Canadian Copyright Law Caps Statutory Damages At $5,000 Just As File Sharing Lawsuits Make Their Unwelcome Return
from the sounds-like-these-suits-should-be-filed-in-small-claims-court dept
There's some bad news on the copyright front in Canada, but at least it's tempered with some, if not actually good news, reasonable news. The bad news is that file sharing lawsuits are returning to Canada, assisted by forensic software companies like Canipre, which has been collecting information on infringing users for the past several months.A forensic software company has collected files on a million Canadians who it says have downloaded pirated content.
And the company, which works for the motion picture and recording industries, says a recent court decision forcing Internet providers to release subscriber names and details is only the first step in a bid to crack down on illegal downloads.
“The door is closing. People should think twice about downloading content they know isn’t proper,” said Barry Logan, managing director of Canipre, the Montreal-based forensic software company.
Logan said while last week’s court case involved only 50 IP addresses, his company is involved in another case that will see thousands of Canadians targeted in a sweep aimed at deterring Internet users from illegally downloading movies and other digital content.
Logan said his company has files on one million Canadians who are involved in peer-to-peer file sharing and have downloaded movies from BitTorrent sites, identifying them through Internet Protocol addresses collected over the past five months.Moving beyond the obvious problem with identifying infringers through an IP address, it looks as if Canadian citizens are going to be on the receiving end of lawsuits brought by members of the content industry. Whether this results in a corresponding sales boost to the industries involved remains to be seen, but the tactics involved (mass lawsuits, IP addresses) seem to have been taken from the copyright trolls' handbook. In short, there's nothing remotely "good" about this news.
Even though the tactics are familiar and the companies involved state that they're modeling their actions on their American counterparts, there's one aspect that trails far "behind" the US system: statutory damages. Michael Geist reminds us of the reasonable news, which is as close to "good" as this situation gets:
While it is possible that many will receive demand letters, it is important to note that recent changes to Canadian copyright law limit liability in non-commercial cases to a maximum of $5,000 for all infringement claims. In fact, it is likely that a court would award far less - perhaps as little as $100 - if the case went to court as even the government's FAQ on the recent copyright reform bill provided assurances that Canadians "will not face disproportionate penalties for minor infringements of copyright by distinguishing between commercial and non-commercial infringement."Compared to the US statutory damage laws, which allow for up to $150,000 per infringement, Canada's limits bring personal liability down to something more in line with the "damages" of non-commercial infringement. Even commercial infringement is treated more realistically, capping out at $20,000 per infringement.
This would be the small bit of "good" news contained within the unwelcome return of file sharing lawsuits. Geist theorizes on the mass lawsuit process, lending more credence to the idea that the represented industries are heading out for a bit of trolling. Fortunately for Canadian citizens, a low cap on damages means very few of those swept up in mass filings will end up in court.
The lawsuits will likely follow a three-step process. First, rights holders will seek a court order requiring Internet providers to disclose customer name and address information. Second, should the court order the disclosure, rights holders will use the information to send settlement demand letters to subscribers. The letters will allege infringement and likely offer to settle the case for several thousand dollars. If subscribers refuse to settle - perhaps they believe the allegation is inaccurate or the settlement demands unfair - it will fall to rights holders to follow through with a lawsuit. Given recent changes to the law, there is reason to doubt those cases will be filed as the individual liability is very limited.If you can't keep rights holders from casting a wide net in hopes of swift settlements, the next best thing is to keep them from seeking outrageous statutory damages. With the very real possibility of showing up in court only to walk out with a $100 bill, one would suspect that settlement requests will stay at more realistic levels.
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Filed Under: canada, copyright, file sharing, lawsuits, statutory damages
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The US needs to import common sense from Canada
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Re: The US needs to import common sense from Canada
Meaning, first we have realistic laws that don't really need upgrading. The US uses those laws, puts them through a lobbyist assembly line, manufacturing them into a copyright clusterfuck, then "sells" them back to Canada.
Basically, the entertainment industry stole the idea from the manufacturing and natural resources sector.
Canada: Hey, we grow apples!
US: Sweet, why don't you ship them over here, we'll wax them with some semi-toxic chemicals, you can truck them back and increase the price above the apples we grow here in the US!
Canada: Great idea, we can screw over our farmers, price them out of the market, damage the environment, and screw price-gouge Canadian consumers, all while helping your farmers!
US: Great trading with you!
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Re: The US needs to import common sense from Canada
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Re: Re: The US needs to import common sense from Canada
Because I want my Unicorn sense!
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Re: Re: Re: The US needs to import common sense from Canada
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Re: The US needs to import common sense from Canada
Much the same way they did with the software lumber fiasco. Free trade? Screw that! Agreement? Screw that too, let's just seize money from them and give it to the our lobby group.
The NAFTA, WTO and other judicial panels all claim we're wrong? Ignore them and try to legislate the transfer of funds before someone can do something to stop us!
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Proportional is fine with me!
But WON'T please Mike or his pirates who want NO copyright. -- Yeah, yeah, spare me the legalistic wiggles: Mike wants Megaupload and his grifting pals to be CLEAR of copyright.
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Re: Proportional is fine with me!
Then you added Megaupload and shot your comment to hell.
You need to get off the internet, son. It's not healthy for someone as unstable as you are.
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Re: Proportional is fine with me!
Who's "you" Who are you talking to?
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Re: Proportional is fine with me!
If we were a free people who could make our own laws, we would never stand for such a perversion of justice.
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Re: Proportional is fine with me!
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Re: Proportional is fine with me!
What you got wrong, other than the whole 2nd paragraph is that non-commercial infringement in Canada and EVERYWHERE else is NOT illegal.. It is unlawful ie: a civil offence that is ONLY unlawful once proven on balance.
