p2pnet MediaSentry digest
p2pnet news view P2P | RIAA News:- That MediaSentry, the RIAA’s dedicated but terribly inept not-so-Private Eye, has been operating across America without proper authorization, is now being widely reported on- and off-line.
Originally revealed by Recording Industry Vs The People and p2pnet, the scandal represents more than a mere licensing difficulty.
Highly questionable evidence collected by MediaSentry is being used by Vivendi Universal, EMI, Warner Music and Sony BMG’s RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) in alleged p2P file sharing cases whose veracity is also open to considerable doubt.
Safenet was hired by Communist China to provide DRM (Digital Restrictions Management) to hopefully stop people from sharing Beijing Olympics broadcasts originating in China.
Best of luck with that.
Meanwhile, the Big 4 record labels contend files shared equal sales lost and are suing their own customers in a fruitless attempt to force them away from independent online music sellers into the arms of corporate-supplied sites.
The Big 4 enforcement unit is using unsupported MediaSentry data to carry the cases forward, with US students now bearing the brunt of the attacks.
Pillory the people
Some 40,000 people, including very young children, are accused of being “massive online infringers” of music owned by the RIAA’s masters.
A multi-million-dollar PR dis- and misinformation mainstream media blitz has created the false impression that RIAA court cases have resulted in the successful prosecution of thousands of people for the ‘crime’ of ‘file sharing,’ even though file sharing is perfectly legal.
Moreover, only one case has reached the civil courts. And even that looks like being overturned by the same judge who heard it.
Meanwhile, the the RIAA continues to pillory the very people upon whom Vivendi Universal (France), Sony BMG (Japan and Germany), EMI (Britain), and Warner Music (US) depend for their very survival, with MediaSentry supplying much of the specious evidence used in the cases.
MediaSentry is, supposedly, an independent company.
And yet, in a ComputerWorld story on MediaSentry’s ‘investigative’ activities, a SafeNet spokeswoman says the company isn’t at “liberty” to comment on ongoing litigation.
Instead, “She referred further inquiries to the RIAA,” it said.
Here’s a digest of some, but by no means all, of p2pnet’s MediaSentry coverage.
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A question or two for RIAA PI MediaSentry … August 14th, 2008
p2pnet news view P2P | RIAA News:- “In UMG v Lindor, when the defendant got close to taking MediaSentry’s deposition, the RIAA tried to fold up its tents and run home to Mommy.” That’s Recording Industry vs The People’s Ray Beckerman. And he’s again asking for help from the online community. “Now that MediaSentry is being investigated all over the place, and giving contradictory and false responses, I’ve pointed out to other lawyers that this is a good time to take MediaSentry’s deposition,” he says, going on: “In the comments to that post, people are starting to weigh in with some interesting suggestions for deposition questions to be posed to MediaSentry. “I’d be interested in what the Slashdot community can provide, especially on the technical issues.” By way of example, “Something I’d be sure to ask Media Sentry is how they synchronize the clock of their detection server with the clock on the Target ISP’s DHCP server. Without them matching closely false identifications can easily take place,” says David Donahue, going on »»»
Another thing I’d love to ask them regards how and who set up and runs their detection server. If this server device is to be legally treated like a tape recorder, video camera or radar gun then only the people who built, setup and maintain it can testify to it’s accurate calibration.
RIAA MediaSentry in new Michigan student case, August 12th, 2008
p2pnet news view | RIAA News:- Michigan students are determined RIAA ‘investigator’ MediaSentry is held accountable for practicing as a private eye in the state without a license. It’s owner, SafeNet, has been hired by China’s Communist leaders to provide DRM (Digital Restrictions Management) for in-country live and on-demand online video footage of the 2008 Summer Olympic Games. They must not have been aware of the company’s considerably less than sterling reputation in the West. Central Michigan University filed a complaint against it with Michigan’s Department of Labor and Economic Growth, “at least the second such complaint in Michigan, the first having gotten the RIAA’s unlicensed investigation firm into a pickle when its lawyer, responding to the accusations, made statements directly contradicting statements he’d made a month earlier in UMG v Lindor,” said Recording Industry vs The People’s Ray Beckerman recently, going on: “The 32-page complaint (PDF) cites to MediaSentry’s problems in 8 other states, including the Massachusetts cease and desist letter, and cites to MediaSentry’s own promotional materials and the RIAA’s court papers as evidence of the illegal activity.” This means there are now at least three cases pending against MediaSentry in Michigan’s Department of Labor and Economic Growth.
