via http://ahprojects.com/c/itp/thesis and http://jwz.livejournal.com/1213497.html

The Justice Department, where President Barack Obama has tapped five former RIAA lawyers to serve, said copyright infringement “creates a public harm that Congress determined must be deterred.”

The administration’s court filing Tuesday is the latest in the case of Joel Tenenbaum, a Boston University graduate student who was the nation’s second defendant to go to trial against the RIAA on file sharing charges. Most of the 30,000 civil cases the music industry has brought have settled out of court.

After the July verdict in a Boston federal court, Tenenbaum’s defense team mounted a legal challenge, saying the damages were unconstitutional because they were disproportionate to the harm the industry suffered. The Copyright Act allows fines ranging from $750 to $150,000 per infringement, all at a judge or jury’s discretion.

“The current damages range provides compensation for copyright owners because, inter alia, there exist situations in which actual damages are hard to quantify,” the Justice Department wrote. “Furthermore, in establishing the range, Congress took into account the need to deter the millions of users of new media from infringing copyrights in an environment where many violators believe they will go unnoticed.”

Among other things, Tenenbaum’s legal team wants the damages reduced to $750 per song.

The Obama administration and the Bush administration have supported file sharing damages of up to $150,000 per track. The Justice Department often weighs into cases when the constitutionality of laws are at issue, as copyright attorney Ben Sheffner notes.

U.S. District Judge Nancy Gertner did not indicate when she would rule in Tenenbaum’s case.

The only other file sharer to go to trial against the RIAA was Jammie Thomas-Rasset. The RIAA won a whopping $1.92 million verdict against the Minnesota woman this summer for sharing 24 songs on Kazaa.

A similar motion to set aside that verdict is pending.

A Fight Identity Theft visitor forwarded this email to us today and it was so creative I just had to post it here.

The email supposedly comes from Robert Mueller - the current head of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigations. Not only was it sent by the FBI, the scammers try to get you to believe it's been vetted by the Anti-Terrorist and International Fraud Division. Unbelievable.

Why Do They Send These Emails?

What they're really after is the fee they want you to pay in order to collect your $850,000 - that's why they call this an "advanced-fee fraud." The fee is sent by money order which makes it very difficult to trace and impossible to recover. Here's the money paragraph:

This letter will serve as proof that the Federal Bureau Of Investigation is authorizing you to pay the required $239.99 ONLY to your claims agent via the information in which she shall send to you upon your request, if you do not receive your winning prize of $850,000.00 US Dollars we shall be held responsible for the loss and this shall invite a penalty of $3,000 which will be made PAYABLE ONLY by you (The Winner).

 The $239.99 will likely only be the start of the fraud. They'll continue to ask for more money in order to deliver the $850,000. No matter how much you pay, the money will never end up in your bank account.

From: robertmul@fbi.gov.us
Subject: E-mail From The FBI..
Date: Wed, 2 Dec 2009 13:53:50 -0500

Anti-Terrorist and International Fraud Division
Federal Bureau Of Investigation.
Seattle, Washington 98101-2904
Telephone/Fax Number: +1(206) 426-2866
 
Attn: Beneficiary
 
This is to Officially inform you that it has come to our notice and we have thoroughly completed an Investigation with the help of our Intelligence Monitoring Network System that you legally won the sum of $850,000.00 US Dollars from a Lottery Company in the United Kingdom. During our investigation we discovered that your e-mail won the money from an Online Balloting System and we have authorized this winning to be authentic and paid to you via a Certified Cashier's Check.
 
Normally, it will take up to 10 business days for an International Check to be cashed by your local bank. We have successfully come to an agreement with this company on your behalf that funds are to be drawn from a registered bank within the United States Of America so as to enable you cash the check instantly without any delay, henceforth the stated amount of $850,000.00  US Dollars has been deposited with Bank Of America.
We have completed this investigation and you are hereby approved to receive the winning prize as we have verified the entire transaction to be Legitimate, Safe and 100% risk free of scams and frauds of any nature, due to the fact that the funds have been deposited at Bank Of America you will be required to settle the following bills directly to the lottery claims agent in-charge of this transaction whom is located at the liaison office of the Lottery Company in Seattle-Washington. According to our discoveries, you are required to pay for the following:
 
(1) Deposit Fee's (Fee's paid by the lottery company for the deposit into an American Bank which is - Bank of America)
(2) Cashier's Check Conversion Fee (Fee for converting the Wire Transfer payment into a Certified Cashier's Check)
(3) Shipping Fee's (This is the charge for shipping the Cashier's Check to your nominated destination)
 
The total amount for everything is $239.99 (Two Hundred & Thirty Nine United States Dollars & Ninety Nine Cents). We have tried our possible best to indicate that this $239.99 should be deducted from your winning prize but the funds have already been deposited at The Bank of America and cannot be accessed by anyone apart from you the winner. Therefore you will be required to pay the needed funds to your lotto claims Agent in-charge of this transaction via Western Union Money Transfer Or Money Gram. The payment will NOT reflect at the Bank of America with the given transaction code(EA2948-910) until you have covered the processing fees needed.
 
In order to proceed with this transaction, Click Here to contact your claims agent Mrs. Louise Major. You will be required to call her for verbal verification and e-mail her with the following informations:
 
FULL NAME:
FULL MAILING ADDRESS(INCLUDING CITY/STATE/ZIPCODE):
AGE/SEX/OCCUPATION:
CONTACT PHONE NUMBERS(CELL & HOME):
 
You will also be required to request Western Union details on how to send the required $239.99 in order to immediately ship your prize of $850,000.00 US Dollars via Certified Cashier's Check drawn from The Bank of America, Also include the following transaction code in order for her to immediately identify this transaction : EA2948-910.
 
This letter will serve as proof that the Federal Bureau Of Investigation is authorizing you to pay the required $239.99 ONLY to your claims agent via the information in which she shall send to you upon your request, if you do not receive your winning prize of $850,000.00 US Dollars we shall be held responsible for the loss and this shall invite a penalty of $3,000 which will be made PAYABLE ONLY by you (The Winner).
 
Signed:
Robert Mueller
Federal Bureau Of Investigation                    
 
NOTE: In order to ensure your check gets delivered to you ASAP, you are advised to immediately contact Mrs. Louise Major via contact information provided above and make the required payment of $239.99 to information in which she will provide you.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________
The information contained in this email message is legally privileged and confidential information intended solely for the use of the intended recipient(s). If you are not the intended recipient(s), any distribution, dissemination, or reproduction of this email message is strictly prohibited.

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The analyst twice logged in to a system involved in the terrorism investigation: first on April 9, when he stayed on for two hours, and then on April 14. He’d gotten the password from another classified message to which he also had legitimate access. Montgomery later told investigators that he hadn’t noticed a warning in the message advising that only personnel participating in the classified operation were authorized to use the password.

Court records say little about the system Montgomery logged into, except that it was was being used from around the United States, and was being monitored by the FBI and other law enforcement agencies at the time of Montgomery’s access.

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