April 5, 2007
To: Williams Students
From: Dinny Taylor, Chief Technology Officer and Charlie Toomajian, Associate Dean of the College
Subject: RISKS INCREASE DRAMATICALLY FOR ILLEGAL SHARING OF COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL
It's important that all students understand recent developments in the legal efforts taken by holders of the copyright on digital material and Williams' response. New actions by the RIAA and other associations representing copyright holders may cost you thousands of dollars the first time you are caught sharing files illegally.
The sharing of copyrighted material violates the College's standards of Computing Ethics and Responsibilities. From now on, if the College receives information about a student's illegal file sharing, in addition to notifying the student, we will disconnect the offending computer from the College's network for one week. For subsequent offenses, the student will also meet with Dean Toomajian and disciplinary action will be likely.
The College does not scan the network for illegal traffic in copyrighted material and cannot protect you from the legal recourse that exists for copyright holders, who do scan the network. The best way to protect yourself from potentially expensive legal complications is to not download and serve music, TV shows, movies, or software, which you have not acquired with permission to share legally. Although P2P programs allow you to obtain copyrighted song and video materials easily, when you download the P2P software, it will typically then use your computer and the campus network to serve these materials out to others without informing you. Even if serving these materials is not your intention, doing so places both you and the College at risk. See www.musicunited.org for more information.
We receive claims regularly from the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and other associations representing copyright holders such as HBO, Universal Studios, the Business Software Alliance, and the Entertainment Software Association. The frequency of these claims has increased significantly in the past three months. The RIAA has recently raised the stakes by sending to colleges and universities letters that threaten to sue students for alleged file sharing infringement and that request the school to forward to the file-sharing student a proposal to settle out of court by paying a fine within 20 days. See a sample settlement letter. You can also learn more from the FAQ from the RIAA at www.p2plawsuits.com. Several small private colleges similar to Williams have already received pre-litigation letters warning them that they will soon be receiving settlement letters to forward to students.
If the RIAA or another agency sends the College a letter threatening to sue you along with a settlement offer, we will forward that letter to you. While we are not obligated by law to inform you of this notification, at this time we believe that we should so that you can make a more fully informed decision on what to do. The College cannot help or advise you in this process so, if you receive such a letter, you might wish to contact an attorney for assistance about how to respond. If the College is served with a legal subpoena to reveal your name as a suspected infringer, the College must comply. The RIAA is just as likely to take this action for a first offense as for later ones. In the past, you merely had to delete or block a file to comply after a first offense unless we received a subpoena. While this still may be the case in some instances, now with the new initiative by the entertainment industry, you may face legal and financial decisions the first time you are caught sharing material, even inadvertently.
For more information see our new website that details how we handle DMCA infractions at File Sharing and Copyright Violations. Please contact us if you have questions.
