| BitTorrent Uploader Faces 5 Years
Posted: 4/18/2007 5:19:25 PM | The United States Department of Justice said this week that a fifth defendant has plead guilty to copyright infringement stemming from the crackdown on the Elite Torrents BitTorrent network, which was illegally spreading music, movies and software.
24 year-old Sam Kuonen of Columbus, Ga., pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement and criminal copyright infringement. He faces up to five years in prison, a fine of $250,000, and three years of supervised release. Sentencing is scheduled for July 16.
The first conviction related to the BitTorrent effort, dubbed "D-Elite" by authorities, came last October, when 23 year-old Grant Stanley from Virginia was sentenced to five months in jail and three years of supervised release. Stanely was an administrator for Elite Torrents.
Although Kuonen was not involved in the operation of the BitTorrent network, he was an "uploader" of copyrighted material. Kuonen supplied the first copy of movies and other illicit content to be shared with others. The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) helped provide evidence in the case.
Elite Torrents was shut down by federal regulators in May 2005. At its peak, the network distributed more than 17,800 titles -- including movies, software, music and games -- which were downloaded over two million times. However, that hasn't stopped piracy on other BitTorrent networks.
Although its namesake company has made a push for legitimacy and launched a legal download service, the BitTorrent technology is currently used almost exclusively for the illegal distribution of copyrighted material by end users. Recent statistics have estimated that 33 percent of P2P traffic is attributable to BitTorrent.
BitTorrent itself is not the culprit, however. It is simply a communication protocol that facilitates efficient distribution of very large files. On the flipside, it is not uncommon for those particular files to be copyrighted music, movies or television shows. Still, it has found some legitimate uses - most notably helping to distribute Linux distributions from Red Hat and Mandriva, which are comprised of multiple 650MB CD images. | |
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| Uploadng makes the baby Jesus cry.
Posted: 4/18/2007 10:59:44 PM | Ya know what? For as long as VHS tapes have been around, and that's like what, 35 years now - there has been a warning: "FBI blah blah, Interpol blah blah, copyright ingfinrment blah blah 250K fine and five years blah blah" at the beginning of every tape and disk ever made.
And some guy got popped and we're shocked about this?
"WOAH, five years? Why had no idea". Riiiiiiiiight.
He probably won't get five years. But I mean come on, everybody on the planet knows it's wrong and the penalty is spelled right out, one of the few crimes that has its penalty spelled out so often and so plainly.
We can express our moral outrage at this, but that does not change the law or the fact he knew what he was doing was illegal at the time he was diong it.
I believe people can do whatever they want. But I also believe they must be responsible for what they did. | |
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| Uploadng makes the baby Jesus cry.
Posted: 4/19/2007 12:48:38 AM | What one person calls 'uploading', is really called distribution of stolen or counterfeit goods. The penalty is normally in relation to value of stolen goods recovered. In this case it could have run into the Millions.
I don't know why people seem to have it stuck in their head that it isn't a real crime. It's theft pure and simple. I'm not taking a moral high ground, I download software/movies/music as well, but I'm aware that it is illegal and I'm taking that chance. | |
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| Uploadng makes the baby Jesus cry.
Posted: 4/19/2007 9:07:21 AM |
The penalty is normally in relation to value of stolen goods recovered.
Err, really it's the actual damages suffered by the copyright holder. One guy uploading a movie isn't liable for the original cost of production.
Say they lost $20 for each one they couldn't sell. Say they let 100 or 1000 "get away" to people that wont buy it now. Do the math.
The maximum fine is a punative damage that is statutory, not a function of actual damages. | |
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| BitTorrent Uploader Faces 5 Years
Posted: 4/19/2007 9:10:51 AM |
Th24 year-old Sam Kuonen of Columbus, Ga., pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement and criminal copyright infringement. He faces up to five years in prison, a fine of $250,000, and three years of supervised release. Sentencing is scheduled for July 16.
Funny, I'm from Columbus, GA too. I do some downloading occassionally but no uploading because I've heard it's the uploaders they go after. | |
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| BitTorrent Uploader Faces 5 Years
Posted: 4/19/2007 10:11:45 AM | I'm waving my Canadian flag and being thankful I am Canadian  Seems you can't piss on a public toilet seat in the US without facing a prison sentence....how many have they got locked up now down there? 2-3 million? That country has issues  | |
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| BitTorrent Uploader Faces 5 Years
Posted: 4/19/2007 10:17:17 AM | Nothing surprising at all, he is one of the few that have got caught, maybe he uploaded the most during a certian month or something. I dont use torrents to download, I would much rather rent and copy, safer, considering each torrent has a 'fingerprint' and is tracked by the torrent site. Onced federal charges are brought upon a site owner is when people should worry, because then the feds have all the logs they could ever want along with uploading frequencies etc..
