Cox Communications Sued for in Excess of $1 Billion for Ignoring Piracy by Customers

cageymaru

cageymaru

Fully [H]
Joined
Apr 10, 2003
Messages
22,361
Cox Communications has been hit with an over $1 billion lawsuit after multiple record labels sued the ISP for allegedly ignoring copyright infringement by customers. Under US law an ISP must take certain steps when sent a DMCA take down notice. Cox is accused of limiting the amount of notices that it would process and turning a blind eye to pirates. Cox says that it has a "13-strike policy" and but record labels say it would only temporarily disconnect an infringing account. Then accounts were reinstated without repercussions even though some had been warned over 100 times.

According to the record labels, it is clear that Cox intentionally ignored these repeated copyright infringements. As such, they believe that the ISP is liable for both contributory and vicarious copyright infringement. As compensation for the claimed losses, the companies demand statutory or actual damages, as well as coverage for their attorney fees and other costs.
 
I have Cox Internet. It's fast, reliable, and affordable. Hopefully none of this will change that.
 
If I was Cox I would just cash everything out as fast as I could and just file bankruptancy so they couldn't take any of my monies. Say a good day and fuck you to the customers and leave them to the shills.
 
It's not Cox responsibility to police dmca and wholly shoulder the financial burden of doing so. I've read about the situation with cox and record labels in the past and it amounts to record labels trying to bully Cox into conducting business as they see fit.
 
Cox is accused of limiting the amount of notices that it would process
Click to expand...


That's reasonable since the entertainment industry automates the notices to the quantity of spam. It's probably expensive for companies sending out all of the notices just in postage alone.

If they're not going to pay a reasonable processing fee, I'd say they don't get priority support.
 
Upon reviewing the law, I think Cox falls under the part of the DMCA that applies to 'transitoey digital networks', and if so, there's no fiscal liability; the only relief available is compliance to supoenas of identity of customers (although, per case law, good luck), or having a judge order some customers to be disconnected. Cox isn't hosting any content, so it's not subject to takedown requests.
 
Cox will win or their attorneys would have advised them to alter their practices already.

Contributory and vicarious infringement are very difficult cases for a plaintiff to win.

Go Cox! (and I refer only to the cable company) ;)
 
NeghVar said:
Didn't this all start because Cox was demanding due process or credible evidence for all claims by the record labels? I believe they were standing with the numerous cases in which courts ruled that an IP address is not enough to link to an infringer and were demanding more than just an IP address from them.
Cobbler Nevada, LLC v. Doe-24.21.136.125
K-Beech, Inc. v. John Does 1-37
Elf-man, LLC. v. Does 1 - 152
VPR Internationale v Does 1-1017
Click to expand...

hahahahaha

expecting the sue happy "music" companies to provide actual evidence?

that's adorable.
 
How is Cox profiting from its subscriber's alleged piracy activities? Are the alleged pirates sharing profits with Cox? As far as I can tell, Cox collects the same ISP fees regardless of if an end user shares a movie or just views a movie. Seems likes the plaintiffs will have to prove that the alleged violators are using Cox instead of the many other ISPs in the area because of Cox's alleged failures to act on the DMCA notices. At least to make the "profiting from" part of the lawsuit.
 
Dead Parrot said:
How is Cox profiting from its subscriber's alleged piracy activities? Are the alleged pirates sharing profits with Cox? As far as I can tell, Cox collects the same ISP fees regardless of if an end user shares a movie or just views a movie. Seems likes the plaintiffs will have to prove that the alleged violators are using Cox instead of the many other ISPs in the area because of Cox's alleged failures to act on the DMCA notices. At least to make the "profiting from" part of the lawsuit.
Click to expand...
You could say they're profiting because customers would use another service if Cox enforced their rules, but that's a bit of a stretch.
 
vpn everything. pirate all content, even netflix shows. bleed em and well be free of these stupid companies. passionate artists will continue to create movies and music without $300 million marketing and effects budgets. itll survive. itll be okay.
 
Lenard said:
I am curious as to what people think is expensive?
Do you mind sharing your speed and Monthly cost?
Click to expand...
Not the person you asked but I had Cox from 2006-2007 in San Diego, pacific beach and over off 55th and El Cajon (can’t believe I remember that) and it was 105mbps/$75month.

I miss cox. We torrented so much shit. Best ISP I’ve ever had.

Comcast, ATT, TWC all suck in comparison. I think we had 0 downtime our entire time down there. Speeds were always fast and no need for a VPN. Crazy times
 
Lenard said:
I am curious as to what people think is expensive?
Do you mind sharing your speed and Monthly cost?
Click to expand...

50mb down, 5mb up, 1TB cap, $85/month.
Only choice as I can't even get slow DSL.

Cable TV pricing is even worse.

Actual price is a little less as I have a small discount for bundling TV and another discount for threatening to cancel the TV service every year :D
 
RIAA is always trolling ways to steal people's money since they can't seem to evolve with the times. There are some instances where they have tried to sue over like 30 songs and wanted $100K plus in rewards....30 songs....not even worth that if it was on a CD dipped platinum.....


