Jeremy Kirk. Antipiracy Group’s Tactics Violate Swiss Law. InfoWorld. Jan. 25, 2008. This is another novel theory of the privacy issues that are raised when the music industry uses private firms to track file sharing networks for alleged copyright infringement. We first heard about this approach late last year, when the University of Oregon questioned the authority MediaSentry had to engage in investigative tracking on the RIAA’s behalf. The University argued, among other things, that MediaSentry’s tracking activities may be illegal because the Maryland-based company does not hold a investigator’s license in Oregon.

(Editor’s Note: Copycense editors originally commented on this article in the Jan. 29, 2008, edition of Copycense Clippings.)

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Tim Wu. Has AT&T Lost Its Mind? Slate. Jan. 16, 2008. Columbia law professor Wu rhetorically poses the obvious question in response to news that AT&T is considering proposals to filter content, ostensibly to halt alleged copyright infringement. Wu delves more deeply into the “safe harbor” provisions of Section 512 than we did when we first reported this story in last week’s Clippings, and offers some interesting thoughts about why AT&T would even consider such an effort.

(Editor’s Note: Copycense editors originally commented on this article in the Jan. 22, 2008, edition of Copycense Clippings.)

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projectb15ck. UCSC Network Woes. Jan. 9, 2008. According to an e-mail within the body of the post, the information technology department at University of California, Santa Cruz is using Cisco’s Clean Access appliance and software to “help speed up the network for legitimate uses and reduce the risk of ‘accidental’ copyright infringement.” In the e-mail, John Rocchio , a UCSC IT administrator, says Clean Access will be configured to block file sharing services such as Gnutella and Bittorrent. The poster notes UCSC is a public university, therefore it is spending public funds to block Internet access. The unnamed writer asks incisively what difference is there between UCSC’s action’s and Comcast’s reported filtering of P2P traffic.

(Editor’s Note: Copycense editors originally commented on this article in the Jan. 15, 2008, edition of Copycense Clippings, and it was an Article of the Week selection.)

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Bits (The New York Times). AT&T and Other I.S.P.’s May Be Getting Ready to Filter. Jan. 8, 2008. Apparently not content with the “safe harbor” provisions that the Digital Millennium Copyright Act affords (it and other ISPs) pursuant to Section 512(c) of the Copyright Act, the former Ma Bell floats a filtering trial balloon at the Consumer Electronics Show. Comcast already faces scrutiny concerning its alleged filtering of Bittorrent traffic, so it will be interesting to see how this issue plays among Washington regulators who have jurisdiction over communications and trade.

(Editor’s Note: Copycense editors originally commented on this article in the Jan. 15, 2008, edition of Copycense Clippings.)

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Mike Elgan. I Want to Live in a Surveillance Society. Computerworld. Jan. 3, 2008. We’ve heard before the argument that one of the the best ways to limit privacy violations is to subject everyone (including government and law enforcement officials) to the very same surveillance they seek to impose on citizens. This article expresses a related view, namely when we discuss privacy and security, we should pay as much attention to keeping public what should be public as we pay to keeping private what should be private.

(Editor’s Note: Copycense editors originally commented on this article in the Jan. 8, 2008, edition of Copycense Clippings.)

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Bits (The New York Times). As Ask Erases Little, Google and Others Keep Writing About You. Dec. 12, 2007. On the same day a member of Congress wrote to Google asking about its search practices, Times reporter Saul Hansell talks about Google’s actual or prospective ability to mine its data to do behavioral marketing. Google’s proposed $3.1 billion deal with DoubleClick likely doesn’t hang on the answer it gives to Rep. Joe Barton, but we’ll bet Google will try to avoid giving Barton a response on that very issue until the DoubleClick deal is final.

(Editor’s Note: Copycense editors originally commented on this article in the Dec. 18, 2007, edition of Copycense Clippings.)

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Jill Aho. University Accuses RIAA of ‘Spying’ On Students. Oregon Daily Emerald. Dec. 3, 2007. After the Oregon Department of Justice moved to quash an RIAA subpoena that sought the identities of University of Oregon students who allegedly committed copyright infringement, attorney general Hardy Myers’ office returns with another motion. This second motion alleges RIAA and MediaSentry are “spying” on Oregon residents. MediaSentry is a Maryland-based company that locates and identifies IP addresses that the RIAA targets in its litigation campaign against consumers. Part of OAG’s new claim is that MediaSentry is an investigator, and as such, not licensed to do business in the state of Oregon. Now that is awfully novel argument that takes a pair to present to a judge.

(Editor’s Note: Copycense editors originally commented on this article in the Dec. 4, 2007, edition of Copycense Clippings.)

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