Hollywood Creates Software For Automatic Booting Of File Sharers

from the due-process-be-damned dept

The folks in Hollywood are getting a bit more technical. Realizing that it was taking some ISPs and university network administrators some time to respond to their DMCA takedown notices when accusing file sharers or illegal activity, Universal has written up some open source software that they're pushing on universities and ISPs that would help automate the process of kicking them off the network. The idea is that the studios could send out a notification, that would automatically go into the system, send off an alert email to the user, and then shut off their account until the "offending material" was removed. Leaving aside the irony of Hollywood offering free open source software (this is the same industry that is still telling people "if it's free, you stole it"), it also seems to go a step beyond what most people consider due process in making sure that those kicked off from the network actually did something wrong.
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  1. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 20 Apr 2004 @ 3:06pm

    No Subject Given

    For those of us with bad hacker instincts, decoding and spoofing the "plz kick this guy off thx k bye" message sent by our friends in the music industry would be job #1.

    Ah, the havoc you could wreak during finals week at any given university.

    link to this | view in thread ]


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