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http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504083_162-57540638-504083/burglar-sues-calif-homeowner-90-who-retu rned-fire/
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The US court system though has not tested it, though as US companies find to their dismay, Canadian courts, like UK, New Zealand and Australia courts don't care one iota about US wants.
Aint life great living in a commonwealth country that actually has some semblance of Democracy
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No.
I repeat. You do not.
A child could see through this. Honestly...
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Damages?
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Re: Damages?
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Re: Re: Damages?
All statutory damages are is that once ALL elements of a tort have been proven upon balance, then the damages that are to give equity for the alleged harm (and harm still has to be reasonably shown - not de minimus for example) are then easily calculated due to the statutory settings. This does not mean that the court cannot set the equity below these amounts, just not above. Unless the plaitiff wants to go the route of proving (and showing evidence) that more harm has been done.
The interesting thing with these limits on Statutory damages being at $5,000 for ALL claims against any one individual (though it could also be proven that the claim could also be against a whole class - but that's a legal scenario for another day) is that the return on investment for any troll like operation could be not only poor but could also be negative. ie: Could cost them more to take respondents to court or to even send letters. that need to be very open and with NO misleading statements (or risk a counter suit) than just to sit back, claim a loss and be silent.
This is a lose - lose for the trolls.
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Re: Re: Re: Damages?
It's the ABC corporate model of the 21st Century:
A) Give people access to technology which allows them to easily copy, send and receive data.
B) The governments, doing the lobbyists' bidding, step in and make it illegal.
C) Presto -- millions of easy targets to go after.
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A million infringers
This will be a great way to start some riots demanding better copyright legislation.
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Re: A million infringers
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Re: Re: A million infringers
I'm also looking forward to cleaning up the 2018 Vancouver Riots, maybe by then they will have finished prosecuting the idiots from the last one.
1993,1994,2011 (Two of which were Vancouver)
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Re: A million infringers
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Re: A million infringers
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Re: A million infringers
3% of the population in a couple months violating the law is certainly a sign that the law doesn't make sense. And that is only the number identified by a single compnay. Certainly there are more people out there violating it.
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Actually it is good news as they are also collecting information that will further distinguish an actual user within an IP address. Time to pay up freeloaders.
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...can you produce any citation on that declaration that doesn't smell like you just pulled it out of your arse?
Seriously. Any citation. From any source.
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Wait a minute. Like most Canadians, I paid the copyright levy (tax) on blank CDs and that gives every one of us permission to download. So you're saying we're freeloaders? How do you figure that?
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Re: Ip Address
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What it looks to me like, is an invitation to clog up the courts with case after case of one infringement followed by another extortion attempt.
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Although, that may not matter if Sony, Universal, Disney, Touchstone, BMG, Geffin, Interscope etc all decide to begin lawsuits at the same time.
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Basically, it doesn't matter if you have 1 charge of infringement, or 500, the cap is $5000.
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You forget - they also learned Hollywood accounting
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Re: You forget - they also learned Hollywood accounting
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Re: Re: You forget - they also learned Hollywood accounting
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The most important part:
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Re: The most important part:
These are lawyers, slimy ones, that are being funded by the masters of the spin. I would expect no less. So yeah. education. But that requires everyone who is at risk to surf sites like the eff, techdirt or torrentfreak.
Maybe the Pirate Bay can link to a copyright troll primer on their main page. Someone email W1n5t0n
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And this claim is backed up by what evidence exactly? If based solely upon an IP Address accessing a torrent it's insufficient. If based solely upon filenames it's insufficient. If based upon known files containing copyright material, how did those files get there? Depending upon the source of these infringing copies there could be many problems for the plaintiff in a real court room. IANAL, but there seems to be more hot air than substance when it comes to press releases about copyright lawsuits. I suppose they claim the details of methods used are proprietary ... tell it to the judge.
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Must not break Godwin's law... Must not break Godwin's law...
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Thinking about how much it goes up when downloaded leads me to believe that many troll companies are doing it themselves for profit.
If you could turn a 10$ cd into a 600$ cd and have a new customer that would never had bought it in the first place would you do it?
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If you walk into a store and steal a CD,
- If successful, you get the CD with all the tracks, album art and case. You also deprived the store of a physical item and no one else can take it. Store can write off the loss. Music industry still made their money from the sale to the store.
- If caught you might (dependent on criminal history) have to pay a small fine usually 2-3 times the cost of the CD. Music industry still made no additional money.
If you download a single track,
- If successful, you get a single track of music, sometimes at a lower quality than that of a CD. The person you got the song still has their file, so you did not deprive anyone of the file. That also left the file for other people to also infringe. No financial loss to the industry, except perhaps a portion of the $0.99 in a possible sale.
- If caught, you pay thousands of dollars in fines often leading to bankruptcy. Industry makes a large amount of money.
So the ratio to the person is like saving $20 for the risk of $60 or $0.99 for the risk of $100,000. Just because it's on "the Internet" should not cause the risk/reward ratio to go so far out of sync. There is also much more risk to public safety with a shoplifting due to the physical nature then that of infringing on the Internet.
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Do not forget that in order to sue, the work must be registered with the Canadian copyright board. If it isn't registered, because they wanted to save $75, they cannot sue.
Check if the supposed infringed work is registered. If it isn't, throw away the letter.
Trolls: Too late to register now. LOL
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Even they can't be that dumb.
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While you are stuck on the "old" technology of tracking IPs on torrents and the "debunked" idea of 1 IP = 1 Person, many people have already moved on to file lockers (yes they are still around after megaupload died) and good old news servers.
Please keep up the effort to waste money just like the Americans do since you have obviously learned nothing. I wish you godspeed on your pursue of wasted efforts, counter-suits and bankruptcy.
Sincerely,
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Download torrent safely..
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