The New Copyright Alert System Will Limit Your Internet Access for Illegal Downloading
Are you still illegally downloading music and movies? You won’t have to worry about getting slapped with a hefty lawsuit anymore, but you might be forced to watch an educational video (gasp!), or worse, your Internet access might be temporarily slowed down.
The Copyright Alert System is backed heavily by major record labels and Hollywood studios and has the reluctant compliance of major Internet Service Providers (ISPs) — AT&T, Cablevision Systems, Comcast, Time Warner Cable and Verizon — and the support of the Obama administration, and has been four years in the making. Content owners will be monitoring P2P networks for illegal downloads of their content, will track the offending user’s IP, then ask the user’s ISP to send the user a notice. Here’s what you need to know:
- the first three offenses will result in simple notifications with no consequences
- subsequent offenses may result in the user having to watch an educational video (gasp!) about copyright infringement and/or acknowledge receipt of the notification
- “six strikes and you’re out” — after the sixth notice, your ISP could slow down your Internet access temporarily
- the Copyright Alert System only monitors P2P services (torrent trackers)
- personal information is not shared with content owners sue you will not be sued
On one hand, it’s hard not to view the CAS as a positive development against piracy. In comparison to the draconian and ultimately unsuccessful measures the content industry has employed in the past — namely lawsuits — the CAS is much more progressive and seems to acknowledge the truth that you can’t truly stop the problem without limiting the freedom of the Internet, but you can discourage it. I suppose it’s possible that some people don’t know downloading from P2P services is illegal and the educational video (gasp!) will alert them to its evils… but I kinda doubt it. However, the threat of slower Internet at home could certainly turn off a few potential piraters.
On the other hand, this system has two serious flaws: 1) it threatens to unfairly penalize networks where multiple people access the Internet from the same IP — i.e. coffee shops, offices, shared home Internet networks, etc — and in those cases punishes everyone for the bad behavior of just one user. 2) It only applies to P2P networks (torrents) and won’t do anything to stop piracy via email, IM, Dropbox, Rapidshare, Sendspace, hard drive swapping, etc, etc etc. — the game of whack-a-mole will continue as pirates simply look elsewhere from P2P to conduct their trade.
Here’s an educational video (gasp!) explaining how the CAS works:
[via Wired]
