Student could pay $3,000 fine to RIAA for file sharing

"It has finally happened," Bob Bayn said.

Last week, USU received advanced notice about an early settlement offer from the Recording Industry Association of America to an unidentified USU student over the matter of a single song he had available to download from his computer. Information Technology Security Team Coordinator Bayn said of the hundreds of take-down notices a year USU has received concerning students sharing music and other electronic files on the USU server, this is the first time a copyright watchdog has taken the step of starting litigation.

The amount of the offer the RIAA is proposing? Three thousand dollars.

"I think (the recording industry is) trying to create uncertainty and publicity and some fear," Bayn said. "This student getting this next level hasn't done anything different than the others that I've seen."

Copyright watchdogs monitor college campuses because students on average commit more copyright infringements than other demographics. Students at universities and colleges across the country have received notices warning of potential consequences if file sharing doesn't stop. When they find a computer on a university server with file-sharing software like LimeWire, BitTorrent, KaZaA or dozens of other programs, they send a notice to the university giving the IP address of the offending computer, and the university contacts the student.

The student, whom Bayn declined to identify pending a subpoena if the student does not settle with the RIAA, received a take-down notification in September, a day when several other similar notifications were sent to USU. Bayn said it appears this student has done nothing worse than what other students have done, yet he is the only one at USU who has been picked out by the RIAA so far. So far in all his dealings with the watchdogs and students, Bayn said he has never had to give out any student's personal information. But, if the subpoena is issued, he will have to report the student, he said.

Students seem reluctant to accept that file sharing is illegal, said Tiffany Evans, ASUSU director, who has been taking an informal poll of students.

"We need to educate students," she said. "What is happening is the recording industry is really going after people downloading illegally. File sharing is stealing. Until technology and the recording industry and the law tell us otherwise, we should treat it as stealing. It could come back to haunt you."

Students at other schools have been hit with fines ranging from $750 to $150,000.

Bayn said complaints from watchdog groups have gone up this year at USU, possibly because of improvements in the university's bandwidth. He said not only student computers linked to USU's wireless Internet are found to have the software, but some school-owned computers have received take-down notices, also.

Music fans who download music from most file-sharing programs automatically become providers of that music, Bayn said. This is one of the ways students get caught in the recording industry's net - they don't realize their computer is visible to others on the Internet, and their library becomes a source of pirated music when they use file sharing software, he said. The software can be used for other, legal, purposes, such as for start-up bands to get their music out there, but illegal downloading is the most popular use, Bayn said.

Evans said a lot of the problem starts with students' ideas about music ownership.

"I know this generation knows technology and doesn't know anything different," she said. Back when Napster was popular, people got used to having access to any music they wanted for free, she said. Now it's hard to accept that the situation has changed.

"A whole other issue, which especially students get caught up in, is there is music out there for free, and they think they should get it for free," Evans said. "I think they're so accustomed to having things right at their fingertips."

Bayn said the school really cannot wash its hands of the matter and let students deal with the copyright watchdogs directly. As long as USU is an Internet provider, it will be responsible for what is done over its connection. Evans said from an educational standpoint, it is not necessarily the university's responsibility. However, she said the school wants to help train students for the real world.

Chief Conduct Officer Dallin Phillips said the chances of getting caught file sharing seem fairly significant, though he is only asked to get involved when a student does not comply with the take-down notices. That has only happened three or four times, he said. But if a student were to consistently refuse to comply with the notices issued by the RIAA or another watchdog group, consequences could include taking all computer privileges away from that student, Phillips said.

As for the student who has already been hit with a potential fine, Bayn said he may receive the actual settlement offer or he might not.

"It's too bad if he ends up having to pay thousands of dollars," Bayn said. "I expect if infringement doesn't go down, we'll see another one picked out of the herd."

-elizabeth.lawyer@aggiemail.usu.edu