US Court of Appeals: An IP address isn't enough to identify a pirate
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Re: US Court of Appeals: An IP address isn't enough to identify a pirate
#2The court holds that the plaintiff must demonstrate reasonable evidence the defendant was the person using the computer.
In this particular case, the defendant ran what amounts to lodging, was deposed, and it was immediately figured out it wasn't him. The complicating factor is that because his lodging was medical in nature, he was not able to hand over guest information.
I mention this context because it's unlikely you would be able to get out of being sued by saying "Well maybe it was my roommate LOL"
Re: US Court of Appeals: An IP address isn't enough to identify a pirate
#3>>> Judge rules that copyright trolls need more than just an IP address if they want to go after copyright infringement. An IP is not enough proof to tie a person to a crime.
I didn't see anything in the story to suggest that the plaintiff was acting as a "troll" in the sense that I understand from reading about patent trolls. In this case, the plaintiff, while found to be in the wrong, was in fact the creator of the content and probably intended to commercialize it.
Re: US Court of Appeals: An IP address isn't enough to identify a pirate
#4It surprises me in a way that "big internet" (AT&T, Verizon, Comcast etc) and associated large enterprise interests have not been more staunch proponents of IPv6, at least for fixed consumer connections.
It would be trivial in that circumstance to blow away any kind of NAT and the pseudo-anonymity/plausible deniabililty it provides and make client devices performing illegitimate activity directly identifiable.
I wonder if such a ruling might be different in that context. It's a perturbing thought.
Re: US Court of Appeals: An IP address isn't enough to identify a pirate
#5It surprises me in a way that "big internet" (AT&T, Verizon, Comcast etc) and associated large enterprise interests have not been more staunch proponents of IPv6, at least for fixed consumer connections. It would be trivial in that circumstance to blow away any kind of NAT and the pseudo-anonymity/plausible deniabililty it provides and make client devices performing illegitimate activity directly identifiable. I wond…
> It would be trivial in that circumstance to blow away any kind of NAT and the pseudo-anonymity/plausible deniabililty it provides and make client devices performing illegitimate activity directly identifiable.
Identifying the device and identifying the person using it are two entirely different things. Multiple people use the same device all the time.
Re: US Court of Appeals: An IP address isn't enough to identify a pirate
#6The court holds that the plaintiff must demonstrate reasonable evidence the defendant was the person using the computer. In this particular case, the defendant ran what amounts to lodging, was deposed, and it was immediately figured out it wasn't him. The complicating factor is that because his lodging was medical in nature, he was not able to hand over guest information. I mention this context because it's unlikely…
The facts of the actual case make it much easier to understand the problem, but how is that situation actually different? There are still multiple people it could have been, no evidence is presented to distinguish between them at all and it's an obvious injustice to punish one person when it was another who did it.
Re: US Court of Appeals: An IP address isn't enough to identify a pirate
#7The court holds that the plaintiff must demonstrate reasonable evidence the defendant was the person using the computer. In this particular case, the defendant ran what amounts to lodging, was deposed, and it was immediately figured out it wasn't him. The complicating factor is that because his lodging was medical in nature, he was not able to hand over guest information. I mention this context because it's unlikely…
The facts of the actual case make it much easier to understand the problem, but how is that situation actually different? There are still multiple people it could have been, no evidence is presented to distinguish between them at all and it's an obvious injustice to punish one person when it was another who did it.
How do you know it wasn't a nearby neighbour piggybacking on your wifi?
Re: US Court of Appeals: An IP address isn't enough to identify a pirate
#8It surprises me in a way that "big internet" (AT&T, Verizon, Comcast etc) and associated large enterprise interests have not been more staunch proponents of IPv6, at least for fixed consumer connections. It would be trivial in that circumstance to blow away any kind of NAT and the pseudo-anonymity/plausible deniabililty it provides and make client devices performing illegitimate activity directly identifiable. I wond…
> It would be trivial in that circumstance to blow away any kind of NAT
Why do you think so? NAT can be used for IPv6 is exactly the same way it's used for IPv4.
Re: US Court of Appeals: An IP address isn't enough to identify a pirate
#9Good decision. It could have gone badly. That is, that hosting open WiFi without logging user activity makes you liable for infringement.
Re: US Court of Appeals: An IP address isn't enough to identify a pirate
#10It surprises me in a way that "big internet" (AT&T, Verizon, Comcast etc) and associated large enterprise interests have not been more staunch proponents of IPv6, at least for fixed consumer connections. It would be trivial in that circumstance to blow away any kind of NAT and the pseudo-anonymity/plausible deniabililty it provides and make client devices performing illegitimate activity directly identifiable. I wond…
Ipv6 defined "privacy extensions" to combat this very thing - and most operating systems use it by default. The idea is that devices generate random addresses instead of just using the device Mac address. I can't say how well this defeats tracking, however, this article (https://www.internetsociety.org/blog/2014/12/ipv6-privacy-ad...) concludes
> ... the ability of security services to track you on IPv4 versus IPv6 is pretty much about the same.