RIAA get countersued for racketeering (plus lots more)

[esd]

http://recordingindustryvspeople.blogsp ... -sues.html

An interesting read.

[BlackDove]

I don't think it'll ever work.

But it's nice to see people try.

[QuantumDelta]

Oh Gee, a Self-proclaimed Vigilantee organisation break the law and get caught for it?



Nothing will come of it though, they have money, and economic power.

[Reaps]

Funny, came on the forums to post this.
saw it on another website today. quoted it so you dont have to open a second window to read . very happy to hear this though

RIAA Countersued - [RIAA News]


A woman who was sued by the Recording Industry of America for file-sharing has countersued the outfit for hacking.

Tanya Andersen, a 41-year old disabled single mother living in Oregon, has countersued the RIAA for Oregon RICO violations, fraud, invasion of privacy, abuse of process, electronic trespass, violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, negligent misrepresentation. She is claiming hurt feelings and "outrage", and deceptive business practices.

According to court documents here, Anderson said the record industry has been abusing the law courts and waged a public relations and public threat campaign targeting file sharing.

She claims that the RIAA hired an outfit called MediaSentry to invade private home computers and collect personal information. Based on private information allegedly extracted from these personal home computers, the record companies have reportedly filed lawsuits against more than 13,500 anonymous "John Does".

She claims the record companies provide the personal information to Settlement Support Center, which engages in outlawed and deceptive debt collection and other illegal conduct to extract money from the people allegedly identified from the secret lawsuits.

She said that she has never downloaded or shared music online. She has not infringed on any of plaintiffs alleged copyrighted interest. However, she has been a victim of the record companies public threat campaign.

The RIAA falsely claimed that Andersen had been an "unnamed" defendant who was being sued in federal court in the District of Columbia. She was never named in that lawsuit and never received service of a summons and complaint, she said.

When Andersen contacted Settlement Support Center, she was advised that her personal home computer had been secretly entered by the record companies agents, MediaSentry.

Apparently she had been up at 4:24am downloading "gangster rap" music under the login name gotenkito@kazaa.com. Andersen does not like "gangster rap", does not recognise the name "gotenkito", is not awake at 4:24 a.m. and has never downloaded music.

The Settlement Support Center threatened that if Andersen did not immediately pay them, the record companies would bring an expensive and disruptive federal lawsuit using her name and they would get a judgment for hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Looks like this one will run for a while.

[BlackDove]

...it's the same thing.

[Syn]

The only question is, how many times do they need to be countersued before the legal shtick starts costing them more money than its worth?

If one person can think of it, theres bound to be a second, hopefully a third. Whether they want to fight it in courts, settle it out of court, whatever, its gonna cost them. THe only question is how many want to come out and take them on? Its gotta be more expensive for them, since lawyers for the plaintiffs need only take a percentage of whatever settlement to make huge gains, but for the defense, you gotta pay upfront, and over time. They have the much more difficult job of keeping things in question when they have a burden of guilt ot overcome. The hacking/not having anything on the computer is a stroke of genious, they can't say, "she had it and we can prove it!" cause they would prove their guilt of hacking and all subsequent crimes, nor can tehy admit she is innocent or all their activities are immediatly illegal and absolutley sh*ty for their PR.

So they will probably go for a waiting game, draw it out as long as they can. And that can get expensive...

[BladeX]

Oh man, I know it's not supposed to be funny but I laughed so hard reading that article. Especially the "gangster rap" part.