Judge Mocks Public Interest Concerns About Kicking People Off Internet, Tells Cox It's Not Protected By The DMCA

from the that's-a-problem dept

The bigger story is O'Grady's determination that there is "no genuine issue of material fact as to whether defendants reasonably implemented a repeat-infringer policy as is required by §512(i) of the DMCA," granting a motion that Cox is not entitled to a safe harbor defense.

I read the brief. It adds absolutely nothing helpful at all. It is a combination of describing the horrors that one endures from losing the Internet for any length of time. Frankly, it sounded like my son complaining when I took his electronics away when he watched YouTube videos instead of doing homework. And it's completely hysterical.

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community. Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis. While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Judge Liam O'Grady -- the same guy who helped the US government take all of Kim Dotcom's stuff , is the judge handling the wacky Rightscorp-by-proxy lawsuit against Cox Communications. The key issue: Rightscorp, on behalf of BMG and Round Hill Music flooded Cox Communications with infringement notices, trying to shake loose IP addresses as part of its shake down. Cox wasn't very happy about cooperating, and in response BMG and Round Hill sued Cox, claiming that 512(i) of the DMCA requires ISPs to kick people off the internet if they're found to be "repeat infringers." Historically, it has long been believed that 512(i) does not apply to internet access/broadband providers like Cox, but rather to online service providers who are providing a direct servicethe internet (like YouTube or Medium or whatever). However, the RIAA and its friends have hinted for a while that they'd like a court to interpret 512(i) to apply to internet access providers, creating a defacto "three strikes and you lose all internet access" policy. Rightscorp (with help from BMG and Round Hill Music) have decided to put that to the test.This is a big, big deal. If the case goes against Cox, then it would create a massive problem for the public on the internet. Accusations of infringement could potentially lead to you totally losing access to the internet, which could really destroy people's lives, given how important the internet is for work and life these days. The details of the caselike they should favor Cox pretty easily. After all, Cox pointed out that Rightscorp only had licenses from the publishes, meaning they had no copyright in the sound recording -- yet they admitted to downloading the sound recording , suggesting that, if anything, Rightscorp was a mass infringer. On top of that there was pretty strong evidence that Rightscorp does not act in good faith in how it runs its shakedown practice, telling people that they have to take their computersto prove their innocence (really).Unfortunately, as Eriq Gardner reports, Judge O'Grady has ruled against Cox on a very key point: does its current policy grant it safe harbor under the DMCA. The judge said no, though we're still waiting for the full ruling as to why.Now, just because you're not protected by the safe harborthat you are automatically guilty of infringement. There are cases where sites have not qualified for the safe harbor and still prevailed. But it does make things more difficult and complicated, much more importantly, opens the door to lots and lots of mischief by the RIAAs and MPAAs of the world to use this to kick people off the internet entirely based on accusations of copyright infringement. That's immensely worrisome.O'Grady doesn't seem to think that kicking people off the internet is really a big deal. Earlier in the case, we've discovered, in the process of flat outan attempt by Public Knowledge and EFF to file an amicus brief, Judge O'Grady made his views clear:That's his response to two well known public interest groups explaining to him the "real world harmful effects" of Rightscorp's copyright shake-down trolling business. But he didn't want to hear any of it. Because protecting the ability of Americans to not be the subjects of extortion schemes and to enable them to communicate and work is "hysterical" and no different from kids not doing their homework because of too much YouTube.The details here matter, but I would imagine that Cox is likely to appeal. One hopes that the appeals court is more open to listening to the concerns over copyright trolling and kicking people off the internet.

Filed Under: 512i, copyright, dmca, liam o'grady, safe harbors, three strikes

Companies: bmg, cox communications, rightscorp, round hill music