So my university just forwarded a copyright notice to my email...

[wustin]

I got an email from student conduct, forwarding a copyright notice from Copyright Enforcement Group (CEG TEK) of an IP address for torrenting a particular porn video and they are offering a small settlement or else I risk facing a bigger one. So I did some research on CEG TEK, turns out they're pretty much a bunch of scammers and bullies who have no agenda to take actual legal action. I shouldn't settle, contact, email them, etc. as they would have my information to match the IP address and it would be an admission of guilt. So yeah, I'm going to ignore that.

The only thing that bothers me is that my student account was placed on a hold from taking any classes next semester (I'm supposed to graduate in the spring). I called student conduct and made an appointment on Monday with the associate director of student conduct.

I will admit, I did torrent that video but it is no longer on my computer nor was it copied and distributed for money. But I'm not sure if I should admit to that during the appointment or if I should just say I had a non-student friend over who used my router. Currently I'm leaning towards to saying I did it because I'm expecting a slap on the wrist because it would be my first offense with the school for infringement.

[bhlloy]

People still torrent porn when you can stream entire movies online for free?

And that does suck, although I can't condone it now I'm glad I didn't get hauled up on this while I was in college.

[muns]

As a director of student conduct, I will tell you what I would do if you went with the student friend thing. I would point to the computer use policy, and say you are responsible for your guest, and think you were lying to me. I would also question if you and your buddy were watching porn together and the conversation would get awkward. Your reaction to that question would also help me figure out of you are lying or not.

If you owned up to it and took responsibility, I am way more lenient. College is for learning/ growing not for hard core punishing and I respect students who take responsibility for their actions. I would advise that you go this route and hope the conduct officer thinks like I do.

I would however read your computer usage policy to make sure what you might be facing as far as sanctions go though. Some of that stuff is pretty serious.

Conduct officers (especially, if they have been doing this for years) have gotten really good when sitting face to face at figuring out who is lying and who is not though. Some sanction harder for students who lie as well. Just keep that in the back of your mind when figuring out what you want to do.

[JPhillips]

I'd second muns. Know your college policy before you go into any meeting. I'd also recommend that you tell the truth. It's very unlikely lying will help you in any way.

[Toddzilla]

remind them that if they were to sanction everyone that torrented porn, the entire student body would be in for it.

[wustin]

I guess I'll tell him I did it and we'll see what goes from there. As for sanctions, besides suspension or expulsion I could be banned from using the university internet for X amount of time I think. Hopefully it's neither of those three but I could live with the latter.

[muns]

remind them that if they were to sanction everyone that torrented porn, the entire student body would be in for it.

While that is true, the difference is the college got put on notice by an outside agency.

My IT office knows everybody does this stuff and can see it occuring, and I haven't touched one porn case in my 9 years at my University. However, if we got a notice like that, that would be my first case.

Getting put on notice by an outside force, and getting caught is the issue for the college.

[wustin]

While that is true, the difference is the college got put on notice by an outside agency.

My IT office knows everybody does this stuff and can see it occuring, and I haven't touched one porn case in my 9 years at my University. However, if we got a notice like that, that would be my first case.

Getting put on notice by an outside force, and getting caught is the issue for the college.

Colleges or ISPs can be held liable if they don't forward the notice to the user of the IP address.

My only concern is if they have legal right to hand out my information to CEG TEK when I admit to what I did.

[muns]

I guess I'll tell him I did it and we'll see what goes from there. As for sanctions, besides suspension or expulsion I could be banned from using the university internet for X amount of time I think. Hopefully it's neither of those three but I could live with the latter.

I doubt you get suspended or expelled. Its not like you have done this 14,000 times and did other stuff with it. That's there for cases like that.

If they ban you for the internet, I would ask the officer if that could be for a specific amount of time for your specific ROOM. Banning the net could hurt your educational ability to do things, so I would make sure you ask if you could still use the computer lab for projects and such. As long as the hearing officer isn't an ass, that would be a reasonable accommodation.

[muns]

Colleges or ISPs can be held liable if they don't forward the notice to the user of the IP address.

My only concern is if they have legal right to hand out my information to CEG TEK when I admit to what I did.

Private or public school?

[wustin]

Private or public school?

public

[muns]

public

My guess would be this would be considered directory information, and they can.

Do you guys have a college directory on your website that anybody can just look up where your live, a phone number, a hall number, or things like that?

Most colleges have that stuff, and if all the college says is that it occurred in room 201A- its not hard to look the rest up, so they would just forward your information on over to the company that requested it and save them the extra time

[wustin]

My guess would be this would be considered directory information, and they can.

Do you guys have a college directory on your website that anybody can just look up where your live, a phone number, a hall number, or things like that?

Most colleges have that stuff, and if all the college says is that it occurred in room 201A- its not hard to look the rest up, so they would just forward your information on over to the company that requested it and save them the extra time

You'd have to be logged in to the school's servers with a student or faculty account to look up who lives where. You can look up students on the school's public domain but it doesn't tell you where they live. ISPs are only obligated to hand out geospatial information iirc?

[muns]

You'd have to be logged in to the school's servers with a student or faculty account to look up who lives where. You can look up students on the school's public domain but it doesn't tell you where they live. ISPs are only obligated to hand out geospatial information iirc?

That would be a question for the conduct officer then. I work at a Private school, and what I can do is vastly different than what my counter parts at public schools can do.

[wustin]

That would be a question for the conduct officer then. I work at a Private school, and what I can do is vastly different than what my counter parts at public schools can do.

