Email from my ISP reporting copryright abuse...

[phoenix6]

So I got this from charter today.... Its kinda freaking me out a little.. Can anyone lend a hand in helping me worry about this or not.

Dear Internet Access Subscriber:

Charter Communications ("Charter") has been notified by a copyright owner that your Internet account has been involved in the exchange of unauthorized copies of copyrighted material (music, movies, or software). We are enclosing a copy of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) notice that Charter received from the copyright holder.

It is possible that this activity has occurred without your permission or knowledge by an unauthorized user, a minor who may not fully understand the copyright laws, or even as a result of a computer virus. However, as a Charter Internet account owner, you can be held liable for this activity.

As a personal computer owner and a user of the Internet, we ask that you be aware of the following: Violations of federal Copyright law can result in civil and/or criminal liability, including payment of monetary damages, costs and attorneys' fees to the copyright owner. See 17 U.S.C. §§ 504-506. In addition, Charter's Acceptable Use Policy explicitly prohibits copyright infringement by Charter High-Speed Internet users. Specifically, Section 3 states:

NO COPYRIGHT OR TRADEMARK INFRINGEMENT
Customer will not use, or allow others to use, the Service to send or receive, or otherwise use any information which infringes the patents, trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets or proprietary rights of any other person or entity. This includes, but is not limited to, digitization of music, movies, photographs or other copyrighted materials or software. Customer must obtain appropriate authorization from such other person or entity prior to sending, receiving or using such materials. Customer represents and warrants that Customer is the author and copyright owner and/or authorized licensee with respect to any hosted content and Customer further represents and warrants that no hosted content violates the trademark, copyright, domain name or intellectual property rights of any third party. Charter assumes no responsibility, and Customer assumes all risks regarding the determination of whether material is in the public domain, or may otherwise be used for such purposes.

Charter is registered under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 (DMCA). Under the DMCA, copyright owners have the right to notify Charter if they believe that a Charter customer has infringed the copyright owner’s work(s). If Charter receives a notice from a copyright owner alleging any Customer has committed copyright infringement, Charter will notify the Customer of the alleged infringement. Charter may determine that Customer is a repeat copyright infringer if Charter learns that Customer has engaged in online copyright infringement on more than one occasion. Charter reserves the right to suspend or terminate the accounts of repeat copyright infringers.

We ask that you take immediate action to remove the infringing material from your computer and stop its exchange. If Charter continues to receive DMCA notices regarding your account, or if you violate any other clause of Charter's Acceptable Use Policy, we will have no choice but to terminate your account. You may view Charter's rules and policies at http://www.charter.com/site/policies.aspx.

If you need assistance in removing the referenced infringing material, please refer to the Security Center at http://www.charter.com.

If you have any questions about this matter, please contact us at 1-866-229-7286. Representatives will be available to take your call Monday through Friday 8am - 8pm, and Saturday and Sunday 8am - 5pm (CST).

Sincerely,

Charter High-Speed Internet Security Team
http://security.charter.com

--- The following material was provided to us as evidence ---


[Part 0 (plain text)]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Re: Unauthorized Use of NBC Universal Properties
Notice ID: 14-16861862
7 Jul 2008 16:58:57 GMT

Dear Sir or Madam:

Please be advised that NBC Universal and/or its subsidiary and affiliated companies (collectively, NBC Universal) are the owners of exclusive rights protected under copyright law and other intellectual property rights in many motion pictures and television programs, including the title(s) listed below (the NBC Universal Properties). NBC Universal diligently enforces its rights in its motion pictures.

It has come to our attention that Charter Communications is the service provider for the IP address listed below, from which unauthorized copying and distribution (downloading, uploading, file serving, file "swapping" or other similar activities) of the NBC Universal Property or Properties listed below, or portion(s) thereof, is taking place. We believe that the Internet access of the user engaging in this infringement is provided by Charter Communications or a downstream service provider who purchases this connectivity from Charter Communications.

This unauthorized copying and distribution constitutes copyright infringement under Section 106 of the U.S. Copyright Act. Depending upon the type of service Charter Communications is providing to this IP address, it may have legal and/or equitable liability if it does not expeditiously remove or disable access to the motion picture(s) listed below, or if it fails to implement a policy that provides for termination of subscribers who are repeat infringers (see 17 U.S.C. 512).

Despite the above, NBC Universal believes that the entire Internet community benefits when these matters are resolved cooperatively. We urge you to take immediate action to stop this infringing activity and inform us of the results of your actions. We appreciate your efforts toward this common goal.

The undersigned has a good faith belief that use of the NBC Universal Property or Properties in the manner described herein is not authorized by NBC Universal, its agent or the law. The information contained in this notification is accurate. Under penalty of perjury, the undersigned is authorized to act on behalf of NBC Universal with respect to this matter.

