Verizon Rejects Hollywood’s Call to Aid Piracy Fight

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Not only has Verizon rejected the call from Hollywood to aid in the fight on piracy, they seem downright happy about doing so. I can see Verizon’s position, and I believe they are smart for not wanting to monitor customer’s data or be liable for it.

Verizon, however, opposes the concept. I spoke to Tom Tauke, Verizon’s executive vice president for public affairs, on the subject. He said the company’s view combines a concern for the privacy of its customers with self interest. It may be costly for it to get into the business of policing the traffic on its network. Indeed, phone companies have largely spent a century trying not to be liable for what people say over their lines.
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What's Verizon's ulterior motive? First they offer us true high speed broadband with their Fios service, and now this. What's the catch? Why are they being so good to us? lol

And why can't other broadband company do the same thing? Why are they all so damn anti-consumer? I mean, whats the point of going into business selling stuff to people if you don't like to sell stuff to people in the first place?!
 
Charter here in the Saint Louis, Missouri area. Seem to be great about keeping customers info very private.
 
Azhar said:
What's Verizon's ulterior motive? First they offer us true high speed broadband with their Fios service, and now this. What's the catch? Why are they being so good to us? lol

And why can't other broadband company do the same thing? Why are they all so damn anti-consumer? I mean, whats the point of going into business selling stuff to people if you don't like to sell stuff to people in the first place?!
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I also wonder what they are after :) Usually companies could care less about customer information/data.
 
It's the RIAA, MPAA or whoever's job to catch people committing piracy.

It's not the job of Microsoft or Apple or the hardware makers or schools or ISPs or any network program to catch these people or even help them.

If they want to protect their stuff, then they should be the ones paying the bill and not the other companies and the customers.

However, you have these idiots that cave in and give them anything they want. Microsoft and Apple and everyone else is caving in. It's good to see some standing up against them.

I don't condone illegal downloading of songs but, I don't believe it's any one's job to protect someone elses investment.
 
[RIP]Zeus;1032031644 said:
Charter here in the Saint Louis, Missouri area. Seem to be great about keeping customers info very private.
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That is a negative, i have been called twice by them about things i have downloaded, they for sure monitor their networks.
 
Hmm... I don't download music or movies, but I'll definitely have to look into Verizon's service soon. They seem to actually want people to access the internet :eek:
 
This is one of the reasons why I've switched from Comcast to Verizon over a year and a half ago. Plus, I've had zero problems with Verizon's service whereas Comcast was fine for a few months then I would experience random downtime for days at a time.
 
azuros said:
That is a negative, i have been called twice by them about things i have downloaded, they for sure monitor their networks.
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Hmmm

Now is this in the same area i am in?

Cause for the past 10 years i have had charter.. I never once got a phone call or anything from them on what i was d/ling
 
/me hugs his Fios

10/2 mbit for $40 a month and no whinging about what I do with it... Is it any wonder people in Fios-available areas are abandoning cable so quickly? See what happens when the corporate types pull their heads out of their asses?
 
This is excellent news!

Now I can almost forgive them for locking me into a 2 year contract with a Moto RAZR with all the good factory features disabled* by the shitty Verizon firmware. Almost. Not that Verizon cares too much how little ol' me feels one way or the other.

(*Sure, I followed the instructions on hacking websites to re-enable all the stuff I wanted -- Bluetooth File Transfer, upload my own ringtones, etc.-- but what a pain in the ass.)
 
I know two people in the Ann Arbor, MI area on their 15/2 service that have received letters from them for "copyrighted material downloading". They had to sign paperwork saying they would comply with the studios that made the claims against them if they got caught again. I don't know if it was just a scare tactic or what, but I wouldn't trust many ISP's, especially large ones.
 
I think here's how it goes down most of the time:

1) You are caught and your IP address is recorded by the piracy police.
2) They find out who that IP address belongs to.
3) The piracy police have their lawyers draft a letter to said ISP.

Now, here's where it can go in one of two directions.

4a) The ISP can tell the piracy police to go f-off. Never happens though because they would then be sued themselves. More realistically, what happens is

4b) The ISP replies thanks for letting us know, then sends the offending customer a letter that says, in effect, you got caught buddy, keep it up and you're going to get in big trouble. Then the ISP says to the piracy police, we informed them, we've got it covered, thanks again, if they keep it up they're all yours. Then, the ISP watches the customer like a hawk from that point on.

