New Revenue Model For Low Budget Films: Lawsuits 162
conspirator23 writes "A 64-year-old retired English teacher is being sued by a copyright troll for illegal BitTorrent downloading of a motion picture. Perhaps it's not all that shocking in the current era. That is, until we learn that rather than protecting something like Game of Thrones, the plaintiff is accusing Emily Orlando of Estacada, Oregon of downloading Maximum Conviction, a direct-to-video action flick released earlier this year starring Steven Segal and ex-WWE wrestler Steve Austin. Voltage Pictures is demanding $7500 from Emily and 370 other defendants. If all the defendants were to pay the demands, Voltage would gross over $2.75 million, minus legal fees. Who needs Kickstarter?"
As you might expect, Mrs. Orlando had never heard of BitTorrent before receiving the legal threat, and she lives in an area with dynamic IP assignments. This is the same company who has been going after file-sharers by the thousands since 2010.
OK already (Score:5, Funny)
EA is only the second worst company.
Hurt Locker? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Hurt Locker? (Score:5, Informative)
This company (from TFA) *is* the maker of The Hurt Locker.
TFA (Score:3)
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OK, the company from TFS is the maker of The Hurt Locker. Their name, Voltage Pictures, is right in the summary, hence why Slashdot's "related articles" mentions their Hurtlocker lawsuits.
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It was not a financial success because, interestingly, people in the US thought it was a commie propaganda movie, while people outside the US found it to be something for and about trigger-happy rednecks. The critics said "exactly" and declared it a masterpiece.
Re:Hurt Locker? (Score:4, Funny)
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English is not my first language, so can you please explain what the title "The Hurt Locker" actually means?
BTW, I kinda liked the movie. Wasn't the best, but pretty entertaining.
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English is not my first language, so can you please explain what the title "The Hurt Locker" actually means?
BTW, I kinda liked the movie. Wasn't the best, but pretty entertaining.
English is my first language (and my second - I emigrated from England to NZ) and I didn't know what 'The Hurt Locker' meant. I know now - 2 hours of my life and a DVD rental fee wasted. Now, 'Redacted' ... that was a good movie ....
Re:Hurt Locker? (Score:5, Funny)
Now, 'Redacted' ... that was a good movie ....
Come now. Don't be coy. Tell us what the name of the movie was. There's no need to censor it.
Re:Hurt Locker? (Score:4, Interesting)
Odd, I'm Australian and found it to be more of a character study. It certainly didn't glorify war but also doesn't criticise the U.S. involvement. In fact I was left wondering how someone who chose to be with James Cameron could demonstrate such subtlety.
Coincidentally a few weeks ago I read a review of it in a Balinese newspaper, I think for expats. The English, or translation, was quite rough, but they did indeed slam it as pro-American propaganda.
Re:Hurt Locker? (Score:4, Informative)
It was not a financial success because, interestingly, people in the US thought it was a commie propaganda movie
Nothing surprises me any longer about a country that could elect Ronald Regan and George W Bush as heads of State.
Re:Hurt Locker? (Score:5, Funny)
Hurt locker was also a huge turd. It beggars belief how it could win anything at the oscars, perhaps excepting the oscar for the biggest piece of contrived shit of the year.
I thought that's what the Oscars(TM) are.
* Biggest piece of contrived shit of the year.
* Biggest leading male piece of contrived shit of the year.
* Biggest leading female piece of contrived shit of the year.
* Biggest piece of contrived shit costumes of the year.
And so on. All awarded at the biggest piece of contrived shit awards ceremony of the year. But maybe I'm thinking of some other awards show.
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You are correct sir. I would feel otherwise about the Oscars had Beasts of the Southern Wild won some awards this year.
It was the best picture of the year, and it had the best actress of the year (even though she was 5/6 years old during filming).
The Oscars are a circle-jerk at this point, awarding themselves awards for awarding themselves awards.
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Makes sense (Score:2)
Hmmm.. (Score:5, Interesting)
Get a lawyer. Countersue for $100,000 for the complainant filing false affidavits with the court. When they try to toss out the claims, say you will settle for $10,000 plus legal fees, otherwise it's off to fucking court.
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Get a lawyer. Countersue for $100,000 for the complainant filing false affidavits with the court. When they try to toss out the claims, say you will settle for $10,000 plus legal fees, otherwise it's off to fucking court.
And then they countersue you for filing a false complaint for $100k in damages, which is significantly easier to over false. At best, the court throws out both your and their claims, but more likely, you're paying their attorney's fees for responding to your stupid countersuit.
