Copyright Alert System Won’t Result in Termination, Lawsuits, ISPs Say

One potential mitigating measure is connection speed reduction for a few days, said Link Hoewing, vice president-Internet and technology policy at Verizon. Reduced speed for two or three days is “intended to get [users'] notice,” he said, not harshly penalize them. Additionally, Hoewing said CAS won’t provide evidence for copyright holders if they want to sue P2P users. “This system is not designed to produce lawsuits. It’s designed to produce education,” he said.

"We know it’s important to our customers that we get it right,” said Time Warner Cable Vice President-External Affairs and Policy Counselor Fernando Laguarda: “We want to get it right.” When an audience member asked whether open wireless network providers would be held accountable for others infringing on their network, Laguarda said Time Warner Cable does not allow its users to host open wireless networks. In that instance, he said, subscribers would be held accountable and receive the notifications and mitigating measures.

"Our goal would be that mitigating measures would never be necessary” because users would stop sharing infringing content after receiving CAS notifications, said Fox Entertainment Group Senior Vice President-Content Production Ronald Wheeler. According to Wheeler, the system places a limit on how many notices copyright holders can send, meaning Fox would have to send fewer notices under the new system than it had been sending previously under agreements with individual ISPs. The tradeoff is that the system will reach and educate more users, he said, and “for that reason, we're willing to accept that fewer notices regarding Fox movies and TV shows will be sent."

The system’s critics worry that mitigating measures could be expanded to include service termination at some point in the future. It’s not enough that ISPs say they won’t terminate service, said Molly Land, associate professor of law at New York Law School. “Can we get that in writing?” she asked. If the system’s goal is really just educating users, she said, there shouldn’t be any mitigating measures at all.

CAS is “really not structured to try to address serial pirates,” Lesser said. Instead, she said, the system is aimed at users who may not know that infringement is happening on their ISP account or may not be aware of alternatives to infringement. The issue of technically savvy users who purposefully share infringing content and can probably navigate their way around the system “is, for now, not addressed by this program,” she said. “The level of skepticism we hear is neither surprising nor unwarranted,” she said, asking critics to reserve judgment until the program has been implemented.

CAS will make the problem of copyright infringement worse, said Assistant Professor at Rutgers University’s School of Communication and Information Aram Sinnreich. “It’s actually going to raise the bar” as tech savvy users find more sophisticated ways to share infringing content while evading the system, he said. While those tech savvy users can find ways to avoid the system, less tech savvy users will have to deal with the notifications and mitigating measures, he said, making CAS “a tuna net that only catches the poorest and most disenfranchised tuna in the ocean."

Despite unresolved questions, the CAS “has the potential to play a positive role,” said Center for Democracy and Technology’s General Counsel David Sohn. The program can be successful if it “really maintains the educational focus” going forward, he said, but he would be concerned “if the focus were to evolve away from pure education towards punishment.” The informational resources provided through the CAS to alleged infringers need to be “really fair and balanced,” he said, or else the CCI “would really lose its ability to be a credible source of education.” Sohn said he’s eager to see how the system handles notifying alleged infringers and identifying allegedly infringing content, as well as whether the system will learn from its mistakes. For instance, he asked, will the monitoring technology recognize and readjust if it incorrectly labels content as infringing?

Education-based systems like this one, rather than punishment-based ones, will help discourage infringement, Sohn said. “The technology to engage in infringement is here to stay,” he said, and “the level of infringement is going to depend on what users choose to do.” Because of that, he said, it’s important that groups like the CCI provide information on what constitutes infringement and easy, legal ways to avoid it.