Im not a pirate, piracy makes prices inflate. Doesnt ever affect the ones who download/upload though 'thats why they do it' Instead it affects the ones who dont have a fast enough internet connection to download the movie etc..
Just as the old saying goes give them a rope they will hang themselves goes, eventually they do catch 1 in a million.
Movie and game makers alike should work with the torrent sites and try and create half-off bargains or incentives to buy there product from the torrent site, that would be more pheasible then trying to catch ALL uploaders..
Just my opinion | |
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| BitTorrent Uploader Faces 5 Years
Posted: 4/19/2007 10:35:36 AM | Copyright Law -- Prosecution Policy
http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/eousa/foia_reading_room/usam/title9/crm01841.htm
Interesting read I recommend skimming through it for a idea on how they prosecute these people.. I dunno know how relevant this policy is now in 2007 but more than likely its not changed much.
This paragraph is what I found to be most interesting..
Congress has made felony penalties available to those who, "willfully and for purposes of commercial advantage or private financial gain," 17 U.S.C. § 506(a), reproduce or distribute, during any 180-day period, "at least 10 copies . . . of 1 or more copyrighted works, with a retail value of more than $2500." 18 U.S.C. § 2319(b)(1). The numerical threshold exists, according to the legislative history, to exclude from felony prosecution "children making copies for friends as well as other incidental copying of copyrighted works having a relatively low retail value." H.R. Rep. No. 997, 102 Cong., 2d Sess., at 6 (Oct. 3, 1992). | |
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| BitTorrent Uploader Faces 5 Years
Posted: 4/19/2007 11:20:35 AM |
I've heard it's the uploaders they go after.
Not at all. Google "RIAA lawsuit" (with the quotes).
Results 1 - 10 of about 82,400 for "RIAA lawsuit"... | |
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| Uploadng makes the baby Jesus cry.
Posted: 4/19/2007 12:03:59 PM |
The maximum fine is a punative damage that is statutory, not a function of actual damages.
The maximum is yes, however the actual fine is in relation to the value of stolen goods, up to the maximum. Steal more and theres more chance you'll get the maximum fine. | |
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| Uploadng makes the baby Jesus cry.
Posted: 4/20/2007 9:15:21 AM |
Nope. Look at the RIAAI lawsuits.
they mean nothing. look at the riaa? its common knowledge that they will sue you, they will sue your dog, they will sue your dead parents, and they will also sue people who don't even have computers.
as a staff member at a major torrent site, I have to keep well aware of the copyright laws in various jurisdictions, and i can tell you two things. if youre in canada, and you're not selling the product, youre fine. it is fully legal to possess pirated dvd's and movies in canada, but it is illegal to sell it.
also, to whomever said that torrents sites have logs, well they do. but you ever try to force the NL gov to give that info up? The US tried to sink ThePirateBay, bu threatening to take away their submarines, and all that happened, was they moved top NL from Swe.
Bottom line, if you're in Canada, you're not going to jail for uploading or downloading. if you're in the US, you may get sued for up or downloading. if youre an admin at a torrent site, or a member of teh scene, you may actually do years in a US federal prison.
and PS do a whois lookup, if youre using torrent sites based in the US, you deserve to get sued. ;) | |
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| Uploading makes the baby Jesus cry.
Posted: 4/20/2007 10:32:39 AM | What you say is all true but somewhat skirts the issue of the case at hand which is in the US, not Canada, the Nederlands, UK or the North Korean embassy in Sweden. The political climate toward the US is very different in Nordica. We have Vice Presidents Harper's regime to be concerned with.
The question here is - can you claim statutory or punative damages in addition to actual damages in cases of copyright infrigement in the US and the answer is yes. This was covered in a thread here a week and a half ago (and you can find citations there). It does vary from state to state but relevant case law is evolving in favour of punative damages in more and more states.
While a lot of the RIAA suits are abjectly boneheaded they are collecting on a lot of the more cut and dried judgements. It's only the stupid ones that are newsworthy like the one two days ago where they deposed a child on a school day.
Moreso, being in Canada only protects you if all the actors in the suit are Canadian. If a piece of US intellectual property is involved and D/L's by a Canadian citizen - you're liable - look what happened with the guys that run gambling sites outside the us - as soon as they get a layover in the US, bang, they're in jail even though what they did is not a crime in their country and never mind their company that does this is publically traded in their homeland. Or look at that UK guy that hacked into USG who lost his last deportation hearing. If they want to prove their point there is a legal framework that allows them to do this. The law is in a different area, but the ponit remanis, break a US law outside the US and they can still get you if the feds feel like it and you aren't in a country that does not have an extradition treaty with the US (Brazil, Libya, et. al.)
Can they nail you personally, right now? In theory yes, right up to extradition. Will they? In all likelyhood no. But these guys are jerks and like to "make a point" every now and again whcih is what the subject of this thread is concerned with.
