Has RIAA Fired MediaSentry? 76
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "According to a tantalizing 'unconfirmed' report, it appears that the RIAA has jettisoned MediaSentry (now known as SafeNet) as its 'investigator.' MediaSentry has come under heat in a number of different states for the fact that it was 'investigating' without an investigator's license and invading people's privacy. Earlier this year it was found to have made diametrically conflicting written statements to two different tribunals within 30 days of each other, in one denying that it was an 'expert witness,' in another claiming that it was an 'expert witness.' If the report is accurate, the termination comes at an interesting time, since MediaSentry's investigator is the plaintiffs' only fact witness to prove copyright infringement in Capitol Records v. Thomas, which is now headed for a retrial on March 9th. If he does take the stand, the reasons for his company's termination will be fair game for cross examination. One also has to wonder if it's in any way connected to the puzzling enigma of the New York Attorney General's alleged involvement in the RIAA's recent Wall Street Journal announcement that it would be reducing its p2p file sharing cases to a trickle."
Private investigator license (Score:4, Interesting)
Requiring some sort of private investigator's license to perform any sort of "investigation" of computers is a really, really bad idea. This has been implemented in a few states and I don't think it is having the desired outcome.
Read Bando v. Gates - it is all over the Internet [harvard.edu]. It is a very interesting read about someone completely unqualified performing an digital forensic investigation. This is what the "licensing" is supposed to prevent. It also virtually eliminates the possibility of someone being able to perform investigations in multiple states because of the absurd licensing requirements. You see, this is done on a state-by-state basis. Texas may require firearms traning for all licensed investigators while some other state does not. This doesn't help the quality of digital investigations. It only hurts.
I would consider the possibility of someone actually being prosecuted for an unlicensed investigation when they never set foot in the state to be very low. Having their expert witness status rejected is another matter but not one to be taken lightly. If expert witnesses must be licensed, then do not expect to be allowed to testify about your own computer in a licensing-required state.
What this sort of licensing is supposed to do is increase accountability of computer forensic examiners. What it in fact does is restrict the pool of such examiners to a very small group and says nothing about the quality or abilities of those people. Other than their ability to put up with completely unrelated requirements, such as firearms training for a computer investigator. The result of this is certainly going to be that you are not qualified to provide any information about your own computer in any sort of legal matter without such a license. Sure, the license may only be required to perform an investigation when it is a paid service, but that says nothing about expert witness qualification.
Re:Big deal. (Score:1, Interesting)
I actually interviewed at Mediasentry once. There were several "whiter" spots behind their sign in the office complex. I imagine if I were to compare the relative whiteness of the spots, I could tell how many times they've changed names.
Indeed, if I didn't read slashdot, I'd have thought I had the wrong address.
Despite hitting it off with the geeks by having a fun chat about being unfriendly in bittorrent but still encouraging peers to direct their bandwidth our way(yes, scummy, but I like being paid), I didn't get the job because the suit thought I "knew too much about the scene".
Re:In related news... (Score:3, Interesting)
Not bloody likely that... Safenet produces a big chunk of crypto hardware for the government, focusing on Type 1 encryption solutions.
How Safenet got involved with Mediasentry has got to be the weirdest story of the decade IMHO.
Re:Quality for Your Dollar (Score:2, Interesting)
Isn't that wishful thinking? A scenario where most if not all ISPs become copyright enforcers (maybe under new laws), and just a handful of scapegoats (paying costumers) are sacrificed once in a while - just enough to keep the masses fearful - seems as possible.
Re:Quality for Your Dollar (Score:5, Interesting)
That might be true in isolated cases. More likely, customers will acquire superior anonymity on their own. Keep in mind that during all this time the RIAA has won one (1) case (which I believe is under appeal) and meanwhile a million geeks at a million terminals have had all that time to code and test the means to make detection and prevention more difficult. In technical issues, geeks tend to win over suits in the long run, and it seems to me that the suits are lagging far behind this time.
Wow. (Score:3, Interesting)
Looks like their one chance at a court win is seriously on the rocks... and they have been trying to get the ISPs to do their police work, for lack of better alternatives...
For the most part, the ISPs won't do it. It costs too much money and helps their competition. So it looks to me like the RIAA (and by proxy, MPAA) are very rapidly losing ground in this whole battle.
About time.
Maybe repeal of DMCA is next? One can hope.
Re:Wow. (Score:4, Interesting)
So, has the "content" industry's strategy of enforcement through oppression, FUD, and deception finally developed enough cracks to let the real light in?
I think so, Jane.