Advice on Sky Broadband > Court Order...

franco_22

franco_22

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You don't have anything to worry about.

First of all, you would not get a high court judgement for 1000 pounds, The High Court is a supreme court and only deals with high-profile cases which can not be dealt with by your county court. A 1000 pounds fine doesn't seem like that big of deal to me.

Second of all and most important, you haven't had a trial or been contacted before, how can you be guilty of a crime to which you haven't been explained you committed or proved guilty of committing it? It's unlawful to sentence someone without a court trial first AND without explaining the offence committed.

Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights, everyone has the right to a fair trial. Have you had one? Copyright law is serious, it's not something they can punish with a letter. The simple procedure that would happen usually is your ISP would inform you and ask you to stop downloading. If they caught you again they could inform the proper authorities. Authorities would request for a warrant to search your house and take your computer. If evidence is found you'd be summoned for a trial and told what you are being charged with. C

Copyright is a criminal offence, it has nothing to do with civil law, you don't just get a debt company or whatever it is sending you letters, trust me, if your wife had in fact been found guilty of copyright, you'd be in much bigger trouble then that.
 

Rigsta

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quickshot89 said:
what about private sites etc? Also, surely reading packets is illegal?
Click to expand...

As I understand it, they use a modified bit torrent (or other P2P tech) client to either join existing swarms or plant false ones. Probably the former as its legality is less dubious. This modified client simply logs the IP, content and any other info it can gather, such as usernames, time etc.

This method doesn't fall foul of wiretapping or hacking laws afaik, because they're not gaining access to your computer, and they're just capturing the data generated and used by a regular P2P client in it's normal operation. The data they gather is available to everyone in the swarm.

Example : you access a web server via a browser and browse around in the normal manner. You find and save something in an obscure section of the website that the owner later removes. You haven't done any thing illegal, you just looked harder than other people.

The list of IPs will be split up according to ISP. They will approach the ISP prior to actually seeking a court order to test the waters and see if the ISP intends to fight the issue - which they can, to a degree.

If the ISP rolls over, which let's face it they most likely will, they apply for and get the court order with no opposition, get names and addresses, and it's mailshot intimidation time.


I am not a lawyer. This is just based on what I've read about this whole thing and layman's knowledge of what hacking and wiretapping are.
 

toon_mad

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They (ACS Law) have eventually replied back after over a year and a few months. They claim the letter we responded to them at that time was a template letter (which it was, but reworded with some extras of our own added). Now they say the letter is not sufficient enough, and that money they were originally seeking of £295 will increase to £1000 and possibly exceed these figure if we dont settle the sum of £295 in the next 14 days.

So understandably my mother is a bit freaked out with all this, she took out her Sky Broadband around the time of getting this letter because sky let her down by giving her details to ACS Law and she is getting hounded for money she hasnt got or should have to pay.

Now they are basically saying, pay £295 in 14 days or be expected to pay over £1000 and court charges etc.

I will be visiting that beingthreatened.com see if there is any more advice. If i remember from the last time I was told to keep denying it, especially as she knows she hasnt downloaded any torrents, she doesnt even know how!

Anybody got any advice here or stories of their own regarding these scum people ACS Law?

Thanks
 

AtreuS

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Ignore them.

They wont go to court as they know they cannot win... they are just trying to scare you into paying.

As far as i know there has not been one case taken to court and won where the person has denied doing it.

Its a game of wills they are playing, hoping you will cave in and submit.. they threaten court but never actually do it as they KNOW its almost impossible to prove beyond doubt that the person named knowingly did the crime they accuse them of. Its costs them to lose court cases so they dont start a case unless they know they will win it.
 

Jayster

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AtreuS said:
Ignore them.

They wont go to court as they know they cannot win... they are just trying to scare you into paying.

As far as i know there has not been one case taken to court and won where the person has denied doing it.

Its a game of wills they are playing, hoping you will cave in and submit.. they threaten court but never actually do it as they KNOW its almost impossible to prove beyond doubt that the person named knowingly did the crime they accuse them of. Its costs them to lose court cases so they dont start a case unless they know they will win it.
Click to expand...

I believe that they won two cases because the other parties did not turn up, Lol
 

toon_mad

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Been talking on that beenthreatended.com

They say that ACS Law are actually close to going bust and been closed down, so they are pursuing old cases in the hope of getting more money.

Keep denying it I have been told again as they have no evidence to suggest who physically use the internet at the time of alleged offence.

I think we will be writing to our MP as well regarding this.
 

Snooble

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Im confused.. why wouldn't they just use utorrents 'peers' window. Open up the torrent file themselves, click on the 'peers' tab. Resolve IP's. And write them down.

Then send them to their company knowing they downloaded that album-

Strange strange way to do it :s
 

PistolPete

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PistolPete said:
Except the 27 awaiting judgement :-/

(not sure how that works now that they've ceased trading)
Click to expand...


Actually it was 26, not 27 (my bad) and the yesterday Judge Birss QC threw them all out!!

Case here: http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWPCC/2011/6.html


I'm still a little confused. You could claim you were downloading something completely legit which you could not verify until you completed the download - however seeding a file means you have had a chance to see what the file is and are actively sharing it
Plus it's reckoned that only a small number of seeders share large amounts of what's on P2P. Surely taking those down does more than picking on end users who each downloaded a small number of files??
 
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toon_mad

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Yeah i heard they got closed down with bomb threats etc, couldnt happen to a better bunch of losers to be honest. Im just annoyed that thousands of people have been scared into paying them money, bunch of crooks.
 

GinG

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Just on the back of this, does utorrent encryption not stop this, or is the encryption more for the isp throttling side?
 
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