The Recording Industry Association of America filed 261 lawsuits Monday against people allegedly sharing large amounts of music over the Internet in violation of copyright law.
According to the U.S. District Court in Albuquerque, none of the lawsuits involve UNM students as of yet, but the association promised more such lawsuits - possibly thousands of them - in the coming weeks.
"When your product is being regularly stolen, there comes a time when you have to take appropriate action," said Cary Sherman, president of RIAA in a news release. "We simply cannot allow online piracy to continue destroying the livelihoods of everyone in the music industry."
According to its Web site, the RIAA is blaming a significant increase in music downloading or file sharing for a three-year decline in music sales as the reason it has begun pursuing the lawsuits.
More than 60 million Americans use music file sharing networks for free, the Web site states.
In several of Monday's lawsuits, defendants' personal information was obtained through subpoenas submitted to their Internet service providers.
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Many local Internet providers disagree with the RIAA's actions.
Jo Fox, president of abq.com, a local internet service provider that has numerous UNM students as clients, said she doesn't agree with the recent actions of the RIAA and that she will only relinquish her clients' information if served with a court order.
"What people do online is their business, it is not our job to police them," Fox said.
Fox said she has not been contacted by the RIAA nor has she been requested to identify users of her Internet service.
Monday's lawsuits were filed on behalf of subsidiary record companies such as Sony Music and Universal Music Group, whose sales are down more than 30 percent since mid-2000, Sherman said in a news release.
The lawsuits were filed in federal courts in several states and named defendants of all ages, including a 12-year-old girl who was downloading music from KazAa, one of many music-sharing programs available on the Internet.
Sherman said that the RIAA is not specifically targeting college students, but admitted that the first lawsuits were timed to coincide with the beginning of the academic year to promote education about the activity.
"It is just too little too late," Fox said. "Illegal music sharing is an unfortunate side effect of the Internet, but it should have been addressed long ago before it had gotten so out of hand."
Sherman said the record companies would promise not to sue individuals for the swapping of music if they stepped forward voluntarily, admitted their participation in the programs and promised not to do it again.
The offer of amnesty would not apply to individuals who have already been identified through the more than 1,500 subpoenas already filed, he said.
The defendants are typically individuals who have downloaded more than 1,000 music files, and under the law the music industry can seek damages ranging from $750 to $150,000 for each illegal file in their possession.
Jeff Gassaway, security administrator at UNM's Computer Information Resources and Technology department, said the department monitors computer use on campus and can identify someone who is running a file-sharing program through the Internet.
"We try to preserve the network for certain kind of use that is primarily academic," Gassaway said. He said UNM does not act on behalf of copyright holders.
If file transfers fall within the parameters of the RIAA's investigators, they will notify CIRT that illegal file transferring has occurred and will subpoena the University to obtain the student's name in order to file a lawsuit.
Gassaway said since the RIAA began its investigation, CIRT has implemented programs to educate UNM students about the possibility of being sued for participating in the illegal activity.
