Over the past two decades, online piracy has proven to be a huge challenge for the entertainment industries.
Some copyright holders have tried to prosecute individual pirates in court, but increasingly third-party intermediaries are also targeted.
There are several lawsuits pending in US courts, where rights holders accused ISPs of not doing enough to stop piracy. One of the main allegations is that ISPs do not terminate the accounts of repeat offenders in "appropriate circumstances" as required by the DMCA.
These lawsuits were promoted by music companies, which had some success on this front, including a $ 1 billion verdict against Cox. However, more recently, a group of filmmakers adopted a similar strategy. These companies have already sued several Internet providers, included Wow!.
Filmmakers Sue WoW!
Wow! is being sued by a group of smaller movie companies, including Millennium Media and Voltage Pictures, which have built up an impressive track record of fighting piracy in recent years. They have gone after individual hackers and targeted various pirate sites, including the YTS torrent index.
The filmmakers now accuse the ISP of failing to terminate the accounts of subscribers who were repeatedly accused of sharing copyrighted material. As such, they hold Wow! responsible for these hacking activities, which could cause millions of dollars in damages.
Wow! he clearly disagrees with these allegations. In a motion to dismiss filed this week, the ISP refutes the claim that it is directly, collaboratively or even indirectly responsible for the alleged copyright infringement of subscribers.
Motion to dismiss
According to Wow! the evidence provided by the film companies' anti-piracy partner, Maverickeye, does not prove any direct infringement. An IP address is not enough to prove that subscribers downloaded any infringing material, the ISP claims, pointing to the 'Cobbler' case.
Additionally, secondary liability claims also fail, as the filmmakers cannot prove that Wow! financially benefited from pirate activity. Wow! charges flat fees for its internet service, which are the same whether subscribers hack or not.
"[T]a Lawsuit lacks plausible allegations detailing how WOW directly benefited from the alleged violation, which makes any economic benefit of the alleged violation mitigated or incidental, and not 'direct', โthe motion to dismiss reads.
Wow! It further argues that there is no evidence to show that its Internet service was particularly attractive to hackers. Finally, the ISP notes that it was simply unable to control or monitor any of the alleged violations, which is also required to prove liability.
Wow! Hundreds of disconnected subscribers
These and other arguments will be reviewed by the court, which will ultimately decide whether this case can go ahead. Many of the defense arguments are in line with what we have seen in previous cases, but there are also key differences.
For example, wow! notes that you are not ignoring piracy. In recent years, the company has terminated the accounts of hundreds of subscribers for whom it received multiple notices of copyright infringement.
"WOW has a robust program under which it notifies account holders of infringement allegations, suspends their Internet access if the allegations continue, and then permanently terminates the account upon additional complaints."
On top of that, the ISP also puts the defendants, their anti-piracy partners, and the evidence in a different light.
Trolls, a victorious person and strange trunks
The motion of Wow! These entities have previously sued file sharers in various courts for easy settlements.
โThe plaintiffs and Maverickeye are part of a notorious network of copyright trolls. So far, the Plaintiffs' modus operandi has been to file John Doe lawsuits in the hopes of securing speedy settlements and dismissing them at the slightest resistance. "
The ISP also points to several lawsuits in which Maverickeye was charged with a wide variety of crimes, including using the expert testimony of a fictitious person.
โAdditionally, the courts and litigants in these cases have persuasively accused Maverickeye of serious misconduct, such as submitting fraudulent statements from fictitious persons 'experts', violating state law by engaging in unlicensed surveillance, and even conspiring with landlords. of copyright to deliver copyrighted content through BitTorrent. and then sue anyone who tries to download it. "
These accusations will have to be proven in court, but it is clear that Wow! is willing to ask tough questions. This also applies to the "testimony" of YTS owner Senthil Segaran, which the filmmakers used as evidence.
The site operator provided information on YTS user records and database as part of an earlier agreement with the filmmakers. However, wow! you are not immediately convinced that this information is credible.
All things considered, Wow! considers that the complaint should be dismissed in its entirety. Regardless of what the court decides, this case will be interesting to watch as the stakes are high.
In addition to millions of dollars in potential piracy damages, the filmmakers want Wow! for block multiple pirate sites and disconnect subscribers whose accounts are subject to three unique violation notices in three days.
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A copy of the Wow! Motion to dismiss, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado, is available here (pdf)
