Law firm ACS: Law stops 'chasing illegal file-sharers'
 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-12253746

A lawyer has dramatically withdrawn from pursuing alleged illegal file-sharers in the middle of a court case he brought.

The patent court in London is currently scrutinising 26 cases brought by ACS: Law on behalf of its client MediaCAT.

The law firm had sent thousands of letters to alleged file-sharers.

But in a statement read to the court, solicitor Andrew Crossley said he had now ceased all such work.

He cited criminal attacks and bomb threats as reasons.

"I have ceased my work...I have been subject to criminal attack. My e-mails have been hacked. I have had death threats and bomb threats," he said in the statement, read to the court by MediaCAT's barrister Tim Ludbrook.

"It has caused immense hassle to me and my family," he added.

In September, ACS: Law was the victim of a cyber attack which exposed thousands of its e-mails online.

These e-mails detailed all the people it was pursuing and the pornographic films they were accused of downloading for free.

The data breach is the subject of an ongoing investigation by the Information Commissioner, and Mr Crossley could face a hefty fine.

ACS: Law hit the headlines when it began sending thousands of letters to alleged file-sharers, on behalf of client MediaCAT.

Consumer group Which? has accused it of sending letters to innocent people, while some ISPs have refused to hand over details about their customers.

Groups such as the BPI, which represents music labels, have criticised its methods.

Judicial scrutiny

Those methods hinge on a partnership between ACS: Law and MediaCAT, which in turn has signed deals with various copyright holders allowing it to pursue copyright infringement cases on their behalf.

The court heard that copyright owners receive a 30% share of any recouped revenue while ACS: Law takes a 65% share.

Members of the public who received letters were given the choice of paying a fine of around £500 or going to court.

Detractors have accused Mr Crossley of seeking to make money with no intention of taking any cases to court.

In his statement, Mr Crossley denied this.

"It has always been my intention to litigate and, but for the fact that I have ceased this work, my intention was to litigate forcefully in these 26 cases," he said.

Mr Crossley is subject to an ongoing investigation by the Solicitors Regulation Authority.

Even before Mr Crossley's statement, the court case had been highly unusual.

ACS: Law's client MediaCAT wants to drop the cases, and letters have already been sent to the defendants informing them that action against them has been dropped.

Not happy

But Judge Birss said granting permission to discontinue the cases was not a simple matter, due largely to the fact that the actual copyright holders were not in court.

This meant that, in theory, these copyright holders could continue to pursue cases against the 26 defendants.

"Why should they be vexed a second time?" he asked.

Judge Birss also questioned why MediaCAT wanted to drop the cases.

"I want to tell you that I am not happy. I am getting the impression with every twist and turn since I started looking at these cases that there is a desire to avoid any judicial scrutiny," he said.

The case was made more complicated by the fact that a new firm, GCB Ltd, had begun sending similar letters, including one to one of the defendants who had been told just the day before that no further action would be taken.

Judge Birss said he was considering banning MediaCAT from sending any more such letters until the issues raised by the cases had been resolved.

Doing so, he said, would be a highly unusual move but one made more likely by the fact that Mr Crossley had said in his statement that there were "no new letters pending" and that GCB Ltd had also halted its work.

The judge was keen to find out what the relationship was between GCB and ACS: Law, something Mr Crossley sought to clarify in his statement.

He said that he had no connection with GCB Ltd beyond the fact that the founders of the firm had previously been employed at ACS: Law.

The case has raised some serious questions about how copyright firms pursue file-sharers.

Barristers acting on behalf of the accused questioned whether an IP address - a number assigned to every device connecting to the internet - could be used to identify the person who downloaded illegal content.

Barrister Guy Tritton also questioned the nature of the letters sent by ACS: Law, asking why it described MediaCAT as a "copyright protection society" - a title that he said was "misleading".

Judge Birss is expected to deliver his judgement on the case later in the week.

Top notch... party at gideon's place. Bring the VCR. Crank up pornbeer.com!
:winkwink:

old news i mentioned them dropping the cases and backpeddlng on their claims in the previous thread about this issue.

I'll break out the Delorean and time travel back toe dat thread.
:thumbsup

I'll save you the time.

DVTimes - posted BBC article, as this is all he does

I then posted saying that I was pleased the dispicable cunt was getting his comeuppance.

