Insight gives broadband users fair warning

By Caleb O. Brown
Snitch Staff Writer

Late last month, Insight Communications e-mailed its broadband Internet customers to detail the role the company “is required to play in enforcing copyrights.”

Insight’s compliance with subpoenas issued by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and other copyright holders could end in federal lawsuits for customers who share and download music using peer-to-peer networks.

“We’re caught in the middle,” said Amanda Kahler, a call center manager for tech support at Insight’s Louisville offices.

Kahler said Insight has been placed in an “unfortunate” situation by the 1998 Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA), a federal law meant to protect copyright owners.

In its e-mail notice, the company announced that it may be forced to comply with portions of the act that allow copyright holders to subpoena records relating to possible copyright infringement. The subpoenas themselves do not have to be issued by judges and they are not attached to any legal proceeding.

In addition to shutting down a customer’s access to the Internet, the company told users that it, like all other Internet Service Providers, “may also be required ... to disclose the infringing customers’ identity to the copyright holder.”

Slashdot.org user “diersing,” who asked other users if they’d received the e-mail, asked, “Am I the only one that sees a difference between a police agency with a warrant in hand asking who’s who and the damn ‘copyright holder’? Shouldn’t there be a burden of proof before my privacy is violated?”

Kahler said Insight is concerned about its customers’ privacy, adding, “We’re very particular about the subpoenas that we’ll consider valid. It has to meet certain criteria.”

Verizon, Boston College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have challenged the subpoenas for different reasons. U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman of Minnesota has written a letter to the RIAA hinting that it may be abusing its newfound subpoena power.

Boston College and MIT won a round in federal court this month when a judge ruled that the RIAA could not serve subpoenas aimed at students suspected of illegal file-sharing. The subpoenas were issued in Washington, D.C., but served in Massachusetts. The two colleges have refused to name the students.

Verizon has been less successful. The communications giant initially moved to quash a subpoena issued by the RIAA. The association had requested the identity of a Verizon customer who used the KaZaa filesharing service to share copyrighted material. Verizon lost the initial case, and was forced to turn over the name while it pursues an appeal.

Sen. Coleman is among critics who argue that the recording industry has been far too aggressive in its attempts to stop illegal file-sharing. Coleman, a former roadie for a rock band, has accused RIAA of being excessive in issuing subpoenas. He said he will hold hearings examining the industry’s authority in enforcing copyright.

On Monday, The Associated Press reported that the RIAA has altered its position, saying it will now sue only those users who have downloaded a “substantial amount” of music. The group declined to define “substantial.”

“Through the end of July, the recording industry says it served 1,075 subpoenas to ISPs demanding information about end users,” said Wendy Seltzer, a staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. “That onslaught is continuing now in August.”

Seltzer says EFF’s main objection to the subpoenas — a provision of the 1998 copyright act — is that they are not issued by a judge and that they don’t have to be attached to any pending legal proceedingas other subpoenas must be.

Seltzer called the subpoenas “fishing expeditions. No judge ever sees them,” she said.

DEA, under pressure to reform itself, may soon shift focus again

By Caleb O. Brown
Staff Writer (Snitch)

“My job has nothing to do with enforcement,” says Milt Galanos, the Drug Enforcement Administration’s newest special agent in Louisville. Galanos, hired just two weeks ago to focus solely on demand reduction for Kentucky, says his job is to “create bad public relations for drugs.”

Galanos says he’s far from being a federal version of a “D.A.R.E. cop,” visiting schools, and preaching the fire-and-brimstone dangers of illicit drugs. He says his efforts include brainstorming with local authorities to come up with education and other initiatives, especially in communities ravaged by methamphetamine and OxyContin abuse.

Galanos joined the DEA in 1988, working as a diversion investigator, checking manufacturers’ inventories to make sure controlled substances weren’t falling into the wrong hands. Now that he’s a special agent focused on cutting drug demand, Galanos says he’s making contacts.

“I’ve tried to contact all the prevention centers throughout the state. I’ve spoken with one in Paducah. I’m just trying to get myself known as a resource in the state.”

Galanos and his job are part of the DEA’s changing face under the Bush administration. His placement in Louisville was part of an initiative launched by former DEA Administrator Asa Hutchinson, who wanted demand reduction coordinators in each state. Hutchinson has since left for the Department of Homeland Security.

Tony King, Louisville DEA’s field office director, says Hutchinson breathed new life into demand-reduction efforts. King says that under the Clinton administration and DEA Administrator Tom Constantine, demand reduction simply “floated down toward the bottom on the list of priorities.”

And now that Hutchinson has left the agency, King and Galanos are left to wonder what newly sworn DEA chief Karen Tandy will bring to the table.

Tandy has pledged that she will focus primarily on dismantling large, international drug rings — attacking the supply of drugs — though she hasn’t said much about her domestic agenda.

“Different administrators have different focuses,” says King. “We had a program where agents worked in South America trying to disrupt cartels. Constantine’s focus was domestic enforcement. Hutchinson’s was demand reduction coupled with foreign and domestic enforcement. It ebbs and flows. Until they deny me money, which they haven’t so far, I’ll just wait and see. We’ll do the best with what they give us.”

For fiscal 2003, Congress appropriated $1.9 billion for the DEA.

The agency’s website indicates that Tandy, a former federal prosecutor, is very interested in enforcement. DEA’s website notes that when Tandy was head of the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force at the Department of Justice, one of her prosecutions “led to the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision that attorneys’ fees are subject to forfeiture notwithstanding the Sixth Amendment right to counsel.”

Tandy, after her confirmation last week, indicated that she knows the criticism of DEA is that the agency has “lost focus” and that she’ll work to restore it.

King and Galanos won’t say if they think demand reduction will be a key part of Tandy’s focus.

King says one complicating factor is a recent federal performance audit of hundreds of agencies, including the DEA.

The review rated DEA as “results not demonstrated,” shorthand for “DEA is unable to demonstrate its progress in reducing the availability of illegal drugs in the U.S.” The report found that while DEA does have performance measures, “DEA managers are not held accountable for achieving results.”

The report gave DEA a rating of zero for accountability.

“How do you measure the influence you have on a kid?” King asks. “If Milt goes to a high school, they keep statistics on how many hours he spends doing presentations, but how do we know the overall impact? That’s the difficulty in demand reduction.”

Ultimately, King says, “Performance reviews like these mean more paperwork for people like me.”