I am not an attorney (you didn't think I was going to use the slashdotese abbreviation on a dating site did you?) but an old friend is one of the better intellectual property attorneys in the US and I'm just passing on what he's explained to me.
I know about whois, having written the .ca whois code back when I almost died embarassment on the world DNS stage at the fact that for a while it was run on a gopher server.
Whois is meaningless anyway, I have some legacy class C blocks deployed in Boston, Florida, Luxomberg, Thailand and Holland that pointt to a mailing address in Toronto where I don't even live any more. Domain registrars update their contact records (snicker - on the honour system) while ARIN doesn't seem to be bothered for IP blocks.
Bottom line, if you're in Canada, you're not going to jail for uploading or downloading. if you're in the US, you may get sued for up or downloading. if youre an admin at a torrent site, or a member of teh scene, you may actually do years in a US federal prison.
That's a pretty good summary of, de facto, what happens right now, BUT, does not reflect actual laws. What happens and what the law actaully says are two different things.
There is a move afoot to change Canadian IP laws to bring them more inline with those in the US (Michael Geist's site is a good reference) so buckle your seatbelts this may be a wild ride. | |
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| Uploading makes the baby Jesus cry.
Posted: 7/16/2009 11:01:38 PM | | i have always wondered about this, i am a avid uploader on alot of torrent sites, and i havent gotten any letters nor has any law enforcement contacted me about it. | |
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- don
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Joined: 4/23/2009
Msg: 16 | |
| Filesharing.....Smart -or- Not So Smart
Posted: 7/16/2009 11:31:26 PM |
i have always wondered about this, i am a avid uploader on alot of torrent sites, and i havent gotten any letters nor has any law enforcement contacted me about it.
Wonder no more, It's risky. I hope it's worth it.
& Why are you risking your ass so other people can use you?
Don't get me wrong, I'm into giving back to the community but not when my ass is on the line.
Good Luck | |
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| Filesharing.....Smart -or- Not So Smart
Posted: 7/17/2009 2:37:05 AM |
Nope. Look at the RIAAI lawsuits.
they mean nothing. look at the riaa? its common knowledge that they will sue you, they will sue your dog, they will sue your dead parents, and they will also sue people who don't even have computers.
Just because they have a lawsuit filed does not mean they will win. A lot of it is scare tactics. Often threating them with a lawsuit, just to get them to back down. In many cases RIAAI know it may not win, but most people don't know it or want to pursue one. | |
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| Uploading makes the baby Jesus cry.
Posted: 7/17/2009 8:58:06 AM |
i have always wondered about this, i am a avid uploader on alot of torrent sites, and i havent gotten any letters nor has any law enforcement contacted me about it.
That's crazy dude. I'm always reading on these torrent forums how users are whining about people who don't share and I just laugh. I mean really, the last thing I'd ever do is leave my computer on all day letting people DL from me.
I used to DL from torrents every now and then, but now I just don't do it at all. Especially since I've read all these things on the web. The fact that there's so many grey areas and people going back and forth about the legality of everything just doesn't make feel comfortable at all.
I'm just convinced it's all in the "luck" of the draw. You might get away with 40 in that 25 for years, but there's always that chance you'll still get ticketed. | |
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| Filesharing.....Smart -or- Not So Smart
Posted: 7/17/2009 9:38:24 AM |
Wonder no more, It's risky. I hope it's worth it.
& Why are you risking your ass so other people can use you?
Don't get me wrong, I'm into giving back to the community but not when my ass is on the line.
Good Luck
i crack games,and apps, or well more in the process of learning. and i do believe in giving back more than what you take, if everyone just seeded back what they took, would we have all of the things that are readily available to us?
That's crazy dude. I'm always reading on these torrent forums how users are whining about people who don't share and I just laugh. I mean really, the last thing I'd ever do is leave my computer on all day letting people DL from me.
I used to DL from torrents every now and then, but now I just don't do it at all. Especially since I've read all these things on the web. The fact that there's so many grey areas and people going back and forth about the legality of everything just doesn't make feel comfortable at all.
I'm just convinced it's all in the "luck" of the draw. You might get away with 40 in that 25 for years, but there's always that chance you'll still get ticketed.
while you have a valid point... people that just seed back what they take are small fish. when you look at the big picture, who are you gonna go after, the person that just downloaded the movie to watch it and maybe seeded to one or two other people? or are you going to go after the guy that uploaded it and made it available to millions of people? there are people out there that upload 50-100tb to just one site, those are the people that i personally think they would go after. not the occasional downloader. | |
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| Filesharing.....Smart -or- Not So Smart
Posted: 7/18/2009 5:44:50 AM | when you download on bittorrent, you will be uploading the file within a few minutes to anyone that is missing bits
if you prevent uploading, then what might take a few hours could take a few weeks to download  | |
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