Please be advised that this letter is not intended to be a complete statement of the facts or law as they may pertain to this matter or of NBC Universal's positions, rights or remedies, legal or equitable, all of which are specifically reserved.

Please send us a prompt response indicating the actions you have taken to resolve this matter, making sure to reference the Notice ID number above in your response.

mailto:X?subject=RE%3A%20DMCA%20Notification%20Notice%20ID%3A%2014%2D16861862

If you do not wish to reply by email, please use our Web Interface by clicking on the following link:

http://webreply.baytsp.com/webreply...=14&commhash=5722a47aa96f057f9d1dc4d13079f07d

Note: If your email program has inserted line breaks into either the email or web links above, you can copy and paste the entire link in to you email program, or favorite web browser, respectively.


Very truly yours,


Mark Ishikawa
c/o NBC Universal Anti-Piracy Technical Operations
100 Universal City Plaza
Universal City, CA 91608

tel. (818) 777-4876
fax (818) 866-2026
X


*pgp public key is available on the key server at ldap://keyserver.pgp.com
** For any correspondence regarding this case, please send your emails to X and refer to Notice ID: 14-16861862. If you need immediate assistance or if you have general questions please call the number listed above.
Title: Wanted
Infringement Source: BitTorrent
Initial Infringement Timestamp: 4 Jul 2008 22:45:52 GMT
Recent Infringement Timestamp: 4 Jul 2008 22:45:52 GMT
Infringing Filename: Wanted_CAM_Eng_2008.wmv
Infringing File size: 698749261
Infringers IP Address: 68.184.150.25
Infringers DNS Name: 68-184-150-25.dhcp.stbr.ga.charter.com
Infringing URL: http://tracker.lthepiratebay.info/announce.php


- ---Start ACNS XML
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="iso-8859-1"?>

<Infringement xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xsi:noNamespaceSchemaLocation="http://mpto.unistudios.com/xml/Infringement_schema.xsd">
<Case>
<ID>16861862</ID>
<Status>Open</Status>
</Case>
<Complainant>
<Entity>BayTSP, Inc.</Entity>
<Contact>Mark M. Ishikawa, c/o NBC Universal Anti-Piracy Technical Operations</Contact>
<Address>100 Universal City Plaza, Universal City, California 91608 United States of America</Address>
<Phone>818-777-4876,818-866-2026</Phone>
<Email>X</Email>
</Complainant>
<Service_Provider>
<Entity>Charter Communications</Entity>
<Address></Address>
<Email>X</Email>
</Service_Provider>
<Source>
<TimeStamp>2008-07-04T22:45:52.000Z</TimeStamp>
<IP_Address>68.184.150.25</IP_Address>
<Port></Port>
<DNS_Name>68-184-150-25.dhcp.stbr.ga.charter.com</DNS_Name>
<Type>BitTorrent</Type>
<UserName></UserName>
<Number_Files>1</Number_Files>
<Deja_Vu>No</Deja_Vu>
</Source>
<Content>
<Item>
<Title>Wanted</Title>
<FileName>Wanted_CAM_Eng_2008.wmv</FileName>
<FileSize>698749261</FileSize>
<URL>http://tracker.lthepiratebay.info/announce.php</URL>
</Item>
</Content>
</Infringement>
- ---End ACNS XML
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Version: 8.0

iD8DBQFIckxAvmTY1IeHkqERAlbNAKDQQROaV+hIEyOYrX5TlNKw+aBU6ACfVFSG
WHMDbTdzZuTgce97eRow08c=
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:3d_frown:

 

[PROJECT N00b]

Do you know what that file is that they are talking about? It pretty much says that they caught something illegal going on on your computer and since you are the person with the account with the company you are responsible. If the holders of the copyrights decide to do something then you'll be in trouble. That letter is just showing Charter that the copyright holders found an "illegal" file transfer taking place and Charter sent it to you.

 

[Fuzz420]

Piratebay is pretty legit. I say the torrent was tainted or that is a fake piratebay tracker.

The safest means of downloading bittorents are through private sites. Pm me and ill tell you which one i use.