Then several idiots posted calling me a pirate because I think sending blackmail letters to the person who paid for an internet connection in a house is abhorrent.

They then carried on looking like wankers as I tried, slowly, to explain that disliking scattergun john doe blackmail letters is not the same as thinking piracy is good.

They failed to grasp this amazing concept.

I mocked them.

They stopped posting.

HTH

Your pal

Damian

PS Pornbeer being shot now this sat. Carl was ill, sadly. I will make sure it is twice as crap as usual to make up for the delay!

Good to see criminals getting ahead for once.

We need more bomb and death threats.

What a surprise. You defend piracy in every thread.

- By the way, it's spelled 'despicable'. Funny you can't spell that, yet you can use big words like comeuppance. :1orglaugh

oh what a surprise people are getting angry when he sends them letters threatening to ruin their lives

So one company has stopped this practice. It seems every few days I see an announcement on Xbiz of more people suing Bit Torrent users downloading pirated porn.

http://www.xbiz.com/news/129866

http://www.xbiz.com/news/web/129683

http://www.xbiz.com/news/web/129652

Suing the innocent is bad. Suing the guilty is good.

1) do you like to wear hats?

2) do you like boats?

3) do you like to get stuff for free?

4) do you like hanging out with your mates?





.

If Gideon is supplying the beer, I'll bring my beer pong table and some cups.

That's right. The largest, most public company that pioneered this blackmail letter idea have stopped it. No one else I am aware of in the UK is doing it. So finally, the ridiculous idea of blackmailing end-users has been stopped. Huzzah.

They've been doing it for years and year years, Paul. They did it for videogames, that industry then sacked them. They tried movies, got sacked again. Then they tried porn, and once again, sacked. It seems the sensible people realise that suing end users is a bad idea, and now they've simply run out of verticals to approach.

Yes, it's because they want to get known, get famous, get their press releases out. At the panel on this subject I was on at interNEXT a very good point was raised. That if this is about stopping piracy, which everyone would want to do, then why not go after the rippers and uploaders? You can find those guys just as easily, if not more so.

Think about this.

It's obvious. Because it's not about stopping piracy. It's about making money.

The leaked letters from ACS: Law that you can find in one google search prove this.

So, all the press releases are about is advertising the ambulance chasing lawyers really.

Wow. We agree on something! Pigs must be flying.

[QUOTE=NetHorse;17867859]What a surprise. You defend piracy in every thread.

Please post one quote where I defend piracy. Just one. Off you go, I'll wait...


Nope, nothing? Gosh, I am surprised!

http://www.singleblackmale.org/wp-co...1235839503.jpg

PS There is one letter difference between the two words, one is hardly 'big'. Maybe you are impressed with trisyllabic words, but honest, kid, there's nothing there to be impressed about. Honest. Thanks for playing though, it was fun!

two pieces of old news.
1)the lame ass approach of the brit lawers failed. not failing in the U.S. however.
2)the trolling pirate is still an idiot:2 cents:

you forgot
5) do you like it when the pirate boys swab your poop deck?

On a somewhat related note, a whole lot of rights-holders, 'watchdog' groups, technologists, entrepreneurs and at least one member of the adult industry recently weighed in on the subject of "Copyright Policy, Creativity, and Innovation in the Internet Economy" in response to an inquiry from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration's Internet Policy Task Force.

It's pretty interesting to read through the comments submitted and to see the same issues that are frequently discussed here examined by the likes of the MPAA and how their perspective differs from the Center for Democracy and Technology and other similar entities.

A couple things that the vast majority of the respondents whose comments I have read so far appear to agree on: the current laws and regulations are insufficient to deal with the issue of online content piracy, and altering those laws has to be done with care in order to ensure that technological development isn't stifled as a byproduct of improving the ability of rights-holders to enforce their intellectual property rights.

Not too surprisingly, most of the content creators whose comments I have read thus far support the establishment of the Combating Online Infringment and Counterfits Act (not all do, though - the Entertainment Software Association is against it, for example), and most of the technology companies/developers I've read oppose that bill being passed.

Damian: thanks again for taking part in the end-user litigation panel discussion at Internext. Thanks to some not-so-deft management on the part of the show's organizers, the whole thing turned into a bit of a clusterfuck, but you and the rest of the panel did a fine job, nonetheless. I was pleased to see that there was minimal acrimony involved, and quite a bit of substantive discussion... and, happily, more agreement between Matt Zimmerman from EFF and the other attorneys present (including those who are actively, currently suing end-users) than I thought there might be.

