I legitly own a copy of a game that I was going to download, Battlefield 2. The reason I was going to download it was because my Disc 2 was missing and I had no way of installing it on my fresh O/S. I went on to a public tracker and started to download it, while I was starting to download I found my Disc 2 and stopped the download. Couple of days later I recieved a letter from my ISP that recieved a letter from the DMCA. To me, there are about three scenarios I can think of when I comes to telling them what happened. 1) I tell them that I was downloading a copy of the game I own, because I could not find my complete set. I looked up the DMCA law after that and found out it to be illegal to download a copy of a game you have. That would mean that I know how to do it, and they could prosecute me for any futher infringement. 2) I can flat out deny any involvement in the downloading of the program, and say that someone masked their IP. 3) I can say that someone went into my wireless network which was unsecure at the time and started to download the game. What shall I do? I want to contact them soon so they don't start any legal action against me. I feel like I should take #1 as I saw nothing wrong with it, and I did not want to purchase a new Battlefield 2. I also had no friends that owned the game, so I couldn't of borrowed their CD.
Very difficult situation here and this is why. 1: They don’t care if you knew or not that you had lost your disc and didn’t know that you aren’t allowed to download it. The will argue this is just an excuse and they may still push proceedings. 2: I am not sure if you could deny it as who knows what methods they are using to track these things? Although it could be a case of their mistake as they did with Shawn (the owner of this forum). 3: You could say that it was your wireless network being un-secure but they would probably argue that is your responsibility for not having it secure but also its back to answer 2 - how are they tracking these things i.e. do they have records of your MAC address?? I really wouldnt know if you would be in a better situation if you just tell them the truth and that it was mistake or to use the other excuses.
I forgot that there was actually a fourth. I could just ignore it and say I never recieved the letter. ^.^
I have the cases for the games and the manuals, so I could actually physically show someone from the DMCA that I physically own a copy of the game.
I dont think that would matter. The MPAA have accussed Shawn of downloading Meet the Fockers and he already has the orginal. He is actually fighting his case because he didnt download it but they are still chasing him. Check out his blog at http://www.shawnhogan.com/ for some of his posts, you can find the category on the right hand side.
Is it a cease-and-desist letter? Don't contact them! Usually its used as a scare tactic, hoping that your a 10 year old boy and when your parents get that DMCA letter they will take away your 2mb broadband connection. If its cease and desist. Don't continue downloading, remove any trace from your pc (you need a shredding program, deleting it wont work). If its a letter we are starting legal proceedings, then seek legal advice. Depending on your isp, you may want to switch as they may be monitoring your ip range.
Having the ownership of the software or game doesn't mean you can download it. It is illegal to download anything copyrighted even if you own it, unless authorized by the owner. Peace,
Do exactly that. I know someone who had recieved something like this from his ISP for trying to down a movie, she simply ignored it, which they sent about 2 more letters after that and thats about it.
Wow. I would say that the only way that they could know that you tried to download it is because they provided the download site. So then, they should first be prosecuting themselves for being a public nuisance. Btw what was the outcome of this?