RIAA goes after Michigan State University coach, August 6th, 2008
p2pnet news view | RIAA News:- Stacy Slobodnik-Stoll (right) is a thief and a criminal, according to Vivendi Universal, EMI, Warner Music and Sony BMG philosophy. She’s a “massive online distrtibutor” of corporate ‘product,” says the Big 4’s RIAA. She’s also Michigan State University’s women’s golf coach and , “As she enters her 11th season at the helm, Stacy Slobodnik-Stoll continues to carry the Spartan women’s golf program into the regional and national spotlight year after year,” says her MSU Spartans profile. If Big 4 machinations don’t get in the way, that is. No doubt much, if not all, of their so-called “evidence’ against her was collected by RIAA ‘private eye’ MediaSentry.
RIAA ‘MediaSentry’ owner hired by China, August 7th, 2008
p2pnet news view RIAA | DRM | P2P:- It seems somehow fitting that SafeNet, a leader in digital wrongs and owner of seriously discredited RIAA ‘private eye’ MediaSentry, has been hired by the People’s Republic of China.SafeNet is to provide DRM (Digital Restrictions Management) for in-country live and on-demand online video footage of the 2008 Summer Olympic Games, it boasts. DRM consumer controls are meant to stop copying. However, companies in all sectors have long been abandoning it as expensive, impractical, unworkable —- and unethical. However, in regimes such as China, whose citizens live under rigid control, DRM offers many interesting possibilities for suppression and repression.
The RIAA, the truth and Marie Lindor, July 9th, 2008
p2pnet news | RIAA News:- “These people will say ANYTHING. “Now let’s hope that the Lindor court finds out about what they’ve been saying in Michigan, and the Michigan authorities find out what they’ve been saying in Brooklyn.” That’s Ray Beckerman on Recording Industrry vs The People. He’s representing Marie Lindor, the New York health aide Vivendi Universal, EMI, Warner Music and Sony BMG’s RIAA says is a massive online infringer of copyrighted music, knowing full well she’s nothing of the kind. In the middle of it all is MediaSentry, a so-called RIAA investigator with few, if any, PI credentials.
North Carolina RIAA MediaSentry probe, July 12th, 2008
p2pnet news view | RIAA News:- RIAA “investigator” MediaSentry has been caught with its undergarments around its ankles. Again. Massachusetts State Police at the beginning of the year MediaSentry to cease and desist, according to court papers filed by a Boston University student who was asking the court to to quash an RIAA subpoena . So did it C&D? Nope. Now, “We have just learned from court papers filed in Capitol v. Doe, one of the six (6) John Doe cases targeting North Carolina State University students in Raleigh, North Carolina, that a Grievance Committee hearing, to determine the existence of probable cause, has been scheduled by North Carolina’s Private Protective Services Board, in connection with the complaints that have been filed charging MediaSentry with the crime of unlicensed investigation,” says Recording Industry vs The People.
LimeWire: RIAA, MediaSentry ‘anti-pirate’ app, May 13th, 2008
p2pnet news | RIAA News:- P2P file-sharing application LimeWire is routinely castigated by Vivendi Universal, EMI, Warner Music and Sony BMG and their RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America). But, says Catherine Rampell in the Chronicle of Higher Education, neither the RIAA, the Big 4 nor their ‘investigator,’ MediaSentry, banned by the state police in Massachusetts, could get along without it. Here’s her story>>>
To catch college students trading copyrighted songs online, the Recording Industry Association of America uses the same file-sharing software that online pirates love, an RIAA representative told The Chronicle at the organization’s offices during a private demonstration of how it catches alleged music pirates. He also said the group does not single out specific colleges in its investigations. The demonstration was given by an RIAA employee who would speak only on condition of anonymity because of concern that he would receive hate e-mail. The official explained that one way the RIAA identifies pirates is by using LimeWire, a popular peer-to-peer file-sharing program that is free online and used by many college students (there is also a more-robust version of the program sold for a small fee).
