this post was submitted on 12 Jan 2024
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Piracy: ꜱᴀɪʟ ᴛʜᴇ ʜɪɢʜ ꜱᴇᴀꜱ
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That's not a meaningful distinction.
They're still trying to take action against discussion of piracy. The target does not matter and is not meaningful to the discussion.
What? That is incredibly meaningful. The legal implications are are very distinct, and also open some pretty frightening doors.
If we can’t even distinguish the legal channels they are trying to screw us with, how can we possibly protect Internet privacy?
I get you want to win an Internet argument or whatever but let’s keep our eye on the ball here, dude
The important legal concept is that it's literally impossible for discussion of piracy to entitle them to any information in any possible context.
The target of their harassment does not matter. Giving them a single bit of data is every bit as unconditionally unacceptable in either case, and you don't get to any ruling on anything else unless you bypass that.
Again, this isn’t about the discussions. They are taking IP’s discussing it and tracing them to frontier. They’re “moving upstream” instead of targeting users, which means they need less info,the discussion themselves are immaterial because they aren’t targeting individuals - which means it’s more likely. This is a different tactic.
It is exclusively about the discussion. If discussion doesn't entitle them to any information, that's the end of everything. They have no path to proceed in a case or get a ruling on anything else without that barrier being destroyed.
They have many ways to harass both users and companies if it is. It's the only line that means anything. There can't be any precedent set on anything else without that being trampled.
The users are immaterial. They are going upstream. They are establishing a pattern of behavior by frontier as evidenced by the comments.
The only relevant part is the fact that it's impossible for the discussion to entitle them to information. That's the ruling that's the core point of the article and it prevents any other meaningful potential precedents from being set, because the case can't get to ruling on them.
Yes I agree it does not entitle them to it.
"I saw a guy get shot last night. He was close enough I was able to record the whole thing in my phone. The police say that the victim was wearing a blue shirt, but didn't mention they were also wearing a yellow hat. I've saved the footage, but I won't be posting it anywhere, so don't even ask."
I make that statement on Reddit. Investigators see that my statement matches their crime scene.
They can subpoena Reddit for my reddit account information, including the IP address from which I posted that comment. They can subpoena the ISP who controlled that IP address and get subscriber information. They can then go to that subscriber and request and require their assistance in identifying the specific person who made that comment. They can then question that commenter as a witness, and subpoena their video.
That's basically what the rightsholders are trying to do here: subpoena "witnesses" to Frontier violating its duties under Safe Harbor provisions.
I agree that they should be told to go fuck themselves with rusty Buicks, but they do have a (tenuous) legal claim for the information they seek.