first cut at the dmca-respo...
Roger Dingledine authored 19 years ago
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38) <div class="main-column">
39)
40) <!-- PUT CONTENT AFTER THIS TAG -->
41)
42) <h2>Response template for Tor node maintainer to ISP</h2>
43) <hr />
44) <p>Written by the Electronic Frontier
45) Foundation (<a href="http://www.eff.org/">EFF</a>). Last updated 19 Feb 2005.</p>
46)
47) <p>Note to Tor server operators: In this litigous era, anyone
48) providing routing services may face copyright complaints under the
49) Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Thankfully, the DMCA safe harbors
50) provide immunity from many of them -- both to you and to your
51) upstream provider. If your Internet host forwards a DMCA complaint
52) to you, here's a template you can use to write a response. You can
53) tailor this to your own circumstances: if you think your host would
54) be disturbed to hear you're running a server on the network, you may
55) want to take that part out. Of course it's up to you to comply with
56) your ISP's terms of service. If you're not comfortable including so
57) much legal explanation, feel free to invite the ISP to contact EFF
58) for a fuller discussion.</p>
59)
60) <p>Also, if you received this document from anywhere besides <a
61) href="http://tor.eff.org/eff/tor-dmca-response.html">http://tor.eff.org/eff/tor-dmca-response.html</a>,
62) it may be out of date. Follow the link to get the latest version.</p>
63)
64) <hr />
65)
66) <p>Dear [ISP]:</p>
67)
68) <p>Thank you for forwarding me the notice you received from [copyright
69) claimant] regarding [content]. I would like to assure you that,
70) contrary to the assertions in the notice, 1) I am not hosting or
71) making available the claimed infringing materials, and 2) you are
72) already protected by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act's ("DMCA")
73) safe harbor from any liability arising from this complaint. The
74) notice is incorrect, probably based upon misunderstandings about law
75) and about some of the software I run.
76) </p>
77)
78) <p>
79) First, in terms of legal liability, this notice does not create any
80) risk for you as a service provider. As you know, the DMCA creates
81) four "safe harbors" for service providers to protect them from
82) copyright liability for the acts of their users, when the ISPs
83) fulfill certain requirements. (17 U.S.C. � 512) The DMCA's
84) requirements vary depending on the ISP's role. You may be most
85) familiar with the "notice and takedown" provisions of DMCA 512(c),
86) but those apply only to content hosted on your servers, or to linking
87) and caching activity. The "takedown notice" provisions do not apply
88) when an ISP merely acts as a conduit. Instead, the "conduit" safe
89) harbor of DMCA 512(a) has different and less burdensome requirements,
90) as the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals held in RIAA v. Verizon (see
91) <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>)
92) and the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals confirmed in RIAA v. Charter
93) (see <a href="http://www.eff.org/IP/P2P/Charter/033802P.pdf">http://www.eff.org/IP/P2P/Charter/033802P.pdf</a>).
94) </p>
95)
96) <p>
97) Here, any content that came from or through my computers merely
98) passed through your network, so DMCA 512(a) applies. Under DMCA
99) 512(a), you are immune from money damages for copyright infringement
100) claims if you maintain "a policy that provides for termination in
101) appropriate circumstances of subscribers and account holders of the
102) service provider's system or network who are repeat infringers." If
103) you have and implement such a policy, you are free from fear of
104) copyright damages, period.
105) </p>
106)
107) <p>
108) As for what makes a reasonable policy, as the law says, it's one that
109) only terminates subscribers who are repeat infringers. A notice
110) claiming infringement is not the same as a determination of
111) infringement. The notification you received is not proof of any
112) copyright infringement, and it certainly is not proof of the "repeat
113) infringement" that is required under the law before you need to
114) terminate my account. I have not infringed any copyrights and do not
115) intend to do so. Therefore, you continue to be protected under the
116) DMCA 512(a) safe harbor, without taking any further action.
117) </p>
118)
119) <p>
120) You might be curious, though, about what did trigger the notice. The
121) software that likely triggered the faulty notice is a program I run
122) called Tor. Tor is network software that helps users to enhance
123) their privacy, security, and safety online. It does not host or make
124) available any content. Rather, it is part of a network of nodes on
125) the Internet that simply pass packets among themselves before sending
126) them to their destinations, just as any Internet host does. The
127) difference is that Tor tunnels the connections such that no hop can
128) learn both the source and destination of the packets, giving users
129) protection from nefarious snooping on network traffic. Tor protects
130) 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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131) In fact, initial development of Tor, including deployment of a
132) public-use Tor network, was a project of the U.S. Naval Research
133) Laboratory, with funding from ONR and DARPA. (For more on Tor,
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first cut at the dmca-respo...
Fix forgotten EFF pages