Chapter 8 has described many types of “Acts” that have been passed to deter step

Question

Chapter 8 has described many types of “Acts” that have been passed to deter stepping on individual and corporate rights. For this group project, choose two of the Acts listed below (pages are based on 8th Ed. Of textbook).
EEA - Economic Espionage Act (page 172)

DMCA – Digital Millennium Copyright Act (page 184)

FTDA – Federal Trademark Dilution Act (page 190)

NET – No Electronic Theft Act (Page 183)

1. please choose two chosen Acts, research and write a page description on a court case involving each Act. 10 pts. (5 pts. for each Act)
2.The description should include:
a. why the case was brought 1 pt.
b. The arguments on each side, and the ruling.
c. Include a link to the court case within your case descriptions.

Explanation / Answer

1) Virginia man Sentenced for violation of "No Electronic Theft' (NET) Act for unlawful distribution of software on the internet (March 3, 2000).

Eric John Thornton, 24, of 1326 Riverfront Court, Virginia Beach, VA, sentenced to a period of five years of probation and ordered him to pay restitution in the amount $9638.00.

Mr. Thornton pled guilty in December last year to a charge of criminal infringement of a copyright, violation of the NET Act, which was enacted in 1997 to punish Internet copyright piracy.

The United States charged that Mr. Thornton wilfully infringed a copyright by the reproduction or distribution over the Internet of copyrighted software with a retail value of more than $1,000.00

As part of court’s sentence, Thornton is also required to maintain for 18 months his website through which the software was pirated. This website is entitled Nopatience.com. The website carries a message which says that Mr. Thornton ran the website, that he was confronted by FBI agents, that he has been convicted of federal criminal copyright infringement, and that his computer has been seized.

In Court hearings, Mr. Thornton admitted that he maintained a website located at www.nopatience.com called No Patience, at which he made available for download illegal copies of copyrighted software. Thornton further admitted that between February 5 and March 26, 1999, a confidential source downloaded onto a hard drive 20 copyrighted software applications found at www.nopatience.com, which had a retail value of $9,638.

2) In February 2011, all five of the five major movie studios joined forced to file a lawsuit against file locker service HOTFILE. The studios accused HOTFILE of enabling copyright infringement on a “mind boggling” scale and sought damages from it.
HOTFILE, however, argued that it was a mere host and was protected under the DMCA safe harbour provisions. The studios, on the other hand, argued that HOTFILE had lost that protection both when it failed to meet the standards in the DMCA and paid many copyright infringers through an affiliate program that rewarded those who uploaded files downloaded a large number of times.
According to the judgement, HOTFILE lost its safe harbour protection due to the fact it had inadequate repeat infringer policy, having only terminated accounts of 43 infringers after over 10 million DMCA notices.
The court also noted that HOTFILE did not immediately register DMCA agent. Waiting until December 2009 to register one with the U.S. Copyright Office and did not list the information on their site until May 2010.
Because of this, HOTFILE was found to be vicariously liable for copyright infringement, meaning they received benefit from the infringement, had the ability to stop it and did not do so. Other infringement issues may still be decided by a jury.
However, now HOTFILE is being taken to task for not complying with the repeat infringer policy and the requirement to designating an agent, making it more important than ever for hosts to ramp up their efforts at complying with the whole of the law, not just the “big ideas”.

THANK YOU. IF ANY QUERIES, ASK IN COMMENT SECTION.

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