Thursday, July 12, 2007

RIAA Subpoenas Documents from Verizon in UMG v. Lindor

Some four years after first serving a subpoena on Verizon, the RIAA has served a new subpoena duces tecum (subpoena for documents) in UMG v. Lindor.

The documents being sought are listed on the third page, in Attachment A.

July 10, 2007, Subpoena Duces Tecum from RIAA to Verizon Internet Services, Inc.

* Document published online at Internet Law & Regulation

Commentary & discussion:

p2pnet


















The above donation button links to a PayPal account established by Marie Lindor's family for people who may wish to make financial contributions to Ms. Lindor's legal defense in UMG v. Lindor. Contributions are not tax deductible.



Keywords: digital copyright online law legal download upload peer to peer p2p file sharing filesharing music movies indie independent label freeculture creative commons pop/rock artists riaa independent mp3 cd favorite songs

9 comments:

StephenH said...

I wonder if that data is still around or has been purged.

Unknown said...

Unless there is something really subtle here that is esacaping me, can you say 'Fishing expedition of monstrous proportions'!!!

Alter_Fritz said...

If *this* isn't an invasion of privacy, I really don't know what one is!
What the hell needs "RIAA-Richard" the complete emails from Mrs. Lindor for 7 month for?

I thought to remember that the "well-known and respected record companies" accuse her of using an "online media distribution system" and not that she has send/recieved songs via email.
And wasn't there just a short time ago this important ruling that emails are protected speech?

This is outrageous!!

Jadeic said...

It seems we are back to the 'if we can't come up with any evidence we sure as hell will find somebody somewhere that will incriminate you' ploy.

Shane said...

They want logs and records from three years ago!! I don't know Verizon's log retention policies, but I doubt they maintain logs for that long as the cost of the overhead would be quite a bit.

Jadeic said...

It may be that in the original subpoena served on Verizon 'some four years' ago there was a requirement to retain logs for just such an event. Extensive though the documents are on the UMG v Lindor case I can't spot anything in Ray's archive that far back. Whatever - Verizon's response is going to be interesting...

mhoyes62 said...

Looking at this, I have the following comments:

1. okay....this one doesn't seem necesary as I doubt there is anything in the acceptable use that mentions downloading information.

2. You are going to be lucky to have the logs from that long ago. Second, unless the service is metered, there won't be any records of traffic from a specific ip address. There is no way of determining any of the MAC addresses except for the router.

3. What use is the billing records other than for proof of having internet access, which doesn't even approch the level of proving copying of songs.

4. Apart from the modem/cable modem installation, Verizon would have none of this information. They especially would not have any information on P2P software unless they installed it on the pc.

5. Except for e-mails to and from Verizon, they should not even have any records. This is also a massive invasion of privacy. What do they think, that she used e-mails and surveys to pick music to purportedly download?

6. appears to be a duplicate of 1, and again, makes no sense.

7. again, is a duplicate of 1 and 6, and apart from confirm her as a subscriber, has no bearing on the issue at hand. I am sure there are several hundred thousand people in the verizon network at the times in quesiton that were subscribers.

8. they should already have this, but okay...

9. maybe looking for a smoking gun? Such as a letter from Ms Lindor saying to hide the information?


Overall, the Subpoena appears to be trying to say that Ms Lindor had internet service during said months. This doesn't address any of the problems with the original suit such as showing that the computer in Ms Lindors posession was the one connecting to the account, assuming it even shows up.

Since Verizon is not a part of the suit and they provided the information originally requested, do they still have a duty to not purge any information related to Ms Lindor? I could see them keeping what was originally requested, but I'm not so sure about all this additional information. It would be very difficult to keep just her information.

Additionally, they should have to provide the time information for each log server that is being queried from the time in question. We have gone through many time changes, I am sure there have also been equipment changes, so any time stamps would be suspect. That is what makes forensic determination of computer records so difficult. The chips used in computers are not precise, and over time, the clocks tend to drift. Additionally, power fluctuations, personal, and general outside influences can effect the clocks. I have seen servers wind up being minutes to months off. So you still have the issue of confirming what PC was actually using the service that was "detected" by Media Sentry. Oh yes, you also need the timing information of MediaSentry's computers at the time of the detection, for the same reason.

Question, did Ms Lindor have dial up or broadband? If dial up, you could look at the sizes of the files in question and make a rough guess of how long such a download would take.

Also, how does MediaSentry know that the IP address reported by their version of KaZaA was not influenced by someone running a non-standard version of the software? They claim that their version is the standard one downloaded from the service, but that doesn't prevent people from hacking the protocol and present false information to the clients. If it is like some of the P2P software I have looked at (from the standpoint of blocking for company firewalls), the network structure tends to be a tree, with nodes communicating with higher branches that control what the nodes see. I am not an expert on the Kazaa network, as I don't use windows, but I would imagine, based on my experience, that it would be fairly easy to falsify records to make it look like the information is from one PC when in reality it is from another, and with a finite list of IP address, it would be concivable that an address was being used that was someone elses.

Just some thoughts,
Michael

Unknown said...

No ISP keeps broadband connection data records beyond 6 months, period. Comcast is the only ISP that keeps records for this long. They do so voluntarily. That came about because federal law enforcement was unable to effectively pursue a pedophile case a little over a year ago. For the past year or so, congress has been beating the bush, threatening to introduce legislation to require ISPs to increase their data record retention time. However, internet providers are universally opposed to such legislation. Currently, they are only required to keep data records of this type for 90 days under the 1996 Electronic Communication Transactional Records Act.

Any records not specifically requested by the RIAA at the time of the original subpoena will be gone.

Oh well, too bad for them.

AMD FanBoi said...

In the past Verizon led the fight to not turn over anything without a valid court order. Once hopes they still have backbone to stand up against the unwarranted parts of this harassment.

As has been pointed out, there is another recent case where it was ruled that the Government DID NOT have the unlimited right to subpoena e-mails, at least in private. Do look that one up.

My question here is, how can Ms. Lindor fight the unreasonable, if not unConstitutional, aspects of this subpoena, since it's directed to Verizon? Especially the e-mail demand? They have NO RIGHT to that at all.

As for the MAC address part, that shouldn't identify any computer. It would only identify the broadband (cable or DSL) modem used. Internet connects to modem, and modem connects to computer, or router. In dial-up, the modem is in the computer, but in broadband it's an entirely separate box with it's own MAC address, which can then connect to single, or multiple computers, each of which have their own MAC addresses that are not seen by the Internet. And modem MAC addresses can be changed.

In short, Ray, whatever any remaining Verizon logs may say about a MAC address, a proper expert (talk to the EFF) should be able to demolish on the stand about identifying any specific computer through them.

This, btw, makes the RIAA demands for information even more useless -- and outrageous! It's like saying that because filesharing was alleged to be done over a telephone line, that the RIAA now has a RIGHT to ALL telephone calls made, and the contents of all calls. I'm sure that would never stand up in court!