Main Area and Open Discussion > Living Room
Prenda Law shall troll no more.
40hz:
Did anybody stop to wonder where they originally got the IP addresses of the people they extorted?
-app103 (April 04, 2013, 10:48 AM)
--- End quote ---
Yes. And it was this same federal district judge by the name of Otis Wright - who basically called BS on the core approach Prenda Law was taking.
In his Order to Show Cause ruling back in December of 2012 he openly challenged the use and veracity of nothing more than an IP address when filing a lawsuit such as this one. He also noted the potential for harm and coercion if it were allowed to go forward.
The Court is concerned with the potential for discovery abuse in cases like this. Ingenuity 133 accuses the Doe Defendant of illegally copying a pornographic video. But the only information Ingenuity 13 has is the IP address of the Doe Defendant. An IP address alone may yield subscriber information. But that will only lead to the person paying for the internet service and not necessarily the actual infringer, who may be a family member, roommate, employee, customer, guest, or even a complete stranger. Malibu Media LLC v. John Does 1–10, No. 2:12-cv-01642-RGK-SSx, slip op. at 4 (C.D. Cal. Oct. 10, 2012). And given the subject matter of Ingenuity 13’s accusations and the economics of defending such a lawsuit, it is highly likely that the subscriber would immediately pay a settlement demand—regardless whether the subscriber is the actual infringer. This Court has a duty to protect the innocent citizens of this district from this sort of legal shakedown, even though a copyright holder’s rights may be infringed by a few deviants. And unlike law enforcement in child pornography or other internet crime cases, the Court has no guarantee from a private party that subscriber information will not abused or that it would be used for the benefit of the public. Thus, when viewed with the public interest in mind, the Court is reluctant to allow any fishing-expedition discovery when all a plaintiff has is an IP address—the burden is on the plaintiff to find other ways to more precisely identify the accused infringer without causing collateral damage.
Thus, the Court hereby ORDERS Ingenuity 13 TO SHOW CAUSE in writing by December 31, 2012, why early discovery is warranted in this situation. No appearances are necessary. Under Ninth Circuit precedent, a plaintiff should ordinarily be allowed discovery to uncover their identities, but discovery may be denied if it is (1) clear that discovery would not uncover the identities, or (2) that the complaint would be dismissed on other grounds. Gillespie v. Civiletti, 629 F.2d 637, 642 (9th Cir. 1980). Ingenuity 13 must demonstrate to the Court, in light of the Court’s above discussion, how it would proceed to uncover the identity of the actual infringer once it has obtained subscriber information—given that the actual infringer may be a person entirely unrelated to the subscriber—while also considering how to minimize harassment and embarrassment of innocent citizens. Ingenuity 13 must also explain how it can guarantee to the Court that any such subscriber information would not be used to simply coerce a settlement from the subscriber (the easy route), as opposed to finding out who the true infringer is (the hard route).
--- End quote ---
I am really starting to like this judge.
Otis D. Wright II may be the person who finally gets this nonsense sorted out once and for all. :Thmbsup:
wraith808:
The sad part? Everything that he says is simple common sense. :-\
app103:
OK, but that still assumes they got the IP addresses from an actual investigation into copyright infringement, from instances of file sharing and not acquired through the logs of activity unrelated to file sharing or copyright infringement.
It takes into account that multiple people could have had access to an IP to use it for file sharing and questions the method they will use to find the correct person that had access to it and did the infringing.
It does not question the method used to even come up with an IP, in the first place. It does not ask them to prove an IP was involved in file sharing. It still just takes their word for it.
They still could have come from access logs related to a website on menopause or prostate cancer.
40hz:
It does not question the method used to even come up with an IP, in the first place. It does not ask them to prove an IP was involved in file sharing. It still just takes their word for it.
-app103 (April 04, 2013, 03:56 PM)
--- End quote ---
That's not what I'm reading.
The process of legal discovery and the rules of evidence are complex and I'm definitely not the best qualified person to try to discuss them. But from what I think I understand about how it works, our court system (in the absence of unimpeachable eyewitnesses to an act) relies on a preponderance of evidence to establish the proof of a claim.
So what the court seems to be saying is that an IP address alone is not (in the court's opinion) sufficient evidence in and of itself to proceed with an intrusive discovery process.
I think the judge (quite correctly) has left the door open that an IP address could be admissible as corroborating evidence once something more reliable has been used to identify an alleged perpetrator.
It's like saying just having an IP address isn't sufficient evidence to accuse somebody of something. But if you were able to ID the person through a more direct, specific, and reliable forensic - then the fact you could also show a link to the person via an IP address (which points to the accused's location at the time of the violation) would likely be acceptable and admissible as evidence at that point because it adds to the preponderance of evidence proving guilt.
Really not that different from using a credit card purchase to show the accused was in the general vicinity of the crime which they were being accused of despite their assertions they were 200 miles away at the time of the crime.
But by the same token, that's supporting evidence. Just combing through all the credit card transactions for twenty-four hours before and after a crime had been committed - and then cross matching them to anybody with a prior criminal record - wouldn't be enough to get a most judges to issue 50 warrants "just in case."
And John Doe warrants have never been very popular with most judges since they're ripe for abuse. About the only time I've ever heard of JD warrants being issued is for unnamed accomplices after one or more named warrants had also been issued. Like when a robbery takes place, and the witnesses say there were four gunman. If one or two suspects had been ID'd by a camera or another witness, a warrant would likely be issued for those individuals along with JD warrants for the remaining number since there isn't anything to attach a name to other than the fact the accused obviously had help.
So no, I don't think Wright erred in not slamming the door on using any IP address as evidence. But I do think he was correct in saying you needed more than just that to ask the court to force an ISP to disclose the identities of subscribers associated with those addresses. Primarily because there isn't enough of a direct link to justify something that intrusive and potentially damaging to the reputations of those who might accused.
He's basically saying "I need something a lot better than that. Bring me a name first. Then I'll consider having the ISP say whether or not there's a match to that specific name with one of the IP addresses you've furnished."
I think that's a good and very reasonable call on the judge's part. :)
app103:
It's still too easy to fake it all, frame someone, then go after them, threaten to sue them, extort money from them. And I won't go into the details of how, lest some greedy lawyer or rep from one of the **AAs come across my post and get some bright idea of trying it.
Send me a PM if you really want to know how....I could give you a step-by-step how-to that would be quite easy to do and might make you wish you were an evil lawyer, when I am done.
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version