RIAA MediaSentry violates C&D order, April 10th, 2008
p2pnet news | RIAA News:- Yesterday, p2pnet posted seriously discredited RIAA private eye MediaSentry was complying with an all-out ban filed by the Massachusetts State Police. Has MediaSentry Ceased and Desisted in Massachusetts? – we asked a state certification officer, “As far as I know, they have,” she responded. But according to Recording Industry vs The People, the company, owned by SafeNet, has violated the order.
RIAA MediaSentry: shut down in Massachusetts, April 9th, 2008
p2pnet news | RIAA News:- Massachusetts state police have ordered MediaSentry, the unlicensed ‘investigator’ for Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG’s RIAA, to cease and desist, according to court papers filed by a Boston University student who’s asking the court to to quash an RIAA subpoena, p2pnet posted in February, continuing >>>
MediaSentry perpetrates ’spoofing,’ a seedy practice used to try to trick people into downloading fake files, or to get information they later hope to use in P2P filesharing lawsuits,.as one of its special activities on behalf of the RIAA. One of the first, if not the first, people to show MediaSentry in its true light was disabled Oregon mother Tanya Andersen who, with her lawyer, Lory Lybeck, sent RIAA attorneys scuttling off, their tails between their legs.
MediaSentry: have you checked your state? March 25th, 2008
p2pnet news | RIAA News:- Is Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG ‘investigator’ MediaSentry operating illegally in your state?” – p2pnet asked by way of a follow-up to MediaSentry: RIAA can of worms. The Massachusetts State police have banned the company, it’s been accused of operating without a licence in Oregon, Florida, Texas and New York, and similar charges have been levelled at it in Michigan, we said in Is RIAA’s MediaSentry illegal in YOUR state?, going on ……………..
MediaSentry: RIAA can of worms, March 10th, 2008
p2pnet news special | RIAA News:- Ray Beckerman and Lory Lybeck (top right) have a lot in common. They live and work at opposite ends of the US, Lybeck in the Pacific NorthWest, Beckerman in the East. But they’re both lawyers, and they both represent RIAA victims. And that’s not all. They’re among the increasing number of legal professionals not only in America, but also in Europe and elsewhere, who want to know more —- a lot more —- about evidence gathering and acquisition methods employed by Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG ‘investigative’ company MediaSentry. Lybeck acts for Oregon mother Tanya Andersen (top left) who, like the thousands of other innocent Big 4 victims, is falsely accused of being a massive online illegal distributor of copyrighted music files. She and Lybeck fought the Big 4’s high-priced RIAA hired legal guns to a stand-still and were the first to accuse MediaSentry of investigating without a license, a view clearly upheld by the Massachusetts State police which has banned the company from operating in its jurisdiction. One of Beckerman’s clients is Marie Lindor, a New York home health aide. On a scale of 1 to 10, her knowledge of computers is about -50. And yet the RIAA accuses her of illegally distributing copyrighted music files online. Through Beckerman, she recently told MediaSentry to put up, or shut up.
RIAA victim tells MediaSentry, put up or shut up, March 3rd, 2008
p2pnet news | RIAA News:- When several years ago Marie Lindor found the RIAA camped on her metaphorical doorstep, blood in its eye, she could have had no idea what was to come. A home health aide from Brooklyn, New York, she quite literally barely knew how to even switch a computer on. She didn’t know what the RIAA meant, either. But that changed, and quickly, because there were Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG and their RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America), publicly accusing her of being a massive online distributor of copyrighted music. Nothing could have been more ridiculous. Except, perhaps, similar accusations levelled at Rae-Jay Schwartz, bound to her wheelchair by the deadly disease of the central nervous system, multiple sclerosis. Or Larry Scantlebury, an ex-Vietnam helicopter pilot who died of a brain aneurysm before the RIAA could really get down to blackening him and his name. Or disabled mother Tanya Andersen and her 10-year-old daughter, Kylee, both harried relentlessly from pillar to post by the RIAA. Or Debbie Foster. Or Patti Santangelo. Or any of the other approximately 30,000 innocent people falsely and wrongly accused of the non-existent crime of file sharing. Tens of millions of Americans share music with each other online every minute of every an hour of every day. The RIAA and the Big 4 angrily declare that shouldn’t be happening. When someone shares with someone else, it costs one or other or all of Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG sales, they claim, calling people who do this criminals and thieves.