I hear ya.

Too bad I don't agree with the way you represent yourself on GFY though.

:2 cents:

Totally my pleasure. Wasn't your fault about the room changes. I really enjoyed it and thought it was very interesting. Honoured to be sat with Mr EFF too!

And I agree, I was expecting fisticuffs.

Where the approach is exactly the same!

Do you actually aim at your foot with that gun in your hand, or is it merely happenstance?

That's terrible news.

I'll try to kiss more ass if it will please you.

So one company stops and many others carry on. This company seems like scum bags, the new ones will learn.

The more publicity it gets the better.

And that in business is bad because?

Maybe you should take a leaf out of my book and learn to make money. Then you can get out of that dump you live in. I know I keep going on about it. Like you keep going on about me living in Czech. :winkwink:

Learn from the marketing genius. http://pornbeer.com/

Hey sir trollsalot, the approach is not the same.:error

Learn to comprehend english.

There is more diligence in the U.S. approach and you should know this, so either you are in a sad butthurt state of denial or you simply can't read.

Without a law to protect creators the profits on being a creator will dwindle. Less profit means less investment means less new products. Or what the music industry has turned to, churning out low level products to get a quick profit and move onto the next craze.

The present laws are inadequate. Change will happen because billions are being lost to some Governments in terms of taxes. A company in Denmark or Russia ripping off US products isn't paying US taxes. Even by giving away billions of $ to earn millions of $ isn't making tax $$$$ and that's the motivation.

What some people don't realise is law is all about precedent. Precedents established in previous cases are learned from for future cases.

When a case is won a precedent is established, when it's lost a lesson is learned. Established precedents are repeated, lost cases are learned from and improve the next case.

ACS screwed up and made mistakes. Mistakes that won't be repeated by other lawyers and law firms in the future. Their failure i's good for the future.

So unless laws are established to protect downloaders this will continue. And lawyers will get better.

Yes lawyers protecting the accused will also get better, but that's not going to stop the guilty getting punished.

Pirates are being named too.. imagine that.. served by process servers.. real lawsuits. :1orglaugh Of course the folks in the UK (defending piracy) would not understand this because they do not know, nor practice, US law.

Be careful. Time travel is the leading cause in Parkinson disease

i guess you didn't explain it slowly enough
:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh

to bad it not true, fair use dependent industry generate 100 times the money of the copyright industry.

changing the laws the way you want to would cost the use economy way more money.

Do you ever get the impression some of the people anti suing pirates might be worried their name will appear on a list?

Post one shred of evidence to support your arsedribble.

It's the exact same scam.

1) Get IP from public tracker
2) Send blackmail letter
3) Profit

Due diligence? Lollington lol.

So Paul, why do you think they don't go after the uploaders?

Seems like everybody is deliberately skipping what the lawyer gave as his reason:
He cited criminal attacks and bomb threats as reasons.

"I have ceased my work...I have been subject to criminal attack. My e-mails have been hacked. I have had death threats and bomb threats," he said in the statement, read to the court by MediaCAT's barrister Tim Ludbrook.

"It has caused immense hassle to me and my family," he added.

I believe RYC has told me on numerous occasions that he too has had his life threatened by these thieving pirate son-of-a-bitches.

So to the gideons and damianj's of the world....keep grasping at straws. That lawyer backed off because his family was being threatened by scumbags.

Just let some asshole who stole from me have the balls to come up to my face and talk shit. I will hit him so fucking hard he'll think he's on gideongallery's time machine.

It's not the same. There's actually 'due process' here in the US. Over in Europe ISPs just hand out IP's like it's candy.

Who's they? New Sensations? Not sure why... we do though.

http://www.removeyourcontent.com/temp/uploaders_too.pdf

Because once again "Le Trollet" refuses to see the difference and he never will.

He has his head so far up his arse it would take a team of skilled proctologists years to dig it out:2 cents:

Methinks this goes here...



:1orglaugh:1orglaugh

:helpme

so he was getting threats (for the last 2 years) his companies email was hacked (8 months a go)and he quits now after his court case goes tits up

and it because those past threats and has nothing to do with the bitch slap he just got from the judge

if you believe that, i have some prime Real estate in florida to sell you.