Thanks for all the insight then I guess.

[muns]

Thanks for all the insight then I guess.

I hope it works out the best it can for ya bud

[JPhillips]

You should consider what would in essence be a no contest plea. Again, check the student handbook for potential penalties, but saying you aren't contesting the discipline, but won't admit guilt may be the way to go.

[wustin]

Well I looked it up, CEG TEK hasn't sued anyone since 2013 and they issue millions of these notices out every year so...

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

Well I looked it up, CEG TEK hasn't sued anyone since 2013 and they issue millions of these notices out every year so...

The copyright people for music, movies, etc. are all that way. They come in with a lot of bravado and noise, but it's mostly to induce payments rather than ever suing the offending party. The only time I've ever heard of a lawsuit filed was a local bar in this area that repeatedly had bands in to play in their bar and they didn't pay for any of the licensing. But this was between 800-1000 instances of violations by this guy, not just one.

[cartman]

Twenty posts in and no one has demanded what the title was of the video? We are slipping.

[wustin]

Twenty posts in and no one has demanded what the title was of the video? We are slipping.

_____ _____ POV _______________

It wasn't even that great.

[sovereignstar v2]

I've gotten a notice like that from my ISP and while they told me to knock it the hell off, they also pretty much told me to not respond to the dickheads.

[britrock88]

(lurk lurk lurk)

[CU Tiger]

I guess I am the outlier.
I wouldnt attend the meeting without counsel present or at the VERY minimum consulting with them first.

[JPhillips]

I guess I am the outlier.
I wouldnt attend the meeting without counsel present or at the VERY minimum consulting with them first.

That would be a huge escalation for a college disciplinary hearing and IMO not at all worth the money. The most likely outcome is a slap on the wrist. The only way I'd talk to counsel is if the student handbook spelled out a severe punishment.

[BishopMVP]

From my UMass experience a decade ago, a ton of people got those notices, and the school itself pretty much had a blanket policy where a first notice was just a temporary suspension until you talked to them and acknowledged you understood what you did wrong. They're not looking to kick you out of school, or even ban you from the internet, they just don't want you to illegally download stuff in the future. Now there was 1 person I knew who actually did end up having to go to a settlement, but it was Disney suing him, and for well more than 1 movie (and even in that case the school didn't punish him any more than other students.)

If it was me, I'd own up to it, take your small slap on the wrist, and like bhlloy said, not illegally torrent porn (or music) when there are so many free, easily accessible, legal, alternatives.

[DanGarion]

I see the conversation starting like this...

Conduct Guy, "So wustin it says here you downloaded ManBoyLove46InChina, is this true...?"

[wustin]

I really hope he asks me, "...so how was it?"

[wustin]

tl;dr

showed me the wikipedia page to Prenda Law, laughed about it, told me to not do it again and to email him stating I deleted the file in question.

[JAG]

I see the conversation starting like this...

Conduct Guy, "So wustin it says here you downloaded ManBoyLove46InChina, is this true...?"

"Kyle, tell me about wustin."

[Toddzilla]

"Kyle, tell me about wustin."High Quality

[Logan]

"Kyle, tell me about wustin."

I just went, found, and re-read that thread.

This is not good...message from HornsManiac enclosed... - Front Office Football Central (http://www.operationsports.com/fofc/showthread.php?t=8914)

[molson]

I'd pay for a coffee table book recounting all of the great FOFC dramas.

[RainMaker]

For the future:

Anonymous VPN Service From The Leaders | Private Internet Access (https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/)

$40 a year. Just turn it on when you want to torrent something or just go undetected. Also works nice for getting around geo IP blocks.

[mckerney]

For the future:

Anonymous VPN Service From The Leaders | Private Internet Access (https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/)

$40 a year. Just turn it on when you want to torrent something or just go undetected. Also works nice for getting around geo IP blocks.

^

In addition to the security it also works well if you have an ISP that throttles torrenting traffic.

[PilotMan]

For the future:

Anonymous VPN Service From The Leaders | Private Internet Access (https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/)

$40 a year. Just turn it on when you want to torrent something or just go undetected. Also works nice for getting around geo IP blocks.

I use Avast's VPN and it's worked great this last year.

[lighthousekeeper]

For the future:

Anonymous VPN Service From The Leaders | Private Internet Access (https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/)

$40 a year. Just turn it on when you want to torrent something or just go undetected. Also works nice for getting around geo IP blocks.

Use this link to get it for $29 instead of $40.

Private Internet Access VPN Service Holiday Sale. (https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/pages/sd-holidays-2015)

[lighthousekeeper]

For those of you that are paying for a VPN - is the only real reason to get one to mask your identity when torrenting?

[Groundhog]

I use PIA and yeah, masking my identity when torrenting is a major reason why. I download digital copies of a lot of things I own a physical copy of - music/movies/books/comics/etc. Another common reason is to give myself a US IP address for netflix/other region locked broadcasts, as a ton of stuff is just plain not available here until a long time after it is most other places.

Depending on how paranoid you are about things, I know people who use it for web browsing in general.

[mckerney]

For those of you that are paying for a VPN - is the only real reason to get one to mask your identity when torrenting?

I used to use it for free Game Pass too when that was available to the Netherlands, but the NFL stopped offering that. :(

[nilodor]

For those of you that are paying for a VPN - is the only real reason to get one to mask your identity when torrenting?

Streaming services, lots of content is geolocked, espn, netflix, etc. Good VPN's can get around this.

[NobodyHere]

I think the spammers are getting better.