University of South Florida - Letter to students regarding file sharing.
 

I have a couple of friends who attend the University of South Florida... and they forwarded this email to me this morning:

From: USF CTO
Subject: RE: File Sharing at USF

January 2008
Monitoring Usage of Filesharing Software on Campus


"As you are aware, universities around the country including USF have
been struggling with the issue of illegal file-sharing and Peer to Peer
(P2P) traffic on their network. We're faced with a dilemma: we want to
allow students to do their work and to use the wealth of resources
available through the Internet, but at the same time we can't support
copyright infringement. It's the responsibility of those using the USF
network to adjust their own behavior and avoid illegal sharing of
copyrighted material. It's also the university's responsibility to help
protect the system from illegal file-sharing.

Effective this month, Academic Computing will begin to more proactively
monitor the network for the use of P2P software, such as Limewire,
Bittorent, eMule, and others. Students found using such software will
be redirected to a website which will inform them of the issues involved
with using P2P software associated with the distribution of copyrighted
music and videos. The student will be asked to acknowledge that their
existing use of the software neither violates the University's
Acceptable Use Policy and Code of Conduct, nor utilize the software in a
manner which violates copyright laws. They will, additionally, be
advised that violation of the University's Acceptable Use Policy would
be cause for loss of on campus network privileges, in addition to other
legal ramifications.

Should the student not acknowledge the agreement, access to the network
will be denied. If the student using the P2P program agrees, he or she
regains access to the network to continue their legal use of the P2P.
This agreement would be valid for one month and the student will be
required to re-acknowledge the Acceptable Use Policy each month that
they utilize P2P software.

Subsequently, if the University receives any notice of copyright
infringement violation due to the illegally sharing of copyrighted
material, in accordance with University Policy, the student's network
access will be suspended immediately and the case forwarded to the
Office of Student Rights and Responsibilities for further penalties.
The University of South Florida is committed to the education of the
students and the protection of the intellectual rights of the copyright
holder."

It appears that USF is more interested in covering itself then it is in defending the rights and privacy of it's students. Any thoughts?

It would look that way, maybe in doing so they can say they 'pro-activly' deter p2p on the campus network and can avoid giving actual ID's to the RIAA extortionists.

It could be a rock and hard place situation or it could be as you say just covering their arses and fuck the students right to privacy.

yup, it looks like USF is trying to walk a really fine line, and it doesn't look entirely unreasonable. since they can detect the use of P2P clients, they could have just shut them down altogether....

is there traffic they can't pick up on? can they detect WASTE? Newsgroups? IRC?