 

[Fuzz420]

Do you know what that file is that they are talking about? It pretty much says that they caught something illegal going on on your computer and since you are the person with the account with the company you are responsible. If the holders of the copyrights decide to do something then you'll be in trouble. That letter is just showing Charter that the copyright holders found an "illegal" file transfer taking place and Charter sent it to you.

you missed it above

*pgp public key is available on the key server at ldap://keyserver.pgp.com
** For any correspondence regarding this case, please send your emails to X and refer to Notice ID: 14-16861862. If you need immediate assistance or if you have general questions please call the number listed above.
Title: Wanted
Infringement Source: BitTorrent
Initial Infringement Timestamp: 4 Jul 2008 22:45:52 GMT
Recent Infringement Timestamp: 4 Jul 2008 22:45:52 GMT
Infringing Filename: Wanted_CAM_Eng_2008.wmv
Infringing File size: 698749261
Infringers IP Address: 68.184.150.25
Infringers DNS Name: 68-184-150-25.dhcp.stbr.ga.charter.com
Infringing URL: http://tracker.lthepiratebay.info/announce.php

 

[phoenix6]

Damn my roomate, he got that file and ran it, he even mentioned it asking for a license to run it... fucking idiiot.

OK so should I be worried or just let it go? I dont want to be in any trouble for my idiot roommate, I mean, does it look like I need to reply to this matter?

 

[GotTurbos?]

Yes, you need to take care of this. My sister just had to pay a little over $3000 for doing the same thing. Hopefully they take more pitty on you than they did on her.

 

[Facime]

Ruh ROH!

Ohh man, I would back up all my stuff, infect my computer hopelessly with viruses and trojans, then take it to a computer repair place and pay to have them removed making sure you get an itemized receipt for what they did. Send a copy of the invoice as an attachment in your responce...

AND PRAY they dont throw the book at you.

 

[Poodles]

this is why Charter sucks...

Whatever you do, do NOT admit to it... they can't prove much, as an IP can easily be proxied.

It's up to SC if this thread should stick around because of it's nature... but yes, I'd have do as Weezl says if you can, as there are TONS of "zombie" computers running as proxies to other people...

 

[GotTurbos?]

You might be able to fight it on the "it wasn't me" position. Unfortunately my sister was on her universities wireless which she has to log into to use, so there wasn't much argument there.

 

[flight doc89]

Got a wireless router? "I'm sorry Charter, I forgot to password my router and someone was bootlegging off my connection"

If you really worried, trash your current NIC and get a new one so that they won't have a MAC address if they happen to raid your shit.

considering they nature of the message, I wouldn't worry about it. I would delete any shit like that off my hard drive and not download anything else since you've already popped up on the radar once, go ahead and bitch out your roommate, but don't stress over it.

The letter is threatening Charter, not you. what happens next is Charter tells NBC that you have been warned, and as long as your IP doesn't pop back up on the grid I bet you'll be fine. If you/roommate/people on your connection continue to download, then Charter has to protect itself (because the letter implies legal liability, think along the lines of aiding criminal activity), either by closing your account or by passing your information off to NBC.

NBC does not know who you are right now. They are hoping that this warning will scare you to stop because (correct me if i am wrong someone, i'm no legal eagle), they will need a court order in order to obtain your private information from Charter, and that means paying a lawyer to go to court. If your IP addy continues to come up downloading illegal software, they may consider it worth the risk to take you to court.

watch your ass and do what Charter said, don't admit anything, and you are fine. Charter shouldn't send NBC without a court order forcing them to because if Charter reveals your info they are at risk for a lawsuit from you.
Go inspect your internet contract/agreement/whatever very carefully, make sure that you didn't sign away your privacy rights or anything important when you opened your account.

NOTE: I'm no expert, so take all this with a grain or two of salt

EDIT: roommate got a laptop? tell him to go download shit at the public library (or starbucks, etc) off their wireless

 

[zachm611]

dam thats crazy usually everything that i download that asks for license i dont accept it.

 

[SupraMario]

You have a PM...hope I can help.

BTW people, no more talking about this, I don't wanna see SM get the can. The MPAA and RIAA are a bunch of fuckin pricks and they have a ton of power.

 

[Poodles]

exactly why I said SC might not let this thread live...

But yes, Charter is known to be weak and not defending net neutrality...

 

[Fuzz420]

:lol: guys no need to be so paranoid. I understand your concern but the RIAA and whatever alphabet agency will not harm sm over this thread or any other like them. I know for personal fact. As an administrator of a site that has lots of links to "3rd party servers" i think you guys arent even a blip on the radar. The thread starter is simply asking "would could happen" thats no worse than some of the other threads in o.t.

back on topic good advice has been givin. Just dont admit to anything. Like has been mentioned before they dont know who you are,and they would have to supena(sp) charter to get the appropriate information. Just dont get caught downloading material again recently.

*disclaimer i am in know way endorsing illegally downloading copy written material on the internet. I am however suggesting that every user know the limitations and bounds of select agencies so users can better protect themselves against "fraud"*

 

[Brewster]

you're ok, just make sure you aren't seeding that file. same thing happened to me when i had charter, except they actually called me.

 

[JustAnotherVictim]

Grab some lube just in case.