'Pre-Settlement' Shakedown By ACS:Law Doesn't Seem Quite So Profitable
from the perhaps-not-such-a-good-business dept
Since late last week, people have been submitting the news that ACS:Law's email archives were revealed and spread widely across the internet late last week. Once again, I find this action somewhat troubling. Like the DDoS attacks that resulted in this leak, I do worry about the backlash that it creates, and I find it a bit shameful that people feel the need to stoop to dirty tricks to try to prove a point or make a statement. I've been debating whether it's worth reporting about the leak at all, or any of what's been found out, and I'll certainly skip over the mundane or merely salacious bits. However, some of the information that's being reported is important in understanding how these "pre-settlement or we'll sue" businesses work, and that's information worth sharing.ACS:Law, of course, was one of the first, and certainly the most well-known, of the law firms practicing this form of "legal threats as a business model." Since then, however, many other law firms (in Europe and the US) have jumped into the game with much fanfare. ACS:Law's principle, Andrew Crossley, regularly bragged about how profitable his enterprise was, and that certainly was likely some of the thinking behind others trying to get in on the action. However, it appears that, from the data gleaned in the leaked emails, the effort really hasn't been all that profitable.
TorrentFreak has a detailed breakdown showing not only what percentage of people actually responded or paid up to the threat letters, but also what the revenue splits were, and how much everyone made -- covering a period of two years. The results are seen below:
Client | Money Recovered | Paid to Client | Paid to monitoring company | Paid to Firm |
---|---|---|---|---|
Digiprotect | £346,607.90 | £151,625.86 | £45,060.21 | £131,048.38 |
Topware | £68,127.47 | £10,880.48 | £10,881.48 | £23,551.18 |
Techland | £22,474.85 | £795.93 | £590.00 | £2,228.43 |
Reality Pump | £34,866.90 | £3519.16 | £4,645.28 | £7,628.20 |
Media C.A.T | £164,681.00 | £35,350.57 | £15,066.06 | £55,957.20 |
Total | £636,758.22 | £202,172.00 | £76,243.03 | £220,413.39 |
That said, it's also worth pointing out that the biggest copycat firm in the US, which goes by the name US Copyright Group, appears to be sending out a much higher number of letters early on and is asking for noticeably higher fees to "settle," though it's also filing an actual lawsuit (which entails additional costs). ACS:Law, of course, is famous for sending out letters and never actually suing, which helps keep its costs lower.
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Filed Under: andrew crossley, business model, copyright, pre-settlement letters
Companies: acs:law
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Salaries
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Money Extorted
And how much on average has been squeezed out of the fundamentally innocent individual for their act of cultural liberty, that may or may not have actually been infringing?
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"What's a paralegal do?"
"The same thing as the guy who's name is on the door, only I get $11 an hour so that he can charge $200."
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Re:
Regardless, this may be used to put him in even MORE hot water with the Tribunal.
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Re: Salaries
I was assuming it's not much, but, honestly, look at the amounts and there's not much room to give. Even at those low amounts, he didn't make that much.
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Re:
It sounds like that was just him bragging (again) with little basis in reality.
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ACS:Law
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No tricks there, the government call those "target of opportunity".
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That's terrible news, because the people on that list may now be set to suffer even more from ACS:law's evil scheme.
On a brighter side, a consumer group has reported ACS to the information commissioner and has announced it's planning to take legal action against them for not following proper data protection procedures.
More here:
http://www.privacyinternational.org/article.shtml?cmd[347]=x-347-566663
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Sure, they can earn that much if they secure a place at a Magic Circle law firm, but by in large, they won't. They'll end up as a two-bit, poorly paid lawyer at some pathetic law firm like ACS:Law.
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Re: ACS:Law
Is there no artist you would pay even a dollar to if they produced a new work in exchange? No favourite musicians or novelists? No bugs in software you'd pay a small amount to have fixed?
I don't think there's anything wrong in paying artists to produce new works.
The wrong is either in being forced to pay (levy) or in being denied your cultural liberty (to grant a monopoly).