If someone is filing false affidavits, notify the court and let the DA get involved. Don't file a false damages claim in response.
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But I rather give up the money and instead have the bar throw their asses out. Better yet, demand jail time for inflicting paper terrorism.
Paper terrorism? You better go for the money, it's much, much more likely than getting thrown out of the bar. Also, please hire a lawyer if you ever get near a court. Or don't, and then tell us the story on Slashdot of what happen.
Comment removed (Score:4, Interesting)
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[mumbles something about 4 boxes] since soap ballot and jury ain't working, i think we all know whats left
Nuking them from orbit? Perhaps a bit harsh.
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[mumbles something about 4 boxes] since soap ballot and jury ain't working, i think we all know whats left
Nuking them from orbit? Perhaps a bit harsh.
Fine, nuke them from the ground.
So Simple... (Score:5, Insightful)
Convince a good lawyer to take this as a class action. Sue for court costs, his own legal fees and emotional damages. I can't imagine jury anywhere on the planet that wouldn't give the win to the little old lady. Use this as a model for said trolls and when it becomes clear that we are hoisting these parasites on their own petards, perhaps they'll go away!
Re:So Simple... (Score:5, Funny)
2: Get little old lady to do something illegal, causing lawsuit by other party
3: Counter-sue, win damages awarded by sympathetic jury
4: Profit!!
or maybe the simpler version
1: Become little old lady
2: Profit!
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by Kittenman (971447)
or maybe the simpler version
1: Become little old lady
2: Profit!
You have a strange definition of "simpler" my friend
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Re:So Simple... (Score:4, Funny)
Convince a good lawyer to take this as a class action.
Sorry. Class actions were deleted from your list of acceptable legal remediations by the US Supreme Court after determining that it gave individuals too much power over corporations. Please submit to binding arbitration instead, Citizen.
Sue for court costs, his own legal fees and emotional damages.
Emotional damages? "Your honor, I couldn't sleep. I couldn't work. The idea that someone could accuse me of downloading something on the internet was just so shocking. I couldn't even go out in public, out of fear others might view me as... as a (breaks down sobbing) downloader."
I can't imagine jury anywhere on the planet that wouldn't give the win to the little old lady.
Your imagination sucks [arstechnica.com].
Use this as a model for said trolls and when it becomes clear that we are hoisting these parasites on their own petards, perhaps they'll go away!
You there, troll! Go away. There. I've just rid the internet of one of its most hated archetypes. I'm gonna step out now for a bit of tea. I expect we'll see no more of those people now that the smack down has been given.
Preexisting business relationship (Score:2)
Please submit to binding arbitration instead, Citizen.
I was under the impression that binding arbitration requirements could apply only as part of a preexisting contractual relationship between the parties. As I understand it, the recipients of these scattershot demand letters are receiving them precisely because they have no contract with the copyright owner.
Re:Preexisting business relationship (Score:4, Interesting)
Find me a case where one of these copyright demand letters was sent to binding arbitration. Go ahead, I'll wait.
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Find me a case where one of these copyright demand letters was sent to binding arbitration. Go ahead, I'll wait.
And if I could make you wait until you dropped over dead, I'd do it, for being a pentulant little bastard. But a cursory google will quickly show I am right, and you are annoying. Good day, sir.
I am an IP attorney (though not your IP attorney) and with all due respect, he, not you, is correct.
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I was under the impression that binding arbitration requirements could apply only as part of a preexisting contractual relationship between the parties.
The use of a copyrighted work creates a contract. Ta-da.
Except that the countersuit would be based on the claim that there was no use of the copyrighted work, hence no contract, hence no requirement for binding arbitration.
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Yes, emotional distress. These people she's never heard of who made a movie she never heard of are demanding a significant chunk of her food and rent money (which they will, with little doubt spend on hookers and blow) claiming she used some computer program she's never heard of. The only way to avoid it is to risk even more of her very limited food and rent money on a spin of the big wheel in court. If she loses, she'll be eating fried dog food.
You don't think that might be a little distressing?
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You don't think that might be a little distressing?
The law doesn't award emotional damages on the basis of a person's fears about the legal process. They award it based on the damage to reputation, etc., as a result of the false accusation. So all that worry over what will happen? It's worth zero dollars.
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It doesn't award for distress over a legitimate legal process. In this case, it looks like the legal process is simply a threat used for extortion rather than any legitimate attempt to address a harm done to them. It could matter.
Re:So Simple... (Score:4, Funny)
A good lawyer [imgur.com]??
