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Topic: WTF!!?? heavy handed police tactics in Germany??? Return to archive
07-18-03 08:26 PM
mac_daddy saw this in my rollingstonesboots digest this morning:
_____
Taken from "highwire":

Bei Hausbesuchen in Deutschland (auch bei Highwire-Mitgliedern!)
wurden heute nicht nur CDs, CD-Rs etc, zur Schredderung eingesammelt, sondern auch PCs mit sämtlichen (!) Daten beschlagnahmt.
(For our other members : In Germany, police is doing house searches and taking CD's, CDr's and PC's away)...
_____

the responses:

"I don't think those searches are aleatory, they must be done to people suspect of piracy, which isn't what we do."

"i agree, we doesnt do piracy or at least i dont support piracy, we have our original recordings..."

"A couple of Spanish traders wrote to state that perhaps the German police home intrusions are limited to those they suspect of piracy. These traders then suggested that our German traders need not worry, since we are not pirating here. Folks, to others, we are guilty of piracy. It's that simple. Law enforcement and the record companies, in their fervor, will not stop to make the distincton between those who circulate live recordings for their own pleasure from those who circulate live recordings for money. They should, but they likely won't. Just at look at the level of seriousness and zeal with which German police are executing their authority: they are going into the homes of citizens! This is not normal behavior! The mentality of those who are behind all of this is "act now and ask later". This is even more serious and intrusive than what the Belgian authorities were doing last year (opening mail packages). I think you do need to be careful, German traders."

_____

is this actually happening?
are there any Germans on this board who can confirm/elaborate on this?
could somebody translate?

this type of thing could happen in the States, too...
07-18-03 09:00 PM
AnitaX RIAA floods U.S. District Court with file-sharing subpoenas

By Ted Bridis
July 18, 2003 | WASHINGTON (AP) --

The music industry has issued at least 871 federal subpoenas against
computer users this month suspected of illegally sharing music files on the
Internet, with roughly 75 new subpoenas being approved each day, U.S. court
officials said Friday.

The effort represents early steps in the music industry's contentious plan
to file civil lawsuits aimed at crippling online piracy.

Subpoenas reviewed by The Associated Press show the industry compelling some
of the largest Internet providers, such as Verizon Communications Inc. and
Comcast Cable Communications Inc., and some universities to provide names
and mailing addresses for users on their networks known online by nicknames
such as "fox3j," "soccerdog33," "clover77" or "indepunk74."

The Recording Industry Association of America has said it expects to file at
least several hundred lawsuits seeking financial damages within the next
eight weeks. U.S. copyright laws allow for damages of $750 to $150,000 for
each song offered illegally on a person's computer, but the RIAA has said it
would be open to settlement proposals from defendants. [give us money or
we'll sue you...how is this not blackmail?]

The campaign comes just weeks after U.S. appeals court rulings requiring
Internet providers to readily identify subscribers suspected of illegally
sharing music and movie files. The 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act
permits music companies to force Internet providers to turn over the names
of suspected music pirates upon subpoena from any U.S. District Court
clerk's office, without a judge's signature required.

In some cases, subpoenas cite as few as five songs as "representative
recordings" of music files available for downloading from these users. The
trade group for the largest music labels, the Washington-based RIAA,
previously indicated its lawyers would target Internet users who offer
substantial collections of MP3 song files but declined to say how many songs
might qualify for a lawsuit.

"We would have to look at historic trends, but that is a very high number,"
said Alan Davidson of the Center for Democracy and Technology, a civil
liberties group that has argued against the subpoenas. "It doesn't sound
like they're just going after a few big fish."

Music fans are fighting back with technology, using new software designed
specifically to stymie monitoring of their online activities by the major
record labels.

A new version of "Kazaa Lite," free software that provides access to the
service operated by Sharman Networks Ltd., can prevent anyone from listing
all music files on an individual's machine and purports to block scans from
Internet addresses believed to be associated with the RIAA.

Many of the subpoenas reviewed by the AP identified songs from the same few
artists, including Avril Lavigne, Snoop Dogg and Michael Jackson. It was
impossible to determine whether industry lawyers were searching the Internet
specifically for songs by these artists or whether they were commonly
popular among the roughly 60 million users of file-sharing services.

The RIAA's subpoenas are so prolific that the U.S. District Court in
Washington, already suffering staff shortages, has been forced to reassign
employees from elsewhere in the clerk's office to help process paperwork,
said Angela Caesar-Mobley, the clerk's operations manager. [your tax dollars
at work!]

The RIAA declined to comment on the numbers of subpoenas it issued.

"We are identifying substantial infringers and we're going to whatever
entity is providing (Internet) service for that potential infringer," said
Matt Oppenheim, the group's senior vice president of business and legal
affairs. "From there we'll be in a position to begin bringing lawsuits."

A spokeswoman for the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts said the
clerk's office here was "functioning more like a clearing house, issuing
subpoenas for all over the country." Any civil lawsuits would likely be
transferred to a different jurisdiction, spokeswoman Karen Redmond said.

Verizon, which has fought the RIAA over the subpoenas with continued legal
appeals, said it received at least 150 subpoenas during the last two weeks.
There were no subpoenas on file sent to AOL Time Warner Inc., the nation's
largest Internet provider and also parent company of Warner Music
Group.[!!!] Earthlink Inc., another of the largest Internet providers, said
it has received only three new subpoenas.

Depaul University in Chicago was among the few colleges that received such
subpoenas; the RIAA asked Depaul on July 2 to track down a user known as
"anon39023" who was allegedly offering at least eight songs. The recording
group sent two subpoenas to Boston College to identify "TheLastReal7" and
"Prtythug23."

There was some evidence the threat of an expensive lawsuit was discouraging
online music sharing. Nielsen NetRatings, which monitors Internet usage,
earlier this week reported a decline for traffic on the Kazaa network of one
million users, with similarly large drops across other services.
07-19-03 05:52 PM
mac_daddy from subsequent post:

"There was no further information on "Highwire" but it could well be that only sellers were involved...

More than a year ago, a Swiss seller's pc and stock were confiscated by Swiss police. Now, more than a year later, Belgian customers from this seller are summoned by the Brussels district attorney. They are shown a list of boots they bought from this Swiss seller and were given two days to turn in the stuff they bought. One of my friends had to turn in more than 50 originals, including TSP's, Taranturas and VGP's)...

It is possible that German police, acting on a request from the Swiss authorities (that was also sent to the Belgian authorities), are doing more or less the same thing. Once again, I do not have further info on this matter, but if I hear something more, I will post it."