first cut at the dmca-respo...
Roger Dingledine authored 19 years ago
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6) <title>Response template for Tor server operator to ISP</title>
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44)
45) <h2>Response template for Tor node maintainer to ISP</h2>
46) <hr />
47) <p>Written by the Electronic Frontier
48) Foundation (<a href="http://www.eff.org/">EFF</a>). Last updated 19 Feb 2005.</p>
49)
50) <p>Note to Tor server operators: In this litigous era, anyone
51) providing routing services may face copyright complaints under the
52) Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Thankfully, the DMCA safe harbors
53) provide immunity from many of them -- both to you and to your
54) upstream provider. If your Internet host forwards a DMCA complaint
55) to you, here's a template you can use to write a response. You can
56) tailor this to your own circumstances: if you think your host would
57) be disturbed to hear you're running a server on the network, you may
58) want to take that part out. Of course it's up to you to comply with
59) your ISP's terms of service. If you're not comfortable including so
60) much legal explanation, feel free to invite the ISP to contact EFF
61) for a fuller discussion.</p>
62)
63) <p>Also, if you received this document from anywhere besides <a
64) href="http://tor.eff.org/eff/tor-dmca-response.html">http://tor.eff.org/eff/tor-dmca-response.html</a>,
65) it may be out of date. Follow the link to get the latest version.</p>
66)
67) <hr />
68)
69) <p>Dear [ISP]:</p>
70)
71) <p>Thank you for forwarding me the notice you received from [copyright
72) claimant] regarding [content]. I would like to assure you that,
73) contrary to the assertions in the notice, 1) I am not hosting or
74) making available the claimed infringing materials, and 2) you are
75) already protected by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act's ("DMCA")
76) safe harbor from any liability arising from this complaint. The
77) notice is incorrect, probably based upon misunderstandings about law
78) and about some of the software I run.
79) </p>
80)
81) <p>
82) First, in terms of legal liability, this notice does not create any
83) risk for you as a service provider. As you know, the DMCA creates
84) four "safe harbors" for service providers to protect them from
85) copyright liability for the acts of their users, when the ISPs
86) fulfill certain requirements. (17 U.S.C. � 512) The DMCA's
87) requirements vary depending on the ISP's role. You may be most
88) familiar with the "notice and takedown" provisions of DMCA 512(c),
89) but those apply only to content hosted on your servers, or to linking
90) and caching activity. The "takedown notice" provisions do not apply
91) when an ISP merely acts as a conduit. Instead, the "conduit" safe
92) harbor of DMCA 512(a) has different and less burdensome requirements,
93) as the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals held in RIAA v. Verizon (see
94) <a href="http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/RIAA_v_Verizon/opinion-20031219.pdf">http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/RIAA_v_Verizon/opinion-20031219.pdf</a>)
95) and the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals confirmed in RIAA v. Charter
96) (see <a href="http://www.eff.org/IP/P2P/Charter/033802P.pdf">http://www.eff.org/IP/P2P/Charter/033802P.pdf</a>).
97) </p>
98)
99) <p>
100) Here, any content that came from or through my computers merely
101) passed through your network, so DMCA 512(a) applies. Under DMCA
102) 512(a), you are immune from money damages for copyright infringement
103) claims if you maintain "a policy that provides for termination in
104) appropriate circumstances of subscribers and account holders of the
105) service provider's system or network who are repeat infringers." If
106) you have and implement such a policy, you are free from fear of
107) copyright damages, period.
108) </p>
109)
110) <p>
111) As for what makes a reasonable policy, as the law says, it's one that
112) only terminates subscribers who are repeat infringers. A notice
113) claiming infringement is not the same as a determination of
114) infringement. The notification you received is not proof of any
115) copyright infringement, and it certainly is not proof of the "repeat
116) infringement" that is required under the law before you need to
117) terminate my account. I have not infringed any copyrights and do not
118) intend to do so. Therefore, you continue to be protected under the
119) DMCA 512(a) safe harbor, without taking any further action.
120) </p>
121)
122) <p>
123) You might be curious, though, about what did trigger the notice. The
124) software that likely triggered the faulty notice is a program I run
125) called Tor. Tor is network software that helps users to enhance
126) their privacy, security, and safety online. It does not host or make
127) available any content. Rather, it is part of a network of nodes on
128) the Internet that simply pass packets among themselves before sending
129) them to their destinations, just as any Internet host does. The
130) difference is that Tor tunnels the connections such that no hop can
131) learn both the source and destination of the packets, giving users
132) protection from nefarious snooping on network traffic. Tor protects
133) users against hazards such as harassment, spam, and identity theft.
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slight rewording of nrl's r...
Roger Dingledine authored 19 years ago
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134) In fact, initial development of Tor, including deployment of a
135) public-use Tor network, was a project of the U.S. Naval Research
136) Laboratory, with funding from ONR and DARPA. (For more on Tor,
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first cut at the dmca-respo...