File sharing crackdown continues

Despite a recent legal victory for protecting file sharers' identities, Tufts administrators have continued to stress the unlawfulness of obtaining and distributing copyrighted material.

Last month the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit said the Record Industry Association of America (RIAA) cannot continue a special fast-track subpoena process which forced Internet service providers (ISPs) -- colleges and universities included -- to provide the names of suspected file-sharers. The alleged downloaders were then sued individually by the RIAA.

Civil liberty groups applauded the ruling, as it protects the identities of accused ISP users. However, RIAA president Cary Sherman told The Chronicle of Higher Education earlier this month that his organization plans to continue suing unnamed file-sharers and then discovering their names through legal proceedings.

Lesley Tolman, Director of Enterprise IT Infrastructure at Tufts Computing and Communications Services (TCCS) said file traders can also be identified by way of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). Relevant sections of the DMCA are included in the "Academic Integrity @ Tufts" handbook.

A university can be held liable under the DMCA if the school fails to terminate infringing users after repeat offenses.

Though Tufts has not yet been served any subpoenas, the school has received many complaints from the RIAA, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), and similar groups, Assistant Dean of Judicial Affairs Veronica Carter said.

In Fall 2002, Tufts received 63 complaints against students of allegedly illegal file-sharing, according to Marj Minnigh, Manager of Networks and Special Projects for TCCS. Last fall, the University received another 60 complaints. However, in spring 2003 Tufts received 400 complaints.

Minnigh said the number of complaints could be the result of increased monitoring from media companies, who issued a number of lawsuits last summer. However, Minnigh theorized that the RIAA's monitoring of ISPs can fluctuate in unpredictable cycles.

As a result, it is hard to pinpoint precisely whether Tufts' internet users' habits correlate with the Pew Internet and American Life Project report released on Jan. 5 claiming that file sharing has dropped 75 percent from mid 2003 figures, when the first lawsuits were filed.

What TCCS does know is that file-sharing, or peer-to-peer (P2P) traffic decreased 50 percent last semester from the 2002-2003 academic year's average P2P traffic, Minnigh said.

"We theorize that students were influenced by flood of publicity and dissuaded from using P2P to share music," said Minnigh.

Many are still unaffected by this "flood." An Admissions survey filled out by the Class of 2007 before this past fall semester showed that 78 percent of the incoming freshman class downloaded MP3 or other media files from the Internet at least once a month. Thirty-seven percent responded that they downloaded such files once to several times a day.

These figures were published in a full-page advertisement in the Daily last semester by the Dean's Office who warned students that "this is a case where there is no 'safety in numbers'."

A junior who wished to remain anonymous said he and most of his friends at Tufts still use P2P file-sharing programs such as KaZaa, Gnutella and WinMX on a regular basis. "I honestly don't think I'll ever get caught, especially if I only download and don't let people upload off me -- there's just way too many of us."

"Tufts, like most schools, can't pursue everything," Reitman said. "What TCCS can absolutely monitor is bandwidth and identify 'bandwidth hogs.'"

High bandwidth users are investigated as well as those in complaints to the University.

TCCS gives the suspected file-sharer a "warning," or first complaint, and shuts off his or her Internet access. Access is only returned after the student completes a "short educational session regarding the DMCA law and copyright issues," according to Tolman and Minnigh.

If TCCS receives a second complaint about the same student, he or she is referred to the Dean's Office. The disciplinary action taken depends on the severity of the file-sharing offense.

"If a student is distributing, trading or selling $600 software suites to others the action taken will be more severe than that [which is] taken against a student merely downloading and not sharing MP3 files," Reitman said. "Students may be expelled or suspended."

"And we have done so in the past," Carter added.

Last semester, there were less than ten second offense complaints -- one of which resulted in suspension, she said.

As for students sure that turning off the upload option will prevent detection, according to Reitman, "it's a lot less dangerous than file-sharing but it's still not legal. You don't have the right to obtain anything that you're not paying for that requires a license. Though [TCCS] may not catch you, you are still at risk [at being caught] by the RIAA. [Not sharing your files] does not make you immune."

Carter and Reitman stressed that they hope every Tufts student will disable file-sharing if they insist on using P2P programs but also said that the University cannot protect a student if he or she is caught by a group like the RIAA or MPAA.

Freshman Tara Dhawan has changed her habits because of the recent actions. "I don't file-share because it's an unnecessary risk," she said.

Reitman suggested legal Internet 'music stores' such as iTunes and the now-legal, reformed Napster as alternate ways to get music. Both iTunes and Napster sell songs for 99 cents each, and can then be transferred onto mobile devices or burned onto compact discs. Students using iTunes on the same network can listen to each other's music libraries but cannot download from one another.