They still think CDs and Cassettes are the best way to distribute their content. /s
 
SomeoneElse said:
RIAA is always trolling ways to steal people's money since they can't seem to evolve with the times. There are some instances where they have tried to sue over like 30 songs and wanted $100K plus in rewards....30 songs....not even worth that if it was on a CD dipped platinum.....


They still think CDs and Cassettes are the best way to distribute their content. /s
Click to expand...


The purpose of the extreme rewards is to restrain others from stealing music through fear.
It is probably not too far off to say that people want music for free, and they will download it for free if there is no consequence.
By getting attention grabbing headlines about grandmothers being bankrupted because grandkids downloaded Bieber they accomplish some suppression. The tactic is effective.
 
Lenard said:
The purpose of the extreme rewards is to restrain others from stealing music through fear.
It is probably not too far off to say that people want music for free, and they will download it for free if there is no consequence.
By getting attention grabbing headlines about grandmothers being bankrupted because grandkids downloaded Bieber they accomplish some suppression. The tactic is effective.
Click to expand...

I agree.
This works on me, personally.
 
I remember getting Cox Cable in 1995 in San Diego. Going from dial up to 6mb, that was an experience. Wasn't maybe a month later I got blocked on Napster for sharing Metallica, lol. Funny thing is I had all their stuff on CD/Cassette/DVD/VHS, well after that was not a fan anymore. I get it, do not sell copied music! Wait, I wasn't selling copy right music, what the heck?

P.S. I discovered binaries shortly there after, my collection grew......
 
Lenard said:
The purpose of the extreme rewards is to restrain others from stealing music through fear.
It is probably not too far off to say that people want music for free, and they will download it for free if there is no consequence.
By getting attention grabbing headlines about grandmothers being bankrupted because grandkids downloaded Bieber they accomplish some suppression. The tactic is effective.
Click to expand...

It's not working though. It's doing nothing to stem the tide. So if they go after Cox, and win, then all the ISP's will all fall in to line and serve up notices based on nothing more than an IP address and a fragment of some torrent 'proving' infringement. It's insane.
 
Pirates will always be 1 step ahead of both ISPs and ahead of RIAA/MPAA - I don't know why they even try.
 
Shotglass01 said:
It's not working though. It's doing nothing to stem the tide. So if they go after Cox, and win, then all the ISP's will all fall in to line and serve up notices based on nothing more than an IP address and a fragment of some torrent 'proving' infringement. It's insane.
Click to expand...


And then I will cancel my service with said ISP and then sign up for the competitor... Then the competitor sends me something, then I cancel and re-sign for my previous ISP under my wife's name. Rinse, repeat, flush, etc...
 
Shotglass01 said:
It's not working though. It's doing nothing to stem the tide. So if they go after Cox, and win, then all the ISP's will all fall in to line and serve up notices based on nothing more than an IP address and a fragment of some torrent 'proving' infringement. It's insane.
Click to expand...

I am not sure you can claim it is doing nothing to stem the tide. I suspect that without the ridiculous monetary damages, ISP notifications of cut-off, and discussion about the issues related to piracy due to the RIAA, many thousands of people, who currently don't, would be downloading things for free. Likewise the difficulty of finding good file sharing sites makes it less likely.
 
Last edited:
Who wants the price of their subscription to go up due to increased measures needed to police where users go online?
 
all artists now know they dont make any money from record sales, its all live shows and merch. And sure cox, as well as suddenlink and other will give you a slap on the wrist, thats about all that is needed considering the "crime" . and yes, i would download a god damned car if i could..
 
Cyraxx said:
And then I will cancel my service with said ISP and then sign up for the competitor... Then the competitor sends me something, then I cancel and re-sign for my previous ISP under my wife's name. Rinse, repeat, flush, etc...
Click to expand...

The flip side is that Cox wins and thus the other ISP's don't bother sending notices anymore.

Lenard said:
I am not sure you can claim it is doing nothing to stem the tide. I suspect that without the ridiculous monetary damages, ISP notifications of cut-off, and discussion about the issues related to piracy due to the RIAA, many thousands of people, who currently don't, would be downloading things for free. Likewise the difficulty of finding good file sharing sites makes it less likely.
Click to expand...

Disagree. As each younger person connects, they immediately start sharing. First it's their goofy challenges, if they survive those, it moves on to films and music. I think sharing has done nothing but increase. You'll find studies and analysis both ways, but if you're not paying for Spotify, you're not paying for music.
 
Shotglass01 said:
Disagree. As each younger person connects, they immediately start sharing. First it's their goofy challenges, if they survive those, it moves on to films and music. I think sharing has done nothing but increase. You'll find studies and analysis both ways, but if you're not paying for Spotify, you're not paying for music.
Click to expand...

I am not talking about kids. I am talking about 40 y/o guys who have money and don't want to deal with the risk of losing it.

If there were no RIAA suits, or potential consequences I would buy a 24TB NAS device download everything. I would even download kids movies just in case nephews visit.
I would have MARVEL marathon weekend viewing parties and have the back catalogue of every major music artist since Clarence "Frogman" Henry.
I would download every comic book and read it on my Kindle. I have no doubt that there are thousands of people just like myself who only stay out of it because of the hassle and potential risk.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top