p2pnet news view | RIAA News:- Hapless RIAA not-so-private private eye MediaSentry was long ago identified as a sham by the P2P community.

Now, a new RIAA victim from Kansas City, Mandy Johnson, a full time stay-at-home day care worker for young children, has accused it of computer fraud and abuse, and civil conspiracy.

Included in the valuable corporate ‘product’ she’s accused by Vivendi Universal, EMI, Warner Music and Sony BMG’s RIAA of stealing are “Fuckers And Friends”, “You Know I`m a Hoe”, and “I Wanna Fuck Your Sister.”

She also says the company, “engaged in the investigation business without a license,” says Recording Industry vs The People.

‘Rejected contentions’

MediaSentry, “strongly disputed accusations, made by legal opponents of the Recording Industry Association of America and some state officials, that the company is engaging in what amounts to an unlicensed private investigation practice as it gathers evidence for the RIAA to use in music piracy lawsuits,” said Computerworld recently, going on

“Through its parent company, SafeNet Inc., Belcamp, Md.-based c that it needs to obtain private investigator’s licenses in order to legally continue its work on behalf of the RIAA in many states.

“The provider of online content-protection services also denied that it infiltrates the computers of users in search of evidence to back up copyright infringement lawsuits filed by the RIAA, as some have suggested. All of the information gathered by MediaSentry for the RIAA is publicly available on peer-to-peer (P2P) networks and has been made openly available by the users of such networks themselves, SafeNet spokeswoman Donna St. Germain said via e-mail.”

Among other things, it’s been charged with operating illegally across the US. It’s already banned in Massachusetts and may soon be ordered to suspend its activities in Michigan.

Following standard operating procedure, using MediaSentry ‘evidence’  as a weapon, the RIAA tried to extort an unknown amount from Johnson.

“On September 8, 2003, five years ago today, the recording industry sued 261 American music fans for sharing songs on peer-to-peer file sharing networks, embarking on an unprecedented legal campaign against its own customers,” she says in a court document.

“Since then, over 30,000 lawsuits have been filed against alleged copyright infringers.”

Actually, it’s more like 40,000 but be that as it may, “These lawsuits include actual pirates and infringers, uninformed consumers, and apathetic youth, disgruntled by the record industry`s lackluster offerings and antiquated business model< she says.

“But among those lawsuits are also suits against dead people, children, the disabled, people who do not own computers, or simply the wrong person. ”

Tanya Andersen

The methods behind its so-called investigations have been shot down in flames several times by experts but, “Through its parent company, SafeNet Inc., Belcamp, Md.-based MediaSentry rejected contentions that it needs to obtain private investigator’s licenses in order to legally continue its work on behalf of the RIAA in many states,” says ComputerWorld.

In charges bearing a remarkable resemblance to those levelled at Tanya Andersen, the Oregon disabled mother who beat the RIAA to a standstill, the Vivendi Universal, EMI, Warner Music and Sony BMG enforcer “irresponsibly and falsely” accused Johnson downloading “gangster rap” music at 5:55 in the morning, says her lawyer, Arthur K. Shafer, going on »»»

 Ms. Johnson does not like “gangster rap” and has never downloaded music. The record companies, acting upon information collected from a third-party, contacted Ms. Johnson and accused her of being a copyright thief and pirate.
The record companies have recklessly targeted and harassed Ms. Johnson much to her great worry and distress.

Prior to the filing of the present lawsuit and upon receipt of the pre-litigation threat letter, Ms. Johnson attempted to contact Plaintiffs to prove her innocence to the Plaintiffs and explained that this must be a case of mistaken identity.

She tried to explain that she listens to country music, not the music selection found in the Complaint, which include songs titled, “Fuckers And Friends” [sic], “You Know I`m a Hoe” [sic], and “I Wanna Fuck Your Sister.” [sic] The record companies responded by bringing suit in federal court.

Below is a post we put online in  2006 which might interest people following efforts by the Big 4 record companies to justify their actions which, in any sane country, would be classified as criminal »»»

RIAA: trying it on with MediaSentry – December 17, 2006

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.

Tapped by various means

The idea is that MediaSentry locates an IP address and from that, the RIAA (or any of the other many so-called trade organizations using MediaSentry) can figure out who the alleged file sharer, aka massive illegal online distributor, is or was.

