Copyright Infringement Notice! :(

[Gulkeeva]

You could always look up the lawfirm, call them see if its real etc. Almost always though, the letter will come from the ISP (if not always) in which case they will give you details, your IP, what you downloaded from where using what. (I've dealt with about 5-6 myself because my idiot friend downloaded crap without encrypting!) Anyway its pretty much a 75% chance fake due to it not coming from an ISP, as most big companies "usually" won't do such a thing (I say usually but it can happen in some rare off chance).

[richardd]

hmm lol

there are things i still download from piratebay/other trackers that i cant find from IPtorrents, but its generally TV shows/seasons/misc anime, lol. do you think its possible for me to have horrible luck and have my cable company come after me and use me as an example of pirating? lol

edit: its quite significant sometimes ;x

i dl'd about 60 gigs of my "anime to watch list" in the last 1.5 months

[hey]

hmm lol

there are things i still download from piratebay/other trackers that i cant find from IPtorrents, but its generally TV shows/seasons/misc anime, lol. do you think its possible for me to have horrible luck and have my cable company come after me and use me as an example of pirating? lol

edit: its quite significant sometimes ;x

i dl'd about 60 gigs of my "anime to watch list" in the last 1.5 months

No one will ever come after you for torrenting anime, unless maybe if you live in japan. If even they did care, it's unrealistic and not worth it (aka would be retarded) for them coming after you from half way across the world. Licensed anime isn't really any different either, since none of the american anime distributors have the money to really fight piracy.

[Cantih]

Yar, the main areas to avoid / be paranoid in your acquisition methods are motion pictures, western music, games, then software. They are the most litigious.
Anything else, your chances aren't zero, but are much much lower.

[Bregor]

i dl'd about 60 gigs of anime

http://img7.imageshack.us/img7/839/2...329634508b.jpg

[richardd]

thanks for the input you guys! :D

http://img7.imageshack.us/img7/839/2...329634508b.jpg

gotta admit, those seasons were CLASSICS. i can watch these same episodes when im 100 years old and still laugh whenever i see that dr zauis musical

[Bregor]

gotta admit, those seasons were CLASSICS. i can watch these same episodes when im 100 years old and still laugh whenever i see that dr zauis musical

Yeah same, I haven't seen that episode in forever but your sig made audibly chuckle.

I think I'll go illegally download it right now.

[Apelila]

No certified letter = what letter? We didn't get a letter.

[Mazmaz]

Thank god I live in Canada.
Also, what is a private torrent site or whatever?

[aurik]

No certified letter = what letter? We didn't get a letter.

This.

Don't respond, never admit to receiving it and no harm will come of ignoring it.

[fantasticdan]

No one will ever come after you for torrenting anime, unless maybe if you live in japan.

That's what I thought until I got a letter from cablevision for downloading a batch torrent of gintama (which I dropped after like 3 episodes), lol.

[Gulkeeva]

You won't get sued for anime UNLESS, its an anime that was co'funded or whatever by a major company (say Walt Disney pays to translate and air some anime) then you might be in trouble. Less likely any "small" anime company that dubs/subs anime will ever go after you, much less an anime company in japan for downloading their tv aired anime (or dvd's or anything else for that matter)

[spz]

Make sure you don't confuse the 2 kinds of letters: letters from ISP and letters from firms.

You can ignore warning letters from ISPs (unless it's a letter stating that someone is trying to subpoena your info).

The letter from the law firm is a pay-up-or-get-sued letter. These firms hire companies to download/upload/monitor copyrighted material and then subpoena your info from your ISP. The letter prob says something along the lines of pay us $1k-5k or we'll sue you for copyright infringement (willful infringement goes up to 150k). They scare most people in to paying the 1k settlement because most people don't want to pay an attorney to handle the case if it would be cheaper to settle.

The letter your friend got sounds suspect. Normally an ISP warns you if some law firm files a john doe supoena duces tecum to get your info so you can challenge it, but I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't because these firms hand giant lists of IPs to ISPs and it's a total mess.

Check out this site: http://beingthreatened.yolasite.com/questions.php
It's kinda old and focuses on the UK (don't use their reply rules) but it has a really good overview of what you should be looking for and what your next steps might be.

One thing to keep in mind is that the firm might not even go forward with the suit and are just trying to cash in on the settlement. Even if they do go forward, recent cases pose a lot of hurdles for these giant lawsuits against downloaders (they usually sue a crapload of people at a time and there are all sorts of jurisdiction problems and the firm definitely does not want to pursue people individually).

edit: check out torrentfreak.com - it should shed more light on the scheme
http://torrentfreak.com/200000-bitto...states-110808/

[Plow]

Get what ya pay for!

[Acevalefor]

They mention that they subpena'd the ISP for the information already, which I agree, is flakey

If there is a subpoena for info, there is a case number. If there is still doubt, your friend can easily check the validity with a simple phone call to the district court that the subpoena was filed at. If there is no case number, there is no case and this is a scam. On top of that, legal proceedings follow a protocol in America that does not include sending threatening letters.

[Kaslo]

I doubt a law firm would misspell something as simple as uTorrent(assuming that's what they meant).

Haha you would think so. But stuff in the legal field is routinely mispelled. Plus technically it's not uTorrent but Mu-Torrent based on the u that uTorrent uses.

[Kaslo]

No certified letter = what letter? We didn't get a letter.

^Truth.

[Jeryhn]

No certified letter = what letter? We didn't get a letter.

Can't be repeated enough times.

[aduidarnenye]

So, what was your friend's mother's reaction upon hearing the information you have learnt?

[Dryr]

The last news I saw about this operation is that it is a law firm based in D.C. or something. Recently (a month or so ago) a judge reprimanded the firm because it was just a scam. They applied for thousands of subpoenas with no intention of actually serving them (because that is very expensive) and sent the letters instead. The firm originally did this for porn companies, then fail films like farcry and hurt locker signed up for free money from them. People were more likely to pay to avoid embarrassment for the porn, but started saying no for sh*t movies.

So, it means nothing until you get a subpoena is what I understand.