On a normal weekend, approximately 6,000 days ago, the news that the so-called "copyright trolls" had arrived in Britain came as a shock. Big surprise to those who share country files.
Aside from the RIAA's highly publicized lawsuit campaign in the United States, in 2007 "trolling as a business model" was considered a largely German problem by the minority who had heard of it.
Despite the thousands of international headlines that appeared in the following years, the same "surprises" were replicated throughout the EU, Australia, the United States, Brazil and wherever else the courts were prepared to accommodate actions against thousands of ISP subscribers.
Not even Canadians can escape
Despite efforts to make Internet subscribers less accessible and in theory, less lucrative targets, the Canadians I have not escaped the global settlement machine on an industrial scale. Reports in recent days suggest things may be getting worse.
An RCI article published on Friday mentions a lawsuit that lists more than 1,900 IP addresses allegedly linked to the piracy of the Ryan Reynolds film. Hitman's wife's bodyguard. The publication grades that opponents of these cases claim that they monetize the โfear and uncertaintyโ associated with threats of being sued.
Of the 10,000 subscribers already sued in Canada, few would disagree; Their names are on the Internet bill, so they are the first to feel the pressure. Regardless of whether they are the real offenders, subscribers are often pressured until they offer to settle, incriminate themselves, or provide details of someone in the household who may have more information about what really happened.
Having spoken to dozens of letter recipients over more than 15 years, the anguish of some innocent subscribers is very real. The existence of real infringers, correctly identified, is also not trivial, and is easily comparable to the often devious rights holders who stop at nothing to convert a "speculative invoice" into hard cash.
Basically nothing has changed
For most readers here, little of the above will come as a surprise. For a worrying number of people who post in huge discussion threads On RedFlagDeals and other platforms, 15 years of lawsuits, warnings, advice and the unprecedented VPN explosion could also have happened in a different dimension.
Despite the abundance of quality local advice From groups like CIPPIC there are many reports of Internet subscribers contacting complainants directly by phone or email, hoping to get everything resolved as quickly as possible. With all due respect to those who published reports suggesting their negotiations were successful, for the uninitiated it is a high-risk strategy that is welcomed by plaintiffs.
In short, IP address evidence alone is useful to a claimant, but an IP address coupled with a subscriber's real name is exponentially more valuable. The general rule is that a plaintiff with great evidence will be in a better position and will be more likely to demand a lot of money. The most likely route to obtaining that big evidence is when a defendant opens his big mouth and tells the plaintiff something relevant that he didn't already know.
Information is currency here and it is not uncommon for innocent subscribers to incriminate themselves or ruin someone else's defense. Having an innocent but nervous human being on the phone dramatically increases the likelihood that they will a) reach into their own pocket or b) provide information about someone in the household more familiar with the allegations. Logical, yes. Predictable result? Not so much.
For example, the subscriber may feel that it is fair to point out the correct offender; Unfortunately, the plaintiffs' transcription may conclude that the subscriber authorized the infringement, so he is still liable. That means there are now two possible routes to get a deal and new leverage to get even more money. That is just one of the many negative outcomes available to those who foolishly hire people who practice law for a living.
Of course, none of this detracts from the fact that if plaintiffs have a case, some defendants will prefer to pay a settlement, and understandably so. There is simply no real reason to maximize the amount when offering compensation for a legitimate claim, as that is taken care of by the claimants.
pirate surprise
Assuming that people who pirate movies must know enough about movie piracy to be able to pirate them, it seems inconceivable that hundreds of thousands of users, primarily BitTorrent users, continue to ignore the risks. For example, adult entertainment company Strike 3 is the most litigious in the industry, but appears to have no problem obtaining large numbers of new IP addresses each month that form the basis of new lawsuits and settlement claims.
Only in the first half of this year, Strike 3 filed 1,600 lawsuits against people who allegedly shared their relatively specific content, sold under blatantly obvious names. However, somehow these fans didn't know or didn't care that the chances of getting caught in Strike 3 torrents are very high. At this very moment, a public torrent site has a 1.2TB torrent that is almost certainly being used for lawsuits, but surprisingly, its peers keep coming.
Kenneth Clark, a lawyer with Toronto-based law firm Aird Berlis, who represents Hitman Two Productions Inc., theorizes that download apps for newer styles may be part of the problem. While users previously used traditional streaming apps associated with a low risk of legal problems, apps that also share downloaded content with other pirates are not always advertised as such, lulling users into a false sense of security. It's hard to confirm, but it seems plausible.
Deterrence versus benefit
This brings us clearly to the stated goal of these lawsuits. Clark told CBC News what these and similar companies have said all along; deterrence.
โThere is a lot of piracy online that people believe has no consequences. Our mandate is to show people that illegal conduct has legal consequences,โ Clark said.
While Clark's mandate may be just that, any deterrent effect is less than obvious, as evidenced by the constant avalanche of lawsuits and 15 years of deterrence that remains completely unknown to the people who matter. More cynical observers believe this is just part of a broader business model that monetizes breaches rather than simply succumbing to them.
In this controversial game, anything is possible, but for those who follow it, new revelations are increasingly rare. Revelations apparently coming later this week may put settlement models like these in a whole new light.