An IP (internet protocol) address is like a street address. And in the same way anyone in a house can be doing literally anything, and you wouldn`t know unless you were there in person in real time, it`s impossible to know what a specific individual was doing from a computer IP address alone, unless it can be indisputably shown that absolutely no one else has, or had, access to that system in any way.

Moreover, a computer can be tapped by various means without the knowledge or permission of the user, this possibility being even more likely in the case of someone who doesn`t know a whole lot about them.

In a fascinating [read it] cross-examination of MediaSentry`s Gary Millin in 2004, he admits, We don`t have the identity of the person operating the computer, so we – we have the IP address that we could see where that piece of content was being offered from.

But, observes lawyer Charles Scott, This doesn`t take account of the problems of static or dynamic IP addresses; it doesn`t take account of wireless routers; it doesn`t take account of people using a router being behind a router; it doesn`t take account of any of those things

And Millin admits, All we can see is the IP address that that content is coming from, and it – it would depend on how a person set up a router or a wireless device to give it public access or not. If they had multiple people using that IP address is something that we can`t tell. We see just the IP address that the content is coming from.

False positives

Has anybody received `Notice of claimed infringement` from MediaSentry for IP addresses which, while registered to you or your organization, are in a range not actively in use? – asks a post on Neohapsis.

It goes on:

I recently received two notices from MediaSentry for MPAA material, each listing a single file shared via Kazaa, for two very different IP addresses for which I am a contact.

In both cases, the IP addresses reported were in fact within the range allocated, however the address shown is not only not in use, no address with the same first three octets is either used or announced via BGP, nor have they ever been publicly visible.

I see two likely possibilities – either MediaSentry is not using due diligence in verifying that the material for which they send infringement notices is actually shared from the address they show in the complaint, or somebody on the Internet is spoofing BGP route announcements for unused address space out of larger allocations.

Largely of heresay

Judges in Canada and Holland, among others, have similarly questioned MediaSentry`s veracity.

In Canada, in a case brought by RIAA clone the CRIA (Canadian Recording Industry Association of America) and which touted MediaSentry evidence, Justice Konrad von Finckenstein ruled putting music into a computer directory that might be shared remotely by someone else didn`t constitute copyright infringement under Canadian law.

Millin, then MediaSentry`s president, described MediaSentry`s findings with regard to the file-sharing activitied of the 29 unnamed defendants, said von Finckenstein. The major portons of these affidavits consist largely of heresay.

In Holland, the District Court of Utrecht decided MediaSentry`s investigation of p2p file sharing wasn`t only flawed, it was unlawful.

Evidence was given by one Thomas Mizzone III, who`s also delivered the same kind of testimony in Australia where, according to CNET News, Mizzone said IP addresses allocated for Internet service providers in Australia can be traced through scanners his company uses to, track down sound recordings and user information .

Total lack of concern

The Big 4 Organized Music cartel`s RIAA hired MediaSentry, to invade private home computers and collect personal information, said Tanya Andersen, an Oregon mother who`s suing the RIAA under the RICO (Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organization).

She was told she`d been viewed by MediaSentry downloading gangster rap music and that she`d logged on with gotenkito@kazaa.com.Ms. But Andersen doesn`t like `gangster rap,` doesn`t recognize the name `gotenkito,` isn`t awake at that time of the morning, and has never downloaded music.

The continuing victimization of Ms Anderson and the unwillingness of the record companies to conduct even the most basic investigation before turning her life upside down betrays the total lack of concern they have for any concepts of fairness, due process and the rights of the individuals who they have wrongfully targeted, her lawyer, Lory Lybeck, told p2pnet.

`Inherently unreliable`

In the Lindor case, material submitted by MediaSentry`s Tom Mizzone is inherently unreliable, states Beckerman, saying there`s a heightened need, for a thorough deposition and crossexamination of Mr. Mizzone, since the RIAA`s attorneys had revealed at the oral argument that Mr. Mizzone was the sole MediaSentry witness they were intending to call.

And, I am taking the liberty of making a post-argument submission, in opposition to the motion, of something not so readily available to the Court, and which is at the same time much more relevant, because it directly relates to the revelation by Mr. Gabriel during the oral argument that Tom Mizzone of MediaSentry is the only MediaSentry witness they are planning to produce, says Beckerman in a court document.

