CBP has recently posted the following to its Web site:
As the U.S. tries to get out of its duty to let residents gamble on foreign Web sites under a World Trade Organization ruling (WID May 7 p1), officials have little to worry about in the way of WTO-authorized retaliation, a former U.S. trade official said at a Cato Institute forum Wednesday. The WTO appellate body that reviewed a panel ruling siding with Antigua, which is heavily reliant on Internet gambling revenue, substantially limited the grounds on which Antigua and others could recoup losses, said John Jackson, a WTO expert at the Georgetown University Law Center.
The apparent successor to dirt-cheap Russian download store AllofMP3.com is back online and promising to take credit card payments following a narrow Russian legal victory. But payment options appeared to be broken, at least for new users, when we attempted checkout Thursday. MP3Sparks.com went down last week, although a related client application called AllTunes remained available for download (WID July 10 p6). MP3Sparks uses a template and an e- commerce checkout system nearly identical to those AllofMP3.com had before it closed, but lists a different parent company, Regiontorg. AllofMP3 was owned by Mediaservices.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative has issued a notice requesting comments on its negotiations for compensatory adjustments with eight World Trade Organization Members as a result of its May 4, 2007 notification to the WTO of the U.S. intent to modify its General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) commitment in order to exclude gambling and betting services.
Fighting the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) can pay off, if the apparent outcome of the P2P infringement case Capitol v. Frye is any indication. The RIAA accepted Terri Frye’s second offer of judgment in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of North Carolina, for Frye to pay the trade group $300. The RIAA typically gets $3,000 or more in a P2P settlement. A single mother on food stamps, living in subsidized housing with a discounted Internet subscription, Frye strongly challenged the RIAA lawsuit in May counterclaims, saying association evidence -- a screenshot of her computer’s shared folder -- showed that she was not sharing files. The RIAA was given until July 15 to file a response. The first offer from Frye to the RIAA is not in court documents. P2P defense lawyer Ray Beckerman, who writes the Recording Industry vs. the People blog, told us it was the first instance he had seen of P2P parties using an offer of judgment to resolve a case. The agreement requires the judge’s approval.
Fear of bad publicity and financial loss is driving more companies to buy cyberinsurance, experts said during a Core Security Technologies webcast Tuesday. “It’s not feasible to manage 100% of cyber risk,” said Tom Kellerman, Core Security Technologies vice president, security awareness. But a combination of self-testing, smart contracting and cyberinsurance can save companies millions, he said.
In a decision likely to spook Internet service providers (ISPs) across Europe, a Brussels court told Scarlet Extended Ltd. (formerly Tiscali) to filter out infringing music downloads. Rejecting claims that filtering solutions are overkill, and that ordering ISPs to install technical measures would threaten their safe harbor from content monitoring liability, the Court of First Instance gave Scarlet six months to install the technology. The ruling marks the first systematic examination and rejection by a judge of ISPs’ arguments against filtering, said Paris lawyer Winston Maxwell, whose firm represents the owner of the technology recommended by the court but was not involved in the lawsuit.
The Recording Industry Association of America escaped counterclaims by a former P2P defendant by “covenanting not to sue again,” under an order by U.S. District Judge Vicki Miles-LaGrange. Last year the trade group dropped its case in Warner v. Stubbs, following a much-noticed “extortion” charge by Tallie Stubbs’ attorney (WID Aug 28 p1). Stubbs had sought a declaratory judgement of noninfringement from the court. By covenanting not to pursue legal claims against Stubbs again, the RIAA deprived the U.S. District Court, Western District of Oklahoma, of jurisdiction, Miles-LaGrange said. Separately, the P2P defense strategy of citing RIAA P2P investigator MediaSentry as “unlicensed” under state law (WID June 5 p2) is catching on. The defense in Sony v. Crain in U.S. District Court, Beaumont, Tex., filed for permission to amend its counterclaims to incorporate allegations against MediaSentry. RIAA knew that by hiring unlicensed investigators in Texas, it was committing “civil conspiracy under Texas common law,” the amended filing said.
The Justice Department warned of a hoax e-mail claiming to be from the agency. The phony “Dear Citizen” spam claims complaints about recipients’ businesses have been filed with the Justice Department and forwarded to the Internal Revenue Service, sometimes even giving a case number and complainant name. The Justice Department does not send such messages via e-mail, the agency said. Spammers have sent similar e-mails invoking the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Federal Trade Commission and Internal Revenue Service. Beware unsolicited “warnings,” ostensibly from the government, instructing users to click on file attachments or provide sensitive information, the agency said, urging recipients of this or similar messages to file a complaint to www.ic3.gov.