Judge: ISP Must Reveal File Trader's Name

[JackSpratts]

Judge upholds subpoena of user accused of piracy
David B. Wilkerson

A U.S. District Court judge on Thursday upheld his ruling that Verizon's online unit must hand over the name of a user accused of piracy by the Recording Industry Association of America.

Verizon said that it plans to appeal the ruling, for the second time, to the U.S. Court of Appeals.

Hoping to set a precedent that can be used to put a halt to music piracy, the RIAA alleged last summer that a Verizon Online customer illegally copied files of copyrighted music onto a personal computer.

When Verizon refused to comply with the subpoena, the RIAA sued the company to have it enforced.

District Court Judge John Bates denied Verizon's request for a stay of the subpoena, which he had declared constitutional on Jan. 21.

Verizon's claim is that the subpoena violates the requirements of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The company maintains that the Act only applies to files hosted on an Internet company's network and not on the computer in a subscriber's home or office.

"Verizon feels very strongly that the privacy, safety and due process rights of hundreds of thousands -- or perhaps millions -- of Internet subscribers hang in the balance of the court's decision," said John Thorne, senior vice president and deputy general counsel for Verizon, in a statement.

"We look to the Court of Appeals to decide this case in a narrow manner that avoids a chilling effect on Internet users' private communications, such as e-mail, instant messages or surfing the Internet."

Amid declining CD sales, record companies are under increasing pressure to respond to the phenomenon of file sharing, which allows computer users to easily collect music they want for free.

Though they have tried to attract customers with pay sites -- such as Sony and Vivendi Universal's PressPlay, the price to download songs can be as high or higher than the cost of a CD. And one of the primary complaints about CDs is that there are often perceived to be overpriced.

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