Doesn't that seem like the usual way these things play out? I mean, I know everyone's heard about some of the more high profile cases like that poor girl who lost her appeal on the $800,000 or whatever fine she was levied -- but realistically they can't sue everyone. They pick and choose among whom they'd prefer to make examples. Hopefully, this means that the "worst" offenders are more frequently targeted.

I'm not advocating piracy but to sue someone's life away, racking up fines they have no hope of ever paying when there was no monetary gain from their infringement is a rather byzantine, at least in my opinion.
 
Verizon is doing the right think by being a dumb pipe provider and washing it's hands of the content that goes across that pipe. They are stating in no uncertain terms that they will not be liable for what their customers do. They sell the service, their customers buy it and use it. End of transaction.

If the rest of the providers did the same thing this wouldn't be an issue. I don't want my ISP looking over my shoulder at what I do online. That's not what I pay them for.
 
Methadras said:
I don't want my ISP looking over my shoulder at what I do online. That's not what I pay them for.
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It's in your contract you signed with your ISP, lol. And if it isn't, they reserve the right to change their contract at any time to include it.
 
w1retap said:
It's in your contract you signed with your ISP, lol. And if it isn't, they reserve the right to change their contract at any time to include it.
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Which is part of the problem in this country. Such one-sided contracts between businesses and consumers (who have no bargaining power) should not be allowed under law. A business that signs a contract should be held to higher, not lower, standards than a consumer who is after all paying for the service.
 
w1retap said:
It's in your contract you signed with your ISP, lol. And if it isn't, they reserve the right to change their contract at any time to include it.
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What the hell are you lol'ing for? I think you are missing the point here and that is, an ISP is not supposed to be a content monitor and that is the way that they should be. If ISP's were provided immunity from litigation or prosecution about what users do online, then a lot of these issues would evaporate. Otherwise, I don't want ISP's being the proxies of government to monitor what I do. If that was the case, then let the government take over the backbone and Root DNS servers in the USA and let them be your nanny.
 
Methadras said:
What the hell are you lol'ing for? I think you are missing the point here and that is, an ISP is not supposed to be a content monitor and that is the way that they should be. If ISP's were provided immunity from litigation or prosecution about what users do online, then a lot of these issues would evaporate. Otherwise, I don't want ISP's being the proxies of government to monitor what I do. If that was the case, then let the government take over the backbone and Root DNS servers in the USA and let them be your nanny.
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I think he's laughing at the fact that many many many people blithely ignore contracts and blurt out "This isn't what I'm paying for".

There's a saying: wanting isn't having.
 
You can put whatever you want into a TOS contract, that doesn't necessarilly mean a damn thing. You think all the torrent sites and p2p clients that have went down didn't have a TOS on how it should be used?

Anyhow, I have fios, I don't have the cable cuz I'm too poor.. but fyi consumer reports rated it as both the highest tv and internet service for those of you who don't know much about it.
 
Methadras said:
What the hell are you lol'ing for? I think you are missing the point here and that is, an ISP is not supposed to be a content monitor and that is the way that they should be. If ISP's were provided immunity from litigation or prosecution about what users do online, then a lot of these issues would evaporate. Otherwise, I don't want ISP's being the proxies of government to monitor what I do. If that was the case, then let the government take over the backbone and Root DNS servers in the USA and let them be your nanny.
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I did not miss the point. ISP can change their contracts at any time, it says right in their agreement you signed with them. There is no such thing as anonymous when you are using their service that you are paying for them to provide to your home. If someone files a lawsuit against them, and they withhold evidence, you think they're not going to hand it over? hah. They could have their business license suspended/pulled, and be sued for millions on top of that.
 
Oh4Sh0 said:
You can put whatever you want into a TOS contract, that doesn't necessarilly mean a damn thing. You think all the torrent sites and p2p clients that have went down didn't have a TOS on how it should be used?
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p2p + torrent sites != registered company with business license
 
w1retap said:
If someone files a lawsuit against them, and they withhold evidence, you think they're not going to hand it over? hah. They could have their business license suspended/pulled, and be sued for millions on top of that.
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There's a big difference between somebody filing a lawsuit and the RIAA fishing for victims. The former is doing it legally through proper channels, the latter is an attempt to browbeat (or bribe) the ISP's into turning over data that is not legally required for them. It is the latter that Verizon is standing up against, and that should be applauded.
 