Failed MediaSentry cover-up, February 19th, 2008
p2pnet news | RIAA News:- MediaSentry has, to use the vernacular, dropped another bollock, panicking as the pigeons flock home to roost. In a lame bid to try to cover up some of the error(s) of its ways, it’s deleted “investigation” and “gathering evidence for litigation” from its web sites. “Ray, I am sending you a PDF file printed from MediaSentry’s web page on 2/3/08,” says a Recording Industry vs The People reader, going on:
In the fine print on the left hand side of each of the pages, MediaSentry claims that it [provides] “Investigative Services”, and that “Safenet has extensive experience gathering evidence for civil/criminal litigation and prosecution against those who engage in unauthorized online content distribution”. When I checked the web page again yesterday, 2/18/08, The page had been completely changed. Gone from the web page are the terms investigation, and information gathering, and they are replaced with terms like “intelligence services” and “Globally detect, track and deter the unauthorized distribution”. Looks like a MediaSentry is trying to cover its tracks.
It do. Did they try to explain the reasons behind the changes to Doug Jacobson or Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG’s RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America), do you think?
Hilarious RIAA training video online, February 18th, 2008
p2pnet news | RIAA News:- It’s called In Trial and it starts off with a judge’s gavel slamming down onto a wooden pad. Hard. The latest Hollywood courtroom flick? Lawyer drama, Yes. Hollywood, No —- unless the MPAA had a hand in it which, these days, is entirely possible. Because In Trial is a flick made jointly by Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG’s RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) and the National District Attorneys Association, with Jonathan Lamy, Cara Duckworth and Liz Kennedy (no ladies first at the RIAA) as the points of contact. Starring ex-prosecutor Deborah Robinson and Frank Walters (right), an ex-Maryland State trooper, it was made to “assist in the training of U.S. prosecutors responsible for handling music piracy cases”. It includes footage from “surveillance” videos and, “techniques on how to identify illegal sound recordings and highlights,” not to mention, “examples of how illegal music is sold”. And here’s the kicker. It even claims to provide instructions on, and we quote, “qualifying an RIAA investigator as an expert”. So that’s where Doug Jacobson and MediaSentry acquired their skills! 
RIAA: egg on face over Ray Beckerman, February 7th, 2008
p2pnet news | RIAA News:- RIAA lawyers are becoming dazed and confused as day after day, they try to con US judges into believing Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG customers, including very young children, are criminals and thieves. Yesterday, in Arista v Does 1-21, targeting Boston University students, the Big 4’s RIAA tried to block the EFF’s (Electronic Frontier Foundation) request for permission to file an amicus curiae brief, says Recording Industry vs The People. This is the case where Big 4 unlicensed ‘investigator’ MediaSentry was told to take a hike, by order of the Massachusetts state police. It’s now also the cause of serious RIAA embarrassment centering on Ray Beckerman, the famous New York lawyer who runs Recording Industry vs The People, the unique online repository of scores of documents relating to Big 4 sue ‘em all cases.
Cease & Desist, RIAA MediaSentry ordered, February 5th, 2008
p2pnet news | RIAA News:- Massachusetts state police have ordered MediaSentry, the unlicensed “investigator” for Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG’s RIAA, to cease and desist, according to court papers filed by a Boston University student who’s asking the court to to quash an RIAA subpoena MediaSentry perpetrates ’spoofing,’ a seedy practice used to try to trick people into downloading fake files, or to get information they later hope to use in P2P filesharing lawsuits,.as one of its special activities on behalf of the RIAA. One of the first, if not the first, people to show MediaSentry in its true light was disabled Oregon mother Tanya Andersen who, with her lawyer, Lory Lybeck, sent RIAA attorneys scuttling off, their tails between their legs.