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Beats the hell out of waiting for a youtube video to load. Besides, the patent ran out on gifs. We can use them without being sued.
At least, until DisneyCorp buys the IP behind GIFs, and by extension, animated GIFs...
Can't wait for there to be case law (Score:2)
Re:Can't wait for there to be case law (Score:5, Funny)
Oooo! Oooo! Me... I'll shoot a lobbyist! We should declare a season... find someone who'll stuff and mount them for our living rooms!!! Why yes, I bagged this fine specimen wandering the hall right around Speaker Boehner's office. He tried to scrabble down a stairway and boom! Funny thing is he's lobbying for the NRA!
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Oooo! Oooo! Me... I'll shoot a lobbyist! We should declare a season... find someone who'll stuff and mount them for our living rooms!!! Why yes, I bagged this fine specimen wandering the hall right around Speaker Boehner's office. He tried to scrabble down a stairway and boom! Funny thing is he's lobbying for the NRA!
I see two problems with this.
Finding a taxidermist willing to deal with hazerdous materials. Lobbyists are full of bullshit. Inflicting that on a poor taxidermist could be considered cruel and unusual.
Once you clean all the bullshit out of a lobbyist, the available material to work with is measured in milligrams. Be a damned small trophy to mount...
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Maybe they are not the tough guys they are pretending to be?
Personally I see them as gutless losers that want military weapons as toys without the responsibility of joining the military and risking their lives for the flag they are always so quick to wrap themselves in.
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Yes, willing to stand up for rights but not willing to take the responsibility that comes with those rights. Sickening.
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I have yet to hear any of my friends and coworkers that are the less gun control side of the debate talk about shooting the opposition
That speaks well of your friends of coworkers, but there definitely are quite a few deranged pro-gun individuals [rawstory.com] out there.
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I don't really find this stuff threatening. The anti-gun side is notorious for being all bark and no bite. But it is just a bit odd to claim that the pro-gun side does it too without any real support for the claim.
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The video was an example, and the guy did threaten to start killing people (in the version that he has since yanked off YouTube). How much more insane do you need it to get?
And while this does not represent the majority of pro-gunners, there is certainly a vocal minority that spouts this kind of thing. I'm pro-gun myself, and I hang out at the corresponding blogs and forums, and I do see it there.
Re:Can't wait for there to be case law (Score:4, Interesting)
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Are there caliber restrictions, or can I use .410 snake shot?
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but you always have to consider whether it'll damage the pelt, if its a nice specimen you might want to have them stuffed ya know.
Gives a whole new meaning to "stuffed shirt".
Who's Steven Segal (Score:2, Funny)
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Was that the movie where the bay watch actress pops out of the giant cake and shows off her boobs?
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Baywatch: The Movie
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Shouldnt it be the other way around... (Score:5, Funny)
Please, Mr. Segal (Score:5, Funny)
Defendant: "Please Mr. Segal, we don't want any trouble..."
Segal: "Well you better save your receipt. Because you just bought some."
(neck snapping ensues)
Mad tv reference: http://youtu.be/mXx3_ykUpfY [youtu.be]
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That's the great irony. His characters would be more likely to be busting the heads of scheming lawyers and business types trying to steal little old ladies retirement money to spend on hookers and blow.
Mr. Segal has left the building (Score:2)
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Personally, I take it to be much more telling of the actual buy-in from the executives. Namely, they don't give a crap and they don't believe a single value the movies may portray.
I do hope that this suitably informs Mr. Segal's future decisions.
TI (Score:2)
In an effort of great moral restraint (Score:2, Offtopic)
I am going to refrain from comment.
Conspirator indeed (Score:2)
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While the lawsuit is silly, there is zero evidence that this was their revenue plan.
Oh really! [dslreports.com]
Probably just picking people out of the phone book (Score:2)
Because no one is going to waste bandwidth downloading some direct-to-video turd on purpose, and it's hard to believe 371 downloaded it by accident while looking for something good.
Either that or they were even cleverer than the article suggests and distributed malware that would download the movie.
Getting sued for not watching a movie (Score:2)
Life immitates a Mr. Show sketch [youtube.com]? That's never a good sign, frankly.
There are 7 billion of us... (Score:2)
You know, there are enough of us now. Perhaps its time we considered a little chlorine for the shallow end of the gene pool? Ask law graduates what they think of this case. If they say, this is a travesty against humanity, they get a pass. If instead they want to know how to get a job at this law firm, we send them to the Office of Soylent Green. Figure they'll do more good as a cheap protein source for the third world. There's a kind of poetic irony to eating those who would gladly eat their own. I wonder
Go after the company (Score:2)
Go after the company. Once anything costs this people anything they are going to stop it. They are only going to spend money when they can get more then 100% returns on the money spent.
