To: Students, Faculty and Staff
From: Michael Kerntke, Chief Information Officer
Re: Illegal Sharing of Copyrighted Materials
Date: February 11, 2008
Over the past year, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has begun a vigorous campaign to stop students and others from illegally downloading music and movie files. The RIAA is doing this to enforce the interests of their member artists, whose works are protected under federal law, specifically the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) of 1998.
The RIAA campaign has resulted in the association sending notices, known as pre-settlement letters, to universities nationwide. We, along with other universities, have been asked to forward the letters on to individuals identified by their Internet Protocol (IP) addresses.
These notices are sent to individuals who have been observed by the RIAA as sharing copyrighted material, such as music and movie files, via the Internet. Outlined in these notices is a process whereby the individual is asked to visit a web site and avoid prosecution by settling the issue for a sum of money, usually in the $3,000 to $6,000 range. It should be noted that the University of Connecticut constantly updates the software that it uses in its anti-pirating procedures in an attempt to protect students from the temptation to illegally share copyrighted materials. It continues to be a challenge to stay ahead of the file-sharing software with file-sharing blocking software.
In addition, the RIAA has stated that it intends to issue a subpoena to the University to obtain the identity of the alleged offender and file a suit against that individual if he or she chooses not to settle via the pre-settlement process. To date the University of Connecticut has received 84 of these pre-settlement letters and has forwarded them to the individual identified by the IP address. Federal law prohibits us from providing the RIAA the information linking student names with particular IP addresses absent a lawfully issued subpoena. However, if the University is served with such a subpoena it will be required to comply, and give notice of the subpoena to the student
It is important that you understand the consequences of engaging in the sharing of copyrighted material such as music and movie files. Several of these cases have proceeded to court and to date the RIAA has prevailed in each of them. A recent court decision awarded an amount in excess of $200,000 to the RIAA.
Several individuals at UConn who have received pre-settlement letters claim that they were unaware that they were running software that was sharing their files via the internet. In the interest of avoiding a costly error, each of you should examine and remove from your computers any peer-to-peer software and infringing material that you may find.
It may interest you to know that a free music service, RUCKUS, has been placed on the Connecticut Education Network at the direction of the Connecticut Commission for Educational Technology. This service is available to all UConn students at no cost. Details of this service are available at: http://www.ruckus.com .
I want to be sure that we again remind you that sharing copyrighted material is against the law and against University policy. The University has created and continually updates policies regarding the appropriate use of information technology resources. Specifically you should read and be aware of the policy at: http://policy.uconn.edu/pages/findPolicy .cfm?PolicyID=356 . In part it reads that "It is prohibited to download, store or share copyrighted materials without permission of the copyright owner."
Please be sure that you are in compliance with this policy.
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Quick, all college students on Newgrounds should pay $3,000 to $6,000 because this is clearly the real damages suffered for downloading illegal music per person.