2007
RIAA named in first class action, August 16th, 2007
p2pnet news | RIAA News:- In cases which should by rights have been initiated by the Bush government on behalf of innocent families across America, falsely attacked by Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG, RIAA victims Tanya Andersen and Michelle Santangelo are determined to make the Big 4, as well as companies involved in the sue ‘em all morass, pay, literally and figuratively, for the distress they’ve caused and are still causing. Andersen, a disabled mother living in Oregon, has launched the first class action against the RIAA and the members of the Big 4 organised music cartel. And in the second lawsuit, Santangelo, from New York, has filed a cross-suit against Sharman Networks’ Kazaa, AOL and Matthew Seckler, whom she says installed Kazaa software on her computer without her knowledge or permission. Anderson and her ten-year-old daughter, Kylee, have been harried by the RIAA from pillar to post. “I think it is really disgusting what the RIAA and these other companies have done to me and people like me,” Andersen told p2pnet today. “They have made my life a mess, put my life on hold, and created a lot of damage. I’ve been treated like a criminal for something I never did. My life will never be the same. I feel these companies should be ashamed and held responsible for what they have done. I don’t care who someone is, they shouldn’t be allowed to attack an innocent person and make their life a living nightmare. “I hope what I’m doing can help not only myself, but others like myself, who have been put under this same type of unnecessary attack.” In a request for class action status which, if and when successful, will ultimately include every one of the 30,000 or so RIAA victims, Andersen and her lawyer, Lory Lybeck (right), are looking to recover compensation for the, “significant damages caused by the Defendants” as well as punitive damages, statutory penalties, litigation fees and expenses and equitable relief. Her amended complaint is impressive. She’s citing negligence, fraud, negligent misrepresentation, federal and state RICO, abuse of process, malicious prosecution, intentional infliction of emotional distress, violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, trespass, invasion of privacy, libel and slander, deceptive business practices, misuse of copyright law, and civil conspiracy. On the wrong end of the class action are
- The RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America)
- MediaSentry and its owner, SafeNet
- The Settlement Support Center, a Washington company operating as the debt collection arm for the defendants’ “coordinated enterprise to pursue a scheme of threatening and intimidating litigation”
- Atlantic Recording Corporation, Priority Records, Capitol Records, UMG Recordings, and BMG Music who filed Atlantic Recording Corp., et al v. Andersen, No. CV 05-933 AS (D Or) action against Andersen
The Pirate Bay takes on MediaSentry, July 5th, 2007
p2pnet news | music:- [Spoofing is] an appropriate response to the problem of peer-to-peer piracy,” an
d “a self-help measure that is completely lawful … I think it would be crazy if record labels, or motion picture studios or any other owners of content didn’t take advantage of those kinds of measures.”So says deputy RIAA spin-doctor-in-chief Cary Sherman (right), quoted in MediaSentry sales waffle. Spoofing is a shady practice used by the corporate entertainment cartels to try to trick people into downloading fake files to discourage them from going after the real ones, or to get information they (the cartels) later hope to use in P2P filesharing lawsuits. Now the Pirate Bay wants MediaDefender to walk the plank to bankruptcy ….
Tanya Andersen sues the RIAA, June 25th, 2007
p2pnet.net news:- Tanya Andersen, a disabled Oregon mother, and her 10-year-old daughter, Kylee, have for the last three years been living a nightmare, thanks to Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG’s RIAA. But now Andersen is turning the tables on the Big 4 enforcer, going after it and other intimidation units for malicious prosecution. She’s suing Atlantic Recording Corporation, Priority Records, Capitol Records, UMG Recordings, and BMG Music; the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America); MediaSentry owner Safenet; and, Settlement Support Center, says Recording Industry vs The People. “They made life horrible and did a lot of damage,” she told p2pnet. “People need to fight back. It’s really wrong they can abuse their power like this. It was three years – two years for the lawsuit and a year when they were harassing me. It was horrible. “It’s really important for me to tell people what they’ve done and I’m really thankful that I’m able to do that.”
RIAA doesn’t like ‘expert’ motion, May 15th, 2007
p2pnet.net news:- Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG’s RIAA is betting the ball game on MediaSentry, the oft-criticised p2p investigative tool used in many RIAA cases, and on Dr Doug Jacobson (right), an “expert” in computer forensics.
Marie Lindor, 57, is a self-confessed computer ignoramus who’s said by the RIAA to be a massive online distributor of copyrighted digital music files owned by the RIAA’s masters, the members of the big four music cartel. “In truth, Mrs Lindor isn’t an online desperado,” said p2pnet yesterday. “She’s a nurse’s aide, a responsible position she’s held for the last 20 years,” going on:
To her, a chip is a French fry and a computer a mystery, and she could no more “distribute” a digitized music file than she could fly to the moon. But that doesn’t play well in mainstream media stories or RIAA press releases and statements. So she’s painted as an example of the “criminal” p2p file sharers who are “devastating” the Big 4, EMI (Britain), Vivendi Universal (France), Sony BMG (Japan and Germany) and Warner Music (US).