Hahahaha! Brilliant. I think you do actually believe him too.

So, he hasn't stopped because:

a) the judge was about the throw out the case, as stated
b) he is facing a bar hearing in March
c) he stupidly let someone download all this company emails where it is PERFECTLY CLEAR he has no interest in stopping piracy, just making bank via blackmail
d) run out of markets prepared to work with blackmailers. Over the last 5/6 years he has tried movies, games, software and finally porn. No one else is left

Bless you!

Thanks for starting my day with a laugh!

The lawyers suing blackmailing IP addresses. Try and keep up. I can draw a picture if you are struggling.

Hilarious. I love your little hard on for the fact I work with them. Get some new material, man.

Well done you! Have a gold star.

Although, I am not sure I understand your post. This thread is about acs:law and how they have given up sending out blackmail letters. It's not about your organisation. In fact, no one mentioned your company, what they do, how they do it or anything at all.

Maybe it's just sig spam?

However, I am very pleased you felt compelled to wave your hard on for me in this thread too. I was missing your - as always - invaluable input.

How many uploaders have you taken to court?

claim to fame in life: leader of the internet punks who think everything should be free.

place in society, either: broke and can't afford to buy content (movies, songs, porn), socialist, jealous of rich people, liberal entitlement attitude, out cast anti social kid looking for sense of purpose.... so which of the those (if not all of them) apply to you?

Would love to see what all of you little sissies do for a living, i bet 99% of you are hypocrites and if you were working for free or people were stealing what ever it is you do you would be pissed.

my money is that you are broke and you like the attention, even though you are not liked it makes you feel important to be knowledgeable on the topic and to try to piss everyone off. At least everyone knows your name now, as without all of this content theft stuff you would be 100% irrelevant and invisible.

So you think you can run their business better than they do. Run it from your one bedroom rented dump. :1orglaugh

More good news for those chasing pirates.

http://www.ynot.com/content.php?r=116492

Now that's what is called marketing. Just in case you didn't recognise it.

No really, Paul, if they want to stop piracy, why do you think they are going after downloaders not the site rip warez groups and uploaders?

For once, I am deadly serious with you. Why would you do that, unless all you were doing was legal blackmail with absolutely no intention whatsoever of ever litigating, of course.

It's not about me claiming I could run their business better, I wouldn't ever work in the ambulance chasing legal blackmail market as I think it is unethical. What I am asking, is, if this is really about stopping piracy, why don't these groups actually try and stop piracy, rather than just legal blackmail?

(Clue - they don't care about piracy, they care about making bank, but you and I both know that. I would love you to try and think of an excuse for them though).

See if you can answer that without name calling or trying to insult me. I dare you!

PS We both know that Paris thing is also just about money, not piracy. I know you're not that stupid.

Here's another thought, Paul.

We can all agree the MPAA and RIAA can afford much better lawyers than the porn companies that are giving copyright troll lawyers 60-70% of the cash they legally extort for them, right?

OK.

Now, the MPAA and RIAA tried this legal blackmail approach for many, many years.

They have both now stopped the practise, admitting that it has had no impact on copyright infringement whatsoever and cost them a fortune.

Why do you think they have done that if it does work and does stop piracy, as you appear to be claiming?

Are you saying you are smarter than the combined legal might of the MPAA and RIAA?

Another great post from Saint Damian.

Seriously you suck at business, give up and go find a decent job you can do.

Here's a clue.

http://www.mygtv.net/wp-content/uplo...7/dsc07479.JPG

Business is all about making money. Torrent Freak and all the other piracy sites are all about making money. The porn industry is losing money to these pirates and getting some back the easiest way possible is the best business route.

Another clue.

http://brandconfucian.com/wp-content...1363566672.jpg

"Would you like to super size that sir?

It's OK Paul, you could just say:

I cannot argue against your simple point, so I am going to insult you instead.

Bless you, you funny little chap.

We all know it's wrong, we all know it is immoral. But rather than defend their practises you just call me names, I am sure it makes you feel better.

I point out the immoral and unethical practises, point out others have tried this approach and given ip on it, and rather than defend sending a blackmail letter, you just try and insult me.

You are proving my point with every post you make.

You cannot argue against it. And that's fine with me.

Thanks for helping me demonstrate this.

PS The real money is in illegal arms dealing, I have a hook up with the Kashogis if you want to get into that now you are immoral.