Peer-to-Peer Technology called "National Security Threat"

Several lawmakers called peer-to-peer networks a potential "national security threat," as some users may, and in some cases have, inadvertantly made sensitive or classified documents on their computers available for sharing with others.

The Government Reform Committee tested file-sharing software Lime Wire, and said it was able to find "personal bank records and tax forms, attorney-client communications, the corporate strategies of Fortune 500 companies, confidential corporate accounting documents, internal documents from political campaigns, government emergency response plans and even military operation orders,".

Link

Defendant Awarded in RIAA File-Sharing Lawsuit

A woman sued by major record labels for copyright infringement on file-sharing networks has fought the charges, and been awarded attorneys' fees in the case.

Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) member label Capitol Records sued Debbie Foster for copyright infringement, but it was found that Foster's name was on an account used by her children, and the RIAA moved to have the case dismissed.

Link

Viacom Sued by YouTube Parody Creators

Viacom, which recently filed a $1 billion copyright infringement lawsuit against YouTube, was itself sued on Thursday by activist groups representing the producers of a parody video who say Viacom made an illegal request that the video be removed from YouTube.


Link

Viacom Sues Google, YouTube for 1 Billion Dollars

Viacom announced that it has filed a $1 billion federal copyright infringement lawsuit against video-sharing site YouTube and Google.

Viacom said that almost 160,000 unauthorized clips of its programming -- the company's holdings include Paramount Pictures, MTV, Comedy Central and Nickelodeon -- have been viewed more than 1.5 billion times on YouTube.

"Their business model, which is based on building traffic and selling advertising off of unlicensed content, is clearly illegal and is in obvious conflict with copyright laws," Viacom said in a statement.

Link

YouTube Wrongful Viacom Copyright Claims

The YouTube's filmmaker page bore a notice that said: "This video has been removed at the request of copyright owner Viacom International because its content was used without permission."

"That note said to anyone looking for my trailer that I violated someone's copyright. And that isn't true. That's where they defamed me," filmmaker said.

Viocom said it regrets its errors.

Link

Canada Added to List of Piracy Havens

The International Intellectual Property Alliance (IIPA), which represents U.S. software, music, movie and video game firms, has asked the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) to add Canada to the U.S. "priority watch list" of countries considered havens for piracy, which includes China, Russia and Venezuela.

The IIPA said that Canada must update its copyright laws and increase enforcement.

Link

Google Accused of Aiding Movie Pirates

One more for Google...

Media firms including News Corp., Viacom, Sony, NBC Universal, Disney and Time Warner have accused Google of enabling piracy by selling keyword ads for sites that offered illegal movie downloads, The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday.

Google held negotiations with the media firms on Friday, and said that it would remove objectionable ads and refrain from selling ads to sites that sell pirated content.

P.S. Attention Google Salespeople: you enable software piracy by allowing sites to sell illigal software, please stop that as well.

Google Loses Newspaper Copyright Case

Google lost in a copyright case where Belgian newspapers accused Google of infringement for posting their news articles without permission.

The court also ordered Google to pay a fine of about $32,400 for each day it did not comply with the ruling, down from an earlier ruling in September that put the fine at $1.3 million a day.

Google said it will appeal the ruling.

Link