3 Count: Poison

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1: European ISPs Attack Secret Acta Copyright Talks

First off today, the European ISP Association (EuroISPA) has released a statement condemming the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA), a controversial new copyright treaty that is being negotiated between the EU, US and other nations all over the world.

EuroISPA specifically condemns both the secrecy that the treaty is being negotiated with and news from a recent leak from EU commentary on the treaty that there is the potential for the treaty to include three strikes legislation that could disconnect alleged file sharers.

The EU has defended the secrecy, saying that such secrecy is common during international trade negotiations, especially during the early stages. Furthermore, the US comments are not available and there is no word either way as to whether or not three strikes has made it into the treaty at all.

Indeed, very little is known about the treaty right now as it is early in the negotiations and the only leaks have revolved around early drafts, itineraries and comments. The final treaty is far away from completion.

2: Using Faulty Data to Demand Settlements from Innocent Surfers

Next up today, Mike Freedman of Princeton Computer Science has been receiving a lot of copyright notices, in particular from Video Protection Alliance (VPA), claiming that his CoralCDN project, which acts as backup for downed sites, has been engaging in file sharing.

The reason, it appears, is lazy copyright enforcers.

What happens is that some copyright enforcers, in this case the VPA, connect to Bittorrent trackers and get a list of IP addresses sharing a specific file. They then run with the list and start sending letters targeted at those IPs. The problem, however is that it requires trackers to provide accurate information, which many intentionally do not.

Bittorrent trackers routinely poison their IP list to include innocent IP addresses so that the information won’t be useful to enforcers. Other companies, such as MediaSentry, have gotten around this by first downloading a portion of the file and then logging the IP. However, some enforcers it appears have been taking a more lazy route and, as a result, have been sending notices to non-infringing IPs.

The result so far has been just some annoyance and some joking, but given some of the stern letters that are sent, it could become a legal issue if the companies are not careful with who they target and how.

3: Elisabeth Hasselbeck Book Drama Gets a Second Act

Finally today, convinced that her lawsuit was thrown out on a technicality, Susan Hassett has refiled her lawsuit against Elisabeth Hasselbeck, whom she accuses of plagiarizing her book.

Hassett is the author of Living with Celiac, a cookbook for those with Celiac disease, a condition that prohibits those with it from eating Gluten. Hasselbeck, who famously has the ailment, later released a similar cookbook entitled The G-Free Diet: A Gluten-Free Survival Guide.

Hassett’s first lawsuit was thrown out after Hassett’s own attorney declined to pursue the case, saying that the potential for damages was not high enough to warrant the suit. However, now the suit has been refiled, seemingly with a new attorney, so we will have to see what happens when Hassett gets her day in court. Hasselbeck has repeatedly called the allegations of plagiarism baseless.

Suggestions

That’s it for the three count today. We will be back tomorrow with three more copyright links. If you have a link that you want to suggest a link for the column or have any proposals to make it better. Feel free to leave a comment or send me an email. I hope to hear from you.

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