Episode: 1010
Title: HPR1010: John Doe on copyright infringement lawsuits
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr1010/hpr1010.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-17 17:20:18

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Music
So this is going to be my story about how I was sued for copyright infringement over
some porn movies.
I would like to keep this anonymous at least for now just to make sure that nothing comes
back on me anyway.
So the story starts, I got a letter from my internet service provider saying that
I was being, my IP address came up in a subpoena from a company who wants to find my subscriber
information so that they can name me in a federal copyright case.
The plaintiff was a company called KBeach so I did a little bit of internet searching
and found some other cases that this company has filed against so-called John Doe defendants.
They're John Doe's because KBeach does not know who the identities of the defendants.
When searching around, I found a website called rfcxpress.com which lists federal copyright
cases and by looking up the case number that was listed in the internet service provider
letter to me, I was able to find my case and the details on it.
In searching around some more, I found some other various blogs on this topic dealing
with what they refer to as copyright trolls and I'll list the three big ones that I found.
On each of these blogs, there were copies and even some fairly detailed instructions on
how to file what they call a motion to quash.
The identity or to quash the subpoena for the identity and also to sever the defendants.
The interesting thing that happened, the first interesting thing that happened in this case
is that they filed against 78 different John Doe defendants and I was one of those 78.
The motion that I found which is now everywhere along with other advice was to quash the subpoena
to get the subscriber information and to sever the rest of the defendants for being improperly
joined together.
So with a little more detail on the case, it has to do with the plaintiff hiring a German
firm to watch BitTorrent and collect IP addresses of people that were sharing this particular
porn movie and record all the IP numbers of everybody that they saw.
Then this KBeach company files federal copyright infringement lawsuits based on those IP numbers
in various courts with the intent to learn to subscribe or contact information through
the subpoena to the ISP.
And so that was where I was at.
So I found a copy of a motion that was filed in a different case.
I did a little bit of editing, added some other information that I found about similar
cases with the same plaintiff that I have had at the time and I filed that motion to quash
the subpoena.
I should have re-worded a couple things that I sort of realized after I filed it, but anyway.
So the process was I mailed one copy to the court.
I started a new Yahoo email address, just an anonymous email address, and that was what
I put as the return address on the envelope of the motion that I sent to the court.
I also, by rule, I mailed a copy of it to the plaintiff.
Their local representation here in my home state, and I didn't put any return address
on that.
In fact, all I did was just staple the thing in thirds, put their address on it, put a
stamp on it, and threw it in the mail.
And I faxed a copy of it to my internet service provider with all of my information because
they already know who I am, and I wanted to make sure that they knew not to release my
information.
Because in the letter from the internet service provider, they said, we won't release
your information if you show that you're trying to fight the subpoena.
So anyway, those are sort of the walls that I set up to protect myself.
Since the court might need to get a hold of me during the lawsuit, I used that Yahoo email
address on the envelope, and that envelope actually becomes part of the public record.
So I didn't put my real name or address on that.
The whole point of this is for me not to give my personal information to the plaintiff.
And I've gotten a little bit of correspondence back and forth from other people at the
email address.
Like I said, by rule, you must also serve the plaintiff with the same notice.
Most of the advice that I read at the time was to send my motion anonymously to the
plaintiff's lawyers, which makes sense.
I'm trying to hide my identity from them.
Send it somewhere not near my house, since the postmark will show up on the mailing.
So I sent it from a post office box sort of near my work in looking up in the subpoena.
There were a number of other John Does in my area, so I just hoped that I would kind
of be lost in the fog, and it wouldn't be worth their time to really try to track me
down.
And again, I also faxed a copy of the motion to my internet provider along with a couple
pages from their initial letter that they sent to me so they would know who it was who
sent it and to not reveal my information to the plaintiffs.
And here's why that is.
The model of this lawsuit isn't for them to sue me in court.
It's really just a shakedown.
So they file these lawsuits in court, in federal court, they get a subpoena for the internet
provider, and then to get the subscriber contact information.
Then what happens is these plaintiffs take that subscriber information and they start
to harass you.
They start to shake you down for settlements, because is it easier to pay them to settle
or are you willing to risk the chance that they will name you in a federal court for
pirating a potentially embarrassingly named porn movie with some very interesting titles.
And it's going to be your name and the crazy name of this movie.
They're trying to shame you and get you to pay them money.
That's their business model.
And a lot of people pay, so they have a good model going.
So back to my case, I filed the motion, and a few weeks later, the judge ruled that all
the John Does in my case were to be separated, disjointed as the legal term.
The first motion that the judge read was mine, and since I asked for everybody to be separated
along with the subpoenas to be quashed, all the other motions that were filed by other
people were moot.
Six other people also filed motions to quashes, subpoena, and to sever the defendants.
And then there were a couple more that were a little bit behind schedule that actually
filed them afterwards, but all those were moot because the judge decided that that
was it.
And they ruled that the plaintiff had one week to continue proceeding the case with John
Doe 1.
So that's what happened.
When they severed the rest of the defendants, they basically said John Doe 2 through 78,
you're off this case, we only have the case with John Doe number 1.
And he gave the plaintiff three weeks to file any new suits on any John Does that they
knew the identities of.
From the subscriber information that they got from ISPs that complied with the initial
subpoena, nine defendants were specifically named, you know, first and last name, and
then there were another couple dozen individual John Doe cases that were filed.
The same judge didn't like that.
So even after the case was dismissed against the other John Does except for number 1, the
judge proposed that they would order the plaintiff to pay for a mediator to negotiate settlements
with everybody, with the plaintiff and with all the defendants named and unnamed.