That is what they are doing with this lawsuits today. Both patents troll and copyright trolls alike.
Emily should've (Score:2)
downloaded it from Mega.co.nz instead of torrenting it.
Downloading by itself only allows for very small damages so companies don't bother suing. It's the act of uploading that brings large damages... because they can claim you were distributing their copyrighted shit. And BT by its very nature means everyone downloading is also uploading.
Like bronzy or goldy only it's made of iron (Score:3)
2. Release the copyrighted documentary on bittorrent
3. File lawsuits against people who download it
4. Profit!!!
Why arent people suing the ISP? (Score:3)
If the ISP is wrongly identifying her MAC address as performing the download, then they are the ones who should get sued. I assume they are even using the MAC as ID.
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It being the ISP, I'd expect them to have a log of which IP was assigned to which physical connection. They know which cable runs where, and which equipment is assigned to each subscriber. And if that database has errors misidentifying a connection, that'd be easy to find out, and then to amend the court case as needed.
While it's always argued here that IP doesn't identify a person, which I think is true, it does identify a connection - that's after all the whole purpose of an IP address. And for a typical
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Maybe. You're presuming that ISPs keep accurate information regarding DHCP leases. From the article it said that her ISP "distributes IP addresses among customers as they log on and that it can't track exactly who had what number when."
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Maybe. You're presuming that ISPs keep accurate information regarding DHCP leases. From the article it said that her ISP "distributes IP addresses among customers as they log on and that it can't track exactly who had what number when."
If so, that sounds to me like a pretty strong "it wasn't me" kind of defence. Defendant also said not to know about bittorrent - haven't her computers been seized? Any bittorrent software and evidence of its use found? No? She didn't do it, case closed.
Definitely makes this sound like one of the weaker cases.
The MAC may be the router and that may not help? (Score:2)
The MAC may be the router and that may not help? any ways was it setup to defaults? did the ISP setup / give out the router? was it set to WEP??
If the router was hacked in some way and it's a ISP router with ISP setting then the ISP needs to stand up and take the blame.
Heh, What? (Score:2)
Voltage Pictures Strikes Again! (Score:5, Interesting)
I was actually one of the first unlucky few who received notice from both my ISP and Voltage Pictures informing me that I was being sued for downloading "The Hurt Locker" via bittorrent. They sent me multiple demands of increasing value in-order to have my name removed from the suit.
I talked to others who have also received similar demands, and we all took the same action, which was to ignore them. We decided that what they were doing was really nothing more than a scare-tactic, and later-on we read that the case as thrown out by a judge because the law-firm failed to submit a full listing of names by their given due-date. I have not heard anything from them since.
Apparently, this is a common practice for Voltage Pictures (and similar companies) when their business begins to fail financially.
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I've seen this exact same business model before, but in regards to parking in the UK rather than movies.
The way it works is:
- You park on privately owned land.
- The landowner contracts a third-party company to provide parking management.
- The third-party company invents a spurious reason to ticket you. (eg. "You stayed over three hours in this car park!" when parking at to the cinema to see a film that is 3 hours 15 minutes long).
- The third-party company sends you a series o
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The third-party company invents a spurious reason to ticket you. (eg. "You stayed over three hours in this car park!" when parking at to the cinema to see a film that is 3 hours 15 minutes long).
I don't think you know what "spurious" means. If you pay for three hours and stay 3:15, that's a legitimate overage. The amount "ticketed" may be excessive, but if you only are supposed to get three hours, pay more or leave before your time is up. Also, can private companies issue a ticket in the UK, or are you saying they just request that you pay more with a piece of paper?
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> I don't think you know what "spurious" means. If you pay for three hours and stay 3:15, that's a legitimate overage.
If it's a free car park and it is there for the benefit of cinemagoers, yes I'd say a 15 minute overstay when it's a particularly long film is spurious.
> Also, can private companies issue a ticket in the UK, or are you saying they just request that you pay more with a piece of paper?
Private companies cannot issue a fine.
If they have suffered a loss for which you are responsible, they c
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> I don't think you know what "spurious" means. If you pay for three hours and stay 3:15, that's a legitimate overage.
If it's a free car park and it is there for the benefit of cinemagoers, yes I'd say a 15 minute overstay when it's a particularly long film is spurious.
Spurious: Not being what it purports to be; false or fake: "spurious claims".