Anyone less likely to be an online distributor is hard to imagine.
Pouwelse: witness in RIAA case, May 14th, 2007
p2pnet.net news special:- It’s going to be interesting when Dr Doug Jacobson, a self-acclaimed expert in software used to monitor or block p2p file sharing applications, meets Dr Johan Pouwelse (right), a universally acknowledged expert in next-generation p2p technology. 
Jacobson, based in the US, was hired by Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG’s RIAA to ferret around in a computer hard drive owned by Marie Lindor to show she is all the RIAA claims she is. Aged 57, she’s a criminal and a thief, someone who illegally distributed copyrighted music ‘product’ online, according to the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America). Pouwelse, based at the Delft University in Holland and a visiting scientist at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), has now been hired by Mrs Lindor’s lawyer, Ray Beckerman, to demonstrate conclusively why ‘evidence’ derived by Jacobson during his investigation, isn’t worth a light.
Lindor vs the RIAA: round I0, May 17, 2008
p2pnet.net news:- The “massive distribution” lawsuit lodged by the multi-billion dollar Big 4 record labels against Marie Lindor, a 57-year-old New York nurse’s aid, continues to pick up steam. Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG’s RIAA has produced Dr Doug Jacobson as an expert witness. Hired to investigate Lindor’s hard drive, Jacobson was presented as someone who knows his way around computer systems. He was to have unearthed hard evidence of her alleged online digital music distribution activities. Instead, in a lengthy deposition, Lindor’s lawyer, Ray Beckerman (right), easily demonstrated Jacobson wasn’t quite the shining light the RIAA had hoped he would be. In the latest in a to-and-fro series of motions and counter motions, Beckerman asked that Jacobson be excluded because, he said, the latter’s testimony suggested he didn’t meet the high standards demanded for expert testimony. Richard Gabriel, a lawyer with Holmes Roberts & Owen, the RIAA’s (Recording Industry Association of America) current chief legal eagles, challenged the motion, and now Beckerman has come back with a detailed list of reasons explaining why Jacobson’s testimony doesn’t amount to a hill of beans, and why Gabriel’s bid should be dismissed.
RIAA expert’s ‘junk science’, March 1st, 2007
p2pnet.net news:- An amazing, and revealing, document has just surfaced in the RIAA’s fight to force customers of its owners, EMI (Britain), Vivendi Universal (France), Sony BMG (Japan and Germany) and Warner Music (US), to buy their digital downloads. It’s deposition given by Dr Doug Jacobson who, on behalf of the RIAA, examined a mirror image of a hard drive owned by RIAA victim Marie Lindor, the Brooklyn, New York, home health aide accused by the Big 4 of illegally distributing their music online. “Now I ask the tech community to review this all-important transcript, and bear witness to the shoddy ‘investigation’ and ‘junk science’ upon which the RIAA has based its litigation war against the people,” says Lindor’s lawyer, Ray Beckerman, the man who also runs Recording Industry vs The People. “The computer scientists among you will be astounded that the RIAA has been permitted to burden our court system with cases based upon such arrant and careless nonsense.” The quality and qualifications of so-called expert witnesses hired by the Big 4’s RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) have been repeatedly called into question in North America and Europe, in particular, MediaSentry and anti-p2p and anti-file sharing technology developed by Audible Magic.
2006
RIAA tries to bury Dutch finding, December 20th, 2006
p2pnet.net News:- Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG, the members of the Big 4 Organized Music cartel, are seriously alarmed because New York judge Robert L. Levy might see a Dutch court’s written decision condemning material submitted by MediaSentry, an online scalp hunter hired by the RIAA to come up with ‘proof’ of file sharing on the part of RIAA victims. So the Big 4 instructed their RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) to get an English-language transcript stricken from the UMG v Lindor hearing.