farfromhome said:
There's a big difference between somebody filing a lawsuit and the RIAA fishing for victims. The former is doing it legally through proper channels, the latter is an attempt to browbeat (or bribe) the ISP's into turning over data that is not legally required for them. It is the latter that Verizon is standing up against, and that should be applauded.
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No doubt. It still doesn't make customers immune like some are touting.
 
jaegertech said:
/me hugs his Fios

10/2 mbit for $40 a month and no whinging about what I do with it... Is it any wonder people in Fios-available areas are abandoning cable so quickly? See what happens when the corporate types pull their heads out of their asses?
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thats nothing in some places they have 20/20 now for 80/m :eek:

i need to move out of AT&T land U-vers is a joke and now they want to filter too the deathstar isnt long if they keep this up
 
w1retap said:
I did not miss the point. ISP can change their contracts at any time, it says right in their agreement you signed with them. There is no such thing as anonymous when you are using their service that you are paying for them to provide to your home. If someone files a lawsuit against them, and they withhold evidence, you think they're not going to hand it over? hah. They could have their business license suspended/pulled, and be sued for millions on top of that.
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sure but they need a court order to do so
the **AAs what the isps to hand it over with out one thats whats different
 
Steve said:
Not only has Verizon rejected the call from Hollywood to aid in the fight on piracy, they seem downright happy about doing so. I can see Verizon’s position, and I believe they are smart for not wanting to monitor customer’s data or be liable for it.
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Verizon being nice? I think not.

I have written on this subject time and time again and it’s all very simple. Two words the politicians love to use “Plausible Deniability”.

What they don’t know about you they can’t tell those who demand to know. By refusing to monitor an individual user they have nothing to report and so far no law says they have to monitor you.

If you get a bit too aggressive with your downloads, yes, you will be throttled a bit but the throttling is automatic and from what I understand from a buddy at Verizon they don’t really monitor that on a case by case basis.

They (Verizon) don’t want to monitor your use, they don’t want the cost of monitoring your usage and they sure as hell don’t want to be caught up in a potential law suite because of some idiot customer.

As I have said in the past, read you’re TOS. They are trying to tell you in the nicest way possible not to be stupid and force unneeded and unwanted legislation.

Now, if the rest of the providers out there take the same stand the copy write people will have to turn to Washington. If that happens God knows what our fate will be.

Another thing to keep in mind is if a given providers bandwidth reaches a high enough level they will also have a good case to raise our rates; I don’t think we want or need that either.;)
 
w1retap said:
I did not miss the point. ISP can change their contracts at any time, it says right in their agreement you signed with them. There is no such thing as anonymous when you are using their service that you are paying for them to provide to your home. If someone files a lawsuit against them, and they withhold evidence, you think they're not going to hand it over? hah. They could have their business license suspended/pulled, and be sued for millions on top of that.
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I understand this, but the point is, is that Verizon seems to be taking the step in saying that they don't want to be a nanny for their users and are looking for a way to be granted legal immunity from doing so. Why do you think AT&T and other telco vendors are seeking immunity from liability for their cooperation with the NSA? It's the same principal. Of course any ISP can change their TOS, but it also has to be done within the framework of legality. Hopefully Verizon is successful in their quest from legal liability and/or prosecutorial responsibility when it comes to users. Be a dumb pipe provider, collect your cash from your bundle packages, and keep your shareholders happy. That's all I'm trying to say.
 
Azhar said:
I think he's laughing at the fact that many many many people blithely ignore contracts and blurt out "This isn't what I'm paying for".

There's a saying: wanting isn't having.
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i would never suggest that is what is going on currently. However what I am suggesting is that this should be the model for how ISP's and users operate. Pay for bandwidth, use the bandwidth, ISP isn't legally liable for what you do with that bandwidth. Dumb pipe provider, nothing more.
 
w1retap said:
No doubt. It still doesn't make customers immune like some are touting.
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Oh, users would still be liable, but the ISP's wouldn't and shouldn't be. That's the argument I'm making. If the **AA's want to come after you, I don't have a problem with that, but they shouldn't dangle the plumb bob of legal liability over their heads for it.
 
This logic is simple, clear, and inarguable:

An ISP should have just as much responsibility / liability for what customers do on the Internet as the government does for people using roads.

Can you sue the government if a bank robber used a government road to transport stolen money? No.
 
If all the ISPs stood up against them and told them they would not give out customer info, they would just pay someone in Congress to pass a bill requiring it.
 
Nice. Verizon found a way to distinguish themselves from their competitors without having to spend any money or effort.

There's a mystery here?
 
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