Alert & File Sharing Advisory
From: Dr. Jonathan C. Enos
Date: Fri, 6 Apr 2007 14:22:32 -0400
To: F&M News
Subject: F&M News: Alert & File Sharing Advisory
*** RIAA Announces Aggressive Strategy to Deal with Illegal Use of Music Files ***
To Franklin Marshall Students, Faculty and Professional Staff
I´m writing to inform you of an aggressive new action being taken by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) that is intended to curtail the illegal on-line sharing of copyrighted music on college and university campuses. The RIAA is sending "settlement letters" to colleges indicating their intention to sue users of systems engaged in illegal file sharing and asking colleges to forward those letters to users. Hundreds of these letters have been sent and many people have settled already, reportedly for as much as $4,000 per settlement.
More information and a sample settlement letter is available at the following links:
http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/CSD4832.pdf
http://www.riaa.com/news/newsletter/022807.asp
http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/article/1938/cornell-offers-students-a-pre-litigation-primer
When Franklin and Marshall receives a copyright infringement claim involving music, video, software, or other digital materials, we investigate the claim and follow a set of guidelines outlined in the 1998 federal statute known as the Digital Millennium Copyright Act or DMCA. As obligated by the DMCA, we contact the owner of the computer that has been identified and ask them to stop sharing the files and remove them. To date, everyone who has been identified has removed the files. Failure to do so would result in loss of F network privileges and possible prosecution from the RIAA. We DO NOT disclose the identity of the user to the claimant and will not unless served with a proper judicial subpoena.
In the event that Franklin and Marshall receives a settlement letter, the College will:
- treat the letter as a DMCA copyright infringement claim and respond as per the DMCA guidelines
- forward the settlement letter to the system user
- refrain from disclosing the identity of a system user unless presented with a subpoena or other legally valid writ
More information about copyright and legal issues is available at:
http://ats.fandm.edu/about/copyright/
This new RIAA strategy provides me an opportunity to remind you that violation of copyright law is a serious issue, with serious financial consequences for the violator. Franklin and Marshall does not approve or condone such violations and we urge you to consider your personal conduct carefully (e.g., do not share copyrighted music, or any other copyrighted works such as video, text, software without the explicit permission of the copyright holder from your computer). You are accountable for your actions and will be held responsible even if you are unaware of peer-to-peer file sharing activity on your computer.
Please refer to Franklin Marshalls Responsible Computing Policy and the measures you should take to protect yourself from unknowingly sharing files with others on the Internet. Uploading or sharing settings are found at the operating system level or in the preferences panel of the specific application. The best thing to do is to remove all peer-to-peer file-sharing programs from your computer (e.g. with LimeWire, use the UninstallerData folder and Uninstall LimeWire 18c). This will not remove any MP3 files that you may have on your computer.
http://computing.fandm.edu/policies/responsible.php
http://computing.fandm.edu/training/osx/preferences.php
Staff in Computer Services ( / ext. 4483) are available to answer questions about this matter.
Jonathan Enos, Chief Information Officer
Ralph Taber, Dean of Students