Utrecht MediaSentry decision, December 18th, 2006
p2pnet.net News:- To say so-called MediaSentry evidence offered up by the the Big 4 Organized Music cartel in its sue ‘em all court cases is suspect is a very considerable understatement. Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG are suing their own customers in an increasingly desperate attempt to convince online music lovers that buying over-priced, low fidelity ‘product’ is the thing to do. The Big 4 use the excuse that files shared equal sales lost and that hundreds of millions of men, women and children around the world are hard-core dedicated “criminals” and “thieves” bent on “massive” illegal online distribution. The Big 4, worth uncountable billions of dollars, claim they’re being “devastated” by file sharers, among whom they’re naming Marie Lindor, a New York mother who barely knows one end of a computer from the other. With their RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) carrying the ball, Warner Music (US), EMI (Britain), Vivendi Universal (France) and Sony BMG (Japan and Germany) say data supplied by MediaSentry are enough to support their claims. And they say this despite the fact the material has been called into question time and time again. Ray Beckerman, who’s defending Lindor, has been trying to get sight of MediaSentry material and recently cited a Dutch appeals court decision in Foundation v UPC Nederland, “agreeing with the lower court that the MediaSentry investigation by Tom Mizzone was insufficiently reliable to form a basis for directing ISP’s to turn over confidential customer information,” as he says on Recording Industry vs The People.
RIAA: trying it on with MediaSentry December 17th, 2006
p2pnet.net News:- If you’re corporate, or corporate linked, you’re corporate cool. It won’t matter what you get into, how often you screw up, or whether you’re credible or totally incredible. Ask SafeNet’s MediaSentry, an online scalp-hunter held up by Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG, the members of the Big 4 Organized Music cartel, as well as Hollywood, as honourable, authoritative and accurate and whose findings are routinely flaunted as reliable court evidence. But on Recording Industry vs The People, Ray Beckerman, the lawyer defending New York home health aide Marie Lindor, continues to demand that the cartel’s RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) either puts up verifiable details of MediaSentry ‘evidence’ it’s using in ‘file sharing’ allegations against his client, or shuts up.
RIAA on the hook in Stubbs case,October 27th, 2006
p2pnet.net News:- Online bounty hunter MediaSentry has again scored a negative appearance in an RIAA case, as has corporate download application Kazaa. Both companies feature in a new debacle where the Big Four Organized Music cartel’s RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) tries to wriggle out of an unsuccessful attempt to pillory a file sharer. MediaSentry told the RIAA Tallie Stubbs had distributed music with Kazaa and the RIAA then tried to terrorize Tallie Stubbs, who’d “likened the RIAA’s tactics to extortion’,” into settling. But Stubbs said she didn’t know anything about the RIAA’s claims, demanding that the ‘trade’ unit provide specific details. It ignored her, and also ignored a declaration by her lawyer, Marilyn Barringer-Thomson, that her client had had nothing to do with copyright infringement. But, “Plaintiffs continued to proceed with the filing of a lawsuit against Defendant although Plaintiffs knew or had reason to know that said Defendant should not be a party to any case involving copyright infringement by use of a computer and the internet,” said Barringer-Thomson in a court document. Now the RIAA wants out of the Stubbs case, and if you’re a regular reader and this all looks familiar, you’re probably thinking of Oklahoma nurse Debbie Foster, also represented by Barringer-Thomson.
2005
MediaSentry’s Dutch p2p foul-up, November 14th, 2005
p2p news / p2pnet: Organized Music fink firm MediaSentry was in July once again found to have presented shoddy and, ultimately, extremely costly, results to one of its clients. It blew the game for the CRIA (Canadian Recording Industry Association of America) in 2004 when the latter demanded that a Canadian court order five ISPs to hand over the names of clients. Justice Konrad von Finckenstein was singularly and quotably unimpressed by MediaSentry ‘evidence’. Then the company blew it again in Holland when the District Court of Utrecht decided MediaSentry’s investigation of p2p file sharing wasn’t only flawed, it was “unlawful,” ruling that Dutch ISPs didn’t have to provide customer information to the CRIA’s Netherlands counterparts. Recording Industry vs The People already has MediaSentry boss Gary Millin’s Toronto deposition online. Now it’s obtained a transcript of the MediaSentry’s Dutch Disaster. Interestingly, Delft University of Technology’s Johan Pouwelse and Henk Sips were expert witnesses in the Dutch case. Professor Sips leads the Parallel and Distributed Systems (PDS) research group, and Dr Pouwelse works within the PDS group and also conducts and coordinates p2p file sharing research.
(The pic at the top is with apologies to Private Eye )
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August 13th, 2008 at 12:36 pm
Another lovely story about Phorm.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/08/13/phorm_us_tests/
This time spying on the Americans. (fucking bastards)