrible as he follows zero rules in the courtroom and the judge lets him push everyone around cause the judge is a fucking biased idiot who lets Jose make a circus out of the courtroom

Seriously, the guy got threatened with being held in contempt of court or being fined more then fifty fucking times during the Casey Anthony case, yet the judge never fucking followed through with it.

Hell he was told during the closing arguments to -SHUT HIS FUCKING MOUTH- and let the prosecutors make their closing statement, and he -STILL- objected 8+ times during it, when the prosecutors let the defense team make their closing argument in silence. The judge fully out front told him to shut his fucking mouth, he didn't, and he still didn't get fined or charged with contempt of court.

Then the judge made some fucking beyond stupid argument that "Charges may be brought up later after the trial over your actions" which is -ILLEGAL- because the charges have to be issued while the case is open, not closed, meaning the judge is a fucking retard. The only time charges can be brought up after a case is if the lawyer has proven to have with-held evidence, with-held facts or has openly lied to the court during the trail. That's it.
 
I'm a lawyer and a lot of what Shamis posted is wrong. I wish he were right but he isn't. In most states private civil settlements are 100% legal, it's threats of criminal prosecution that isn't.
 
lordsegan said:
I'm a lawyer and a lot of what Shamis posted is wrong. I wish he were right but he isn't. In most states private civil settlements are 100% legal, it's threats of criminal prosecution that isn't.
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I said civil settlements are legal

I said its illegal for you to be threatened with being brought to court unless you pay a fine. You have to be officially charged in a courtroom before you can be offered a chance to settle a lawsuit out of court.
 
Well I hope some of you realize it's going to take folks like Shamis to save some asses in the near future here. It would seem that this is a technology so out of the scope for most season lawyers they can get pushed around for not knowing how to argue it well enough. I believe this is where some younger graduates can really start to make a push to get some definitive cases handled and provide ground for future cases. As it stands it seems like a bunch of pencil and paper, old timer judges and lawyers trying to dictate something not quite in their understanding.

And no I don't think Verizon is doing this for the consumer. This is strictly for themselves and to save themselves from being formally charged all the time. It's almost akin to suing the car dealership b/c a drunk driver who killed a family bought the car from that dealership. Verizon is merely the media given to a consumer to do with as they need.
 
lordsegan said:
I'm a lawyer and a lot of what Shamis posted is wrong. I wish he were right but he isn't. In most states private civil settlements are 100% legal, it's threats of criminal prosecution that isn't.
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Indeed. A civil settlement is a well-established area of contract law and such a contract will be enforced by the court. Both sides brought consideration (forbearance from a lawsuit, exchanged for $$$), there is assent, and offer/acceptance, etc.

Probably the only wiggle room would be the fact that these contracts might have been formed under duress (unlawful threats), and thus unenforceable. Generally, threats of legal action are not considered "unlawful threats", but if the party making threats knows that they have no legal basis, then such threats can indeed be considered "unlawful threats".

From what I understand (and I'm just a 1L, so that's not much), Verizon is trying to do this discovery to find out if Malibu Media actually has a legal basis for their threats.
 
ShamisOMally said:
I said its illegal for you to be threatened with being brought to court unless you pay a fine.
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No. No it is not.

If the party making legal threats objectively believes in good faith that they have a solid basis for their claims, forbearance from that legal right to sue is sufficient consideration for a settlement.
 
InorganicMatter said:
No. No it is not.

If the party making legal threats objectively believes in good faith that they have a solid basis for their claims, forbearance from that legal right to sue is sufficient consideration for a settlement.
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But that's the problem, they don't believe in good faith they have a solid basis for these claims

Hence, this is why Verizon is going to court over this, and I bet a billion too one the copyright trolls will try to pull out of the case to protect their business, in which Verizon could bring them to court for attempted extortion etc
 
ShamisOMally said:
But that's the problem, they don't believe in good faith they have a solid basis for these claims

Hence, this is why Verizon is going to court over this, and I bet a billion too one the copyright trolls will try to pull out of the case to protect their business, in which Verizon could bring them to court for attempted extortion etc
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It's still not illegal, as you have tried to depict it as. It just makes the contract voidable.
 
InorganicMatter said:
It's still not illegal, as you have tried to depict it as. It just makes the contract voidable.
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Like I have said, this is a legal grey area.

Its something the pirate party is trying to get addressed right now, and have the government close up these loopholes, so if they want to bring people to trial again, they'll have to do it one at a time
 
Ur_Mom said:
There is no intent on the end user to distribute the media........
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Yes there is, they are uploading and CHOOSE to upload the media.. that would be the argumment, if not they would disable uploading of content downloaded...

Your router is your responsibility....you should be held accountable for it if it is not secured and you left it wide open.. your property. BUT then you get into more issue like if a gun is stolen from a house and used to kill someone.. should you be held accountable...
 
MrGuvernment said:
Yes there is, they are uploading and CHOOSE to upload the media.. that would be the argumment, if not they would disable uploading of content downloaded...

Your router is your responsibility....you should be held accountable for it if it is not secured and you left it wide open.. your property. BUT then you get into more issue like if a gun is stolen from a house and used to kill someone.. should you be held accountable...
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That's not necessarily true.

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/...gs-raids-wrong-home-due-to-open-wifi-network/

Cases like the above have happened a number of times over recent years. You'll need a MAC address as well.

This is just a case of the law, judges and lawyers, all being old twats with no real grip on just how the series of tubes that is the internet actually works or how to police it, or even if they should bother policing it.

It's all 21st century and shit. Things were far simpler back in the early part of the 20th century. Back then we didn't torrent porn but rather send kinky telegrams and before then telegraphs.

I want to beep beeeeep beep beep beeeeeeep beeeep you in the beeeeep beep beep beeeep .
 
So how do you propose copyright owners protect their shit without incurring costs greater than the actual damage ?

If I were a pornographer or a musician, I'd want to get my money too.

Eye for an eye. You stole my shit in the first place, so now I use my mafia tactics on you.
Don't steal, and we won't have any problems. Didn't yo momma teach you that?


(I'm just standing in their shoes. This argument usually is too one sided.)
 
If I could have sweet loving sex with Verizon I totally would. I'm a proud member of their wireless group - and if I could get FiOS in my area I would.
 
I like the way people think verizon is stepping up for the consumer, lol born yesterday? Lets see if they gave a shit about the consumer when they decided to lock phones to their network, but shitty map apps on to trick people into paying for a GPS when they have a free google gps or any thing else including their high rates.

Now that there are no unlimited plans on verizon they want you to bit torrent so you can pay them more thats all. Its always the bottom line nothing else.
 
Uh, they are stepping up for the consumer, it may have intentions to improve their own bottom line, but it's still stepping up for them. It's rare that anyone helping anyone, much less a company, doesn't have other intentions behind it.

So I'm fine with it.
 
If Verizon sold out the consumer it could be a bigger problem in a couple of areas:

1) Bad publicity thus losing subscribers by the droves.
2) Potential privacy issues

Another thing is, what's to stop any copyright trolls from being the ones to share their media and see people either download it, or download it based on a file name indicating something else.

Ie. I think I downloaded a torrent for "Bambi versus Godzilla" but it turns out it was "Bangbi versus C**kzilla"
 
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