There is nothing false about their claim that you overstayed the three hours. As I said above, 80 pounds is certainly an excessive charge for 15 minutes of parking, but it is in no way a spurious claim. If you had parked there for 2.5 hours and the company claimed you were there for 3.25, then that would be a spurious claim.
To relate it to the main topic, $7500 is too much of a fine for the offense, but if the person did downlo
About that cat video you watched (Score:2)
This troll is stupid (Score:2)
They are sending settlement demands for $7500? Odds are, you could hire one of the thousands of hungry lawyers out there to defend the entire case on a fixed fee for $7500 (or maybe $7499).
The whole point of copyright trolling is to set the demand at just under what you think it will cost the defendant to hire a lawyer, say $3000, that way it is more cost-effective for them to just pay you.
Re:Simple #2 (Score:4, Informative)
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Re: Simple #2 (Score:2)
AC actually has a point (crazy times we're livin in)
The company knows that someone downloaded their movie. And so someone has to pay the piper. The company doesn't care if they're playing Russian Roulette and just accusing people at random. They're putting the onus on every random old lady to prove that they didn't download this tripe.
Guilty until proven innocent.
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The mouth breathers are going after IP addresses to sue from an ISP with dynamic IP hosting. What you do has nothing to do anymore with someone who wants to sue you for deeds done on an IP address that may or may not have anything to do with you on the date of the infraction. The bottom line is that they are not interested in justice, this is rape pure and simple.
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Re:Dear lawmakers (Score:5, Funny)
Guy on 127.0.0.1? That guy has the best taste in porn, music, and movies. Problem is, it's all a bunch of stuff I already have.
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He said:
"An IP address does NOT constitute unique identification."
He's right. Although a public internet facing IP address will normally uniquely identify some attached device you can't preclude the fact that some network along the way will be misconfigured to route an IP to the wrong place.
Consider the scenario where this person's ISP's DHCP server has assigned her a new IP and the logs updated as such, but a faulty or misconfigured router has cached assignment of her IP to the destination of the previous
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"An IP address does NOT constitute unique identification."
He's right. Although a public internet facing IP address will normally uniquely identify some attached device you can't preclude the fact that some network along the way will be misconfigured to route an IP to the wrong place.
He doesn't identify what is "NOT uniquely identified". As such, I pointed out that it uniquely identifies *something*, much like a license plate will uniquely identify a car it was issued to. That doesn't "prove" the car wasn't stolen, or the plates stolen off it, or that it was being driven by someone else. But it does "prove" something.
In this case who does the IP identify?
Why must it be a "who?" In some places, the owner of the Internet service is liable for the use of it, in which case it does uniquely identify the responsible party, eve
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So you are saying that the IP *DOES* uniquely identify "something" even if not a person, thus proving the original AC to be an idiot, which was my point.
The IP identifies a communication end-point on the ISP's network, but unless the ISP has allocated that as a static IP address, the allocation is done on a DNCP basis and is time-sensitive.
If you want to put this in terms of physical locations, that DHCP address is like saying that a bomb was mailed from a particular hotel room, and the hotel has given the authorities a list of the people who booked that room during the period in which the bomb might have been posted. The authorities then go and charge all
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The IP identifies a communication end-point on the ISP's network, but unless the ISP has allocated that as a static IP address, the allocation is done on a DNCP basis and is time-sensitive.
When subpoenas are issued for a DNCP address, they specify they want the "owner" at that point in time. If the ISP lies to the FBI, that's hardly the FBI's fault, is it? Which is all a distraction from my statements, that the AC is an idiot. An IP address does identify "something" even if we don't agree on what that something is.
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or example a car license plate is not a unique ID of the driver but apparently you still have to pay a ticket for running a red light with a red light camera
At least in my country/state while the registered owner of the vehicle is issued the infringement notice they can then trivially reply identifying the individual that was driving the car: i.e. hubby, little Johnny, the local mechanic etc. The fine/penalty demerit points are then applied to the driver (with some scrutiny for obvious abuses). There is always recourse to a Magistrates Court. In some cases the camera picks up the face of the driver and this is used in court.
Granny has no hope of identifying
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You in fact lied. A registration plate and a vehicle matching the details on the registration plate are required and the owner can contest the penalty if they can provide evidence of the vehicle being elsewhere at the time. In the case of the IP address, an agent acting for the copyright holders, who gets paid per claim, makes a claim of infringement against an IP address at a particular time. This in turn is sent to an ISP who then sends their internal details of the accounting relatively matching to the
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