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AD.C. Appeals Court Says RIAA Subpoenas for File-Swapper Identities Illegal

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on December 19, 2003 - 4:40am.
Washington -- In a major setback for the recording industry's legal campaign against music file-swappers, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia has ruled that the streamlined subpoena process currently being used to compel alleged file-swappers' Internet service providers to reveal their identities is illegal. The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has filed thousands of such subpoenas with a number of ISPs -- including Verizon -- which sued the RIAA saying the subpoenas violated their users' privacy. A lower court agreed with the RIAA's argument that the subpoena process, which doesn't require a judge's approval, was justified under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The appeals court ruling will mean that the RIAA now must file a more cumbersome "John Doe" lawsuit against alleged file-swappers to get their identity from an ISP. "We are not unsympathetic either to the RIAA's concern regarding the widespread infringement of its members' copyrights, or to the need for legal tools to protect those rights," the court wrote in its ruling. "It is not the province of the courts, however, to rewrite [copyright law] in order to make it fit a new and unforeseen Internet architecture, no matter how damaging that development has been to the music industry." At this point, it is unclear what effect if any the ruling will have on the hundreds of lawsuits that the RIAA has already filed -- and in some cases reached settlement agreements -- against individual file-swappers using the now illegal subpoena process. "Today's ruling is an important victory for Internet users and all consumers," said Verizon vice president and associate general counsel Sarah Deutsch. "Copyright holders seeking personal information about Internet subscribers will now have to file a traditional lawsuit. These requests will undergo scrutiny by a judge, thus preserving the privacy, safety and legal rights of every Internet subscriber."
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/031219/nyf048_1.html  http://pacer.cadc.uscourts.gov/docs/common/opinions/200312/03-7015a.pdf  http://news.com.com/2100-1027_3-5129687.html  http://makeashorterlink.com/?Z66023BD6  http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,61670,00.html  http://www.riaa.com

tags: Law | RIAA | File-Swapper | Illegal | AD.C |



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