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Conflicted
One part of me thinks "Yah, f*** ACS:Law. They had it coming". But another part of me feels kinda sorry for all those people that got their info spilled all over the internet. I am also not entirely sure if DDOSing anyone is really gonna help. It just gives them more justification to lock down the internet.
But gotta say, it feels kinda good to see those scammers being hit hard.
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Re:
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WTF????? "No bugs in software you'd pay a small amount to have fixed?"
Oh wait.... PeopleSoft, Oracle, JD Edwards, Microsoft, Electronic Arts, Blizzard, etc, etc, etc.
Okay, you got me. I guess that's a perfectly valid business model for software that's been making companies money for years.
I hate it when something that sounds so stupid you wouldn't think it could possibly be true turns out to be what's actually happening in reality.
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That reminds me . . .
Including that the anon group did it in retaliation, that ACS:law was a secondary target, that they are continuing to attack anti-file sharing sites, as well as the codename of the operation and, in an image, the name of the IRC channel used to organize the attacks.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11418962
I think I read another article on this subject from BBC yesterday, that was also accurate, too. Someone from BBC news is anonymous . . .
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Re: ACS:Law
I find this statement troubling and feel it needs exploring. While you refuse to pay for content, do you seek out ways to support artists you like in other ways; such as the means by which you access that content, or buying merchandise?
I often pay for content for the sole reason that by supporting an artist I help ensure that I have new content to enjoy. While relying purely on fan investment probably isn't a good business model for artists, as a fan direct payments can be a more useful way to spend your money than buying endless merchandise.
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Re: WTF????? "No bugs in software you'd pay a small amount to have fixed?"
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Re: Re:
Someone on torrentfreak commented on that:
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Re: That reminds me . . .
Either someone from BBC News is Anonymous, or just a good reporter (they exist).
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If this truly is an accurate accounting of the money collected and split up...
£636,758.22 (extorted) - £498,828.42 (paid to...) = £137,929.80 (unaccounted for.)
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Doesn't Seem Quite So Profitable
From reading some of the back and fourth between him and a couple of his advisors, it did seem like they were trying to be on the up and up with everything.
Their main problem in my opinion was outsourcing the monitoring. They left the monitoring up to that guy Ali who was clearly not trustworthy. If they had a couple monitoring geeks in-house, I think it could have been a much better operation.
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on the cheap
At the end of the day, I don't think these people felt they were doing anything wrong. They're in the business of using their status as a law firm to make a living, and they saw an opportunity in illegal file sharing. The problem is, their operation ended up looking more like a debt collection company than a law firm. Really that's exactly what it had turned into. They might as well have fired the paralegals and advisors, and just hire a bunch of telemarketer/debt collector types and pay them a commission based off what they could squeeze out of people.
But no, the real problem was they outsourced the monitoring and they had no way to really trust the results of the monitoring, plus it would have been much more cost effective in house.
They wanted the quick money without much effort and it looks like it ended up biting them on the ass.
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Re:
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Re: Doesn't Seem Quite So Profitable
A pity he didn't think that way when he targeted people like these for his shakedowns.
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Re: Re: That reminds me . . .
In this case, I was surprised to see BBC be correct in some places where torrentfreak had made a mistake, for example.
That indicates to me, that rather than hearing about anon through another source, that they are at the source themselves, and interested in the source material.
But yeah, there's a possibility it could be only good reporting.
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ISPs are investigating
I told them I'd be using my connection to share the leaked secrets of the acs law firm scam...the customer service rep laughed ;) lol
mirrors up here: http://acslaw.blogspot.com/2010/09/breaking-news-andrew-crossleys.html
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Payback
ACS:Law scammers and extortionists getting away with. And it was all fine, wasn't it? Business as usual. They got the power and the money. Filesharers have no other recourse than to fight back with the only tools they have.
Let's not forget the key word here - Payback is a bitch, isn't it?
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ACS:Law = legalised extortion
Download and share the full leak: http://acslaw.blogspot.com/2010/09/breaking-news-andrew-crossleys.html
Don't let those around you get bullied by this scam law firm.
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