And the plaintiffs just dropped the case.
So now this original case that was against 75 John Does, they got a handful of subscriber
information from people, they started to get a few settlements, and then they dismissed
the case.
There was no trial.
In a similar case in the state of Virginia, the judge got so pissed off at this situation
that he threatened the plaintiffs with sanctions that would basically punish them for phishing
for dependent defendants and their subscriber information using the court's time and then
using the information from that subpoena to threaten and extort money from the defendants.
That case also got dismissed and the defendants just agreed to stop doing it.
Since that initial case that I was on was dismissed, there have been a lot more developments.
So a little while later, I get another letter from my internet service provider.
It's the same plaintiff, they have the same complaint, they're asking for the same damages,
but now I'm the only John Doe defendant.
So after the initial 78 defendants were severed, the plaintiff filed a bunch of individual cases
with named defendants and with John Doe defendants and somehow I ended up being one of the John
Doe defendants.
Still not sure how that happened if it's just my luck.
So I put together another motion to quash the subpoena to my internet service provider
with a bunch of various legal rationale behind it and the plaintiff filed a response.
The judge ruled to allow the subpoena to the service provider for the plaintiff to get
my contact information, but in between the time that I filed my motion and the judge ruled
another judge in the same district made a ruling on the exact same, not my case, but
the exact same kind of case on the same issues that I brought up in my individual motion
to quash and he ruled against the plaintiff in that one.
So I made another argument, filed another motion to reconsider in my case based on the
idea or the argument that the plaintiff didn't actually have the copyright to the movie
in question.
So that was the legal rule that I had started with was that the plaintiff had only filed
for copyright protection with the movie and then they looked and saw that there were
people who were sharing it on BitTorrent, they copied down everybody's IP numbers and
they started the lawsuit process and then nine months later they actually got a registered
copyright and the judge who ruled against that said that the copyright office has a job,
the function of the copyright office is to look into copyright applications and determine
whether or not to give the applicant copyright to the movie in question.
Well the judge in my case disagreed with that, he said that the copyright office might
take too long, there's a potential for potential copyright holders to suffer the damages
of piracy or whatever else and so they don't need to wait around for the copyright office.
Anyway that was what happened, the law on it is of course ambiguous and their judges go
both ways whether you can sue for infringement after filing but before registration the so-called
application, understanding versus the registration method where the copyright has actually been
granted. Anyway the other judge not in my case who follow and there's a lot of other judges
and a lot of other districts who follow this registration model saying that if people can
can sue before they even have a copyright and they just file why bother even having copyright
registration if the application is enough. Like I said my judge followed the application side
of things and ruled that a potential copyright holder should not have to wait before they
can sue. But anyway about a month later without any action in this case on my behalf or on
the plaintiffs it was just one day dismissed with what they call with prejudice meaning that
that's it there's no more chance of a lawsuit against me. So both of my cases are effectively done
along with my case where the named defendants and the other John Doe defendants all of those
were also dismissed. They were all filed at the same time and the dismissals all came down at
the same time and there's nothing since. As far as I know the plaintiff does not have my subscriber
information I have not gotten any phone calls any emails any threats from anybody. So that's sort
of why the case is interesting for me. The details on everything are seem very sketchy and it's
basically a shakedown. A lot of people pay the shakedown so they have a business going but when
people actually started standing up for themselves some big name people like the Electronic Frontier
Foundation some other legitimate copyright lawyers took notice and now these copyright trolls
are starting to have battles on their hands. In one case one of the alleged infringers hired
her own lawyer and turned around and sued the plaintiffs. The plaintiffs dropped their
copyright case against her but she's not letting up and she's she's suing them for
a defamation and going after legal fees. Anyway the proof that the plaintiff claims is that
they saw an IP address sharing a copyrighted file on BitTorn and then they turned that into a
literally turned it into a federal case. But forget the fact that an IP address doesn't actually
equal a person. There's shared internet on Secured and even if everybody knows even if your
Wi-Fi is secured somebody can get into it and it looks like you're doing it even when you don't.
You know so just because something is happening at an IP address doesn't mean the person who owns
that is doing it. But to me this is the analogy that I see. So picture yourself you drive
in in the city at night and you stop at a traffic light and there's a prostitute standing on a
corner and she just turns her head and looks into your car and just as she does there's a guy
across a block who takes a picture of the two of you and then later on he gets a hold of you
and threatens you that if you don't pay him he's going to tell everyone that you're soliciting a
prostitute and that's that might be embarrassing. So but whether you were or weren't doesn't matter
since he says he has a picture of the whole thing. So do you just give him the finger and say you
don't have proof you just have a picture that doesn't that doesn't prove anything. But what would
your family think if they heard about you involved with a prostitute or what would your neighbors
think or what would your boss think. So or maybe you just pay him to go away. And enough people pay
that's the the business model of the copyright trolls. So anyway like I said in
I'll list these blogs that have amazing amazingly informative discussions basically step by step
on how to defend yourself if you get involved in one of these cases what to expect
specifically zero of these cases that have been filed have ever gone to trial. They all of them
have been dismissed. There have been 200,000 people named in these porn movie copyright infringement
cases in US federal court over the past couple of years none of them have ever gone to trial.
So while the intimidation stuff is there the plaintiffs are coercing people based on embarrassment
to pay to settle if you can stand up for it if you can stomach it for a little bit none of them
have ever gone to trial. Anyway that's my story on these two cases hopefully it's informative
to people if you find yourself in a situation and I'll list my anonymous email address if you
want to ask me questions thank you. You have been listening to Hacker Public Radio at Hacker Public
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