He`s talking about the expert witness statement by Henk Sips and Johan Pouwelse mentioned earlier and which discusses in detail, the unreliability of Mr. Mizzone`s so called `investigations`, and the decision of the District Court of Utrecht, in the Netherlands, which relied upon that declaration. These demonstrate clearly the importance of a thorough deposition and crossexamination of Mr. Mizzone as to the `instructions`, `parameters`, and `processes` of his `investigations`.

The Netherlands court refused to permit the ISP`s to divulge the information sought by the RIAA`s Netherlands counterpart, due to the unreliability of Mr. Mizzone`s `processes`, adds Beckerman.

Below is the Sips / Pouwelse witness statement:

Background and expertise

Henk Sips and Johan Pouwelse are employed by Delft University of Technology. Professor Sips leads the Parallel and Distributed Systems (PDS) research group, has decades of experience, and co-authored numerous scientific papers and books in this field. Dr. Pouwelse works within the PDS group and both conducts and coordinates Peer-to-Peer file sharing research.

The PDS group has conducted numerous measurements of Peer-to-Peer (P2P) file sharing systems since 2001. In 2003 onwards, we started the worlds largest measurement of the Bittorrent file sharing network1. As of June 2004, the Bittorrent network is the largest P2P file sharing network2. During our file sharing measurement study we followed over 100,000 files, many of which contained copyrighted works. We followed one file in detail for several months and estimated that over 90,000 people downloaded it illegally. Dr. Pouwelse has appeared before the American Federal Trade Commission to testify as an expert on P2P file sharing.

On June 8th 2005 we were asked to create this statement about P2P file sharing in general, the Kazaa network, and the MediaSentry findings under standard university contract work rules.

General statements on Peer-to-Peer

The topic of Peer-to-Peer (P2P) is attracting wide spread attention. This new technology enables people to distribute information and communicate at only marginal cost.

For example, the telephony software from Skype.com can be used to call ordinary telephones in the Argentine and Australia from The Netherlands at a rate of roughly one Euro per hour. This software only requires an Internet PC, microphone, and speakers. The Skype software exploits P2P technology to reduce telephony costs significantly. The paradigm shift of using The Internet and P2P technology for costs reduction is changing the entire telephony industry. Numerous companies are at risk of being put out of business3.

P2P file sharing is both controversial and popular. File sharing means connecting millions of computer hard disks together into a single network. Roughly two thirds of all Internet traffic consists of P2P file sharing traffic4. According to a study by Intomart GFK, more than half of the Dutch broadband users have used file sharing to download content5. Content creators are under pressure from two sides. On one side, their customers are using P2P file sharing to download movies, music, and songs for free6. On the other side, artists are also using P2P to bypass them. With P2P artists themselves can reach a worldwide audience of millions at only marginal cost. Within Kazaa, users can use micropayments to pay artists directly and download legally. The economic impact of file sharing is still poorly understood. For For instance, a leading study by Harvard researchers was unable to find a relation between illegal downloading and decreases in Audio CD sales7.

Measurements of file sharing networks

File sharing networks are difficult to measure. Only a few companies and universities in the world have the required expertise to conduct measurements of file sharing networks. It is very difficult to directly establish that a certain computer contains copyrighted works and makes them available to others through a file sharing application.

The first problem is that we need to have an understanding of the file sharing application itself. This is difficult due to the complexity of such applications and lack of detailed documentation about their inner workings. The second problem is that we often do not have physical access to the computer under investigation. When we can only observe this computer through The Internet, we are severly limited in our observational power. The third problem is that The Internet and P2P are dark places where people commit fraud and abuse. All obtained information must be treated with suspicion. Users use fraudulent means to obtain a higher download speed from their broadband ADSL connection, install abusive software to obtain higher downloads on a file sharing network (at the cost of other people), and like to fool other people with fake content on file sharing networks.

The Kazaa file sharing system

Only one detailed study has been conducted of the Kazaa file sharing network8. This study is conducted by the research group of Professor Keith Ross from Brooklyn Polytechnic University. They investigated how Kazaa operates and measured it extensively.

This research group focused the polution in Kazaa9. Pollution refers to meaningless files and mismatches between filenames and their actual content. Kazaa was found to be severly poluted. For many recent pop songs, more than 50% of the copies were polluted. Our research group at Delft University has found similar polution levels in Kazaa for all types of content.

There are three causes of pollution. First is the unintentional pollution by average users when they insert files such as credit_card_statements.doc into the system10. Second is the intentional pollution by users for fun. For example, a file named hot big blond women playing around.mpeg that contains a movie of a laughing clown. Third is the active pollution by companies in an attempt to reduce piracy. Several companies exploit weaknesses in Kazaa in order to pollute the search results of popular queries11. Their aim is to reduce the usability of Kazaa in searches for popular copyrighted works.

The Kazaa-lite software is also described in the measurements of Keith Ross`s team. This popular, modified version of the official Kazaa client provides improved performance. However, this performance gain comes at the cost of others and Kazaa-lite lies to Kazaa users to obtain more performance. This phenomenon indicates that information from the Kazaa network must be treated with suspicion.

The Kazaa software communicates with numerous other computers on The Internet during its operation. Communication can consist of transmission of advertisement data, instant messages, actual file transfers, and control traffic for maintaining the file sharing network. Kazaa has a special feature to increase file downloads, called multi-peer downloading. When the same file is present on several computers it is possible to download pieces of this file in parallel from multiple computers.

Accurate file sharing measurements

Due to the complexity of file sharing applications, limited observation powers, rampant lying, high pollution levels, and multi-peer downloading it is nearly impossible to obtain solid evidence and detailed checks are therefore required.

We believe that the following procedure takes the necessary precautions when trying to establish if a user is making copyrighted works available for download.

- Collect filenames by searching the network using keywords.

- Filter out polluted files by checking the actual content.

- Establish that a specific file can be downloaded from a certain computer. File sharing applications often talk to numerous other computers at once. Sufficient hygiene precautions should be taken by blocking traffic from all possible other computers.

- Investigate if the computer is possibly highjacked. Check if a computer is cracked, for instance, running an open proxy or a hacked Microsoft Internet connection sharing application. A thorough measurement would check if there is a significant difference in traceroute timings and Kazaa protocol response times.

- Track this computer for several days if it does not go offline for reliable IP-address translation by an ISP.

Approach of MediaSentry

The technical information provided by MediaSentry is limited and their measurement procedure is simplistic. MediaSentry did not conduct a thorough investigation such as outlined above to provide evidence of infringement.

The statement from Tom Mizzone hints in item 27 that they systematically searched the Kazaa network for certain keywords, by means of modified Kazaa software. How they resolved relevant technical problems such as superpeer hopping, NAT translation, and firewall relaying by Kazaa is unclear.

In item 28, it is stated that no actual complete file transfer took place; It was only initiated at this stage. Item 30 again hints that MediaSentry simply took filenames at face value and did not mention any correction for pollution on Kazaa. Pollution levels can be as high as 90% for some files.

Item 33 indicates that MediaSentry has no knowledge of the limitations of Kazaa in file searching. Not many of the 2,499,121 users online would be able to see the mentioned 736 files. Reliable global searching in P2P file sharing networks is still an unsolved problem. Only users connected to the same Kazaa Superpeer are guaranteed to see these files when Kazaa operates properly (roughly 100 to 150 users as measured by Prof. Keith Ross).

Item 36 states that no computer hygiene precautions where taken. The collected evidence of the spacemansam@KaZaA alias cleary contains multi-peer downloading contamination. Therefore, it is difficult to establish the contribution of the various IP-addresses. It is possible that some IP-addresses contributed 0 Bytes to an actual download, thus there was only involvement and no actual contribution.

Delft, 10 Juni 2005,

Prof. Dr. Ir. H.J. Sips
Dr. Ir. J.A. Pouwelse

References:

1 http://www.isa.its.tudelft.nl/~pouwelse/Bittorrent_Measurements_6pages.pdf
2 http://www.cachelogic.com/research/slide9.php
3 http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/01/10/skype_euro_telcos/
4 http://www.cachelogic.com/research/slide12.php
5 http://www.muziek-en-beeld.nl/Live_2005_juni/
6 http://money.cnn.com/2005/05/25/technology/piracy/
7 www.unc.edu/~cigar/papers/FileSharing_March2004.pdf
8 http://cis.poly.edu/~ross/papers/KazaaOverlay.pdf
9 http://cis.poly.edu/~ross/papers/pollution.pdf
10 http://www.hpl.hp.com/news/2002/apr-jun/kazaa.html
11 http://www.zeropaid.com/news/articles/auto/08262003a.php

Stay tuned.

Jon Newton – p2pnet

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