Corporations and universities have received letters from the movie and music industries urging them to take actions against employees and students to curb the use of corporate and college systems for these uses.  Apparently the letters did not threaten direct legal action against the colleges but they certainly were intending to turn up the heat on the network officials to stop the use of the internal networks for the illegal file swapping activities. Cnet’s News.com carried an article last October that quoted the industry letter that was sent to 2,000 universities as including, 

Peng was accused of running a file swapping server using the university’s internal computer system, complete with lists of top downloads of the day on a Website that was open to users of the Princeton network as well as the outside world through the university’s high-speed computer connections. Supposedly it has been possible to copy songs from Christina Aguilera, U2, Santana and Billy Joel, among others from Peng’s system. 

The Petition filed against Mr. Peng included this general statement, 

One unusual allegation is that Peng’s 

Apparently, these activities were widely known around the Princeton campus. The petition alleges that Peng’s site was the subject of an article in the student newspaper, the Daily Princetonian, last November.

So what have the plaintiffs requested of the Court? The answer is fairly staggering. The plaintiffs ask for $150,000 for each work which was found to be illegally copied plus attorney’s fees, expenses and for a permanent injunction.

Two developments on the technology and privacy front have occurred. Both of the events center around Congress. The first is a report from the Associated Press (Reprinted in Government Technology on April 3, 2003 that the e-mail account of Florida Congresswoman Ginny Brown-Waite was hijacked and used by a hacker to send scandalous e-mails which were opposed to President Bush and the war in Iraq. The Hacker sent copies of the bogus message to everyone in her e-mail address book and other copies went to members of the Florida Legislature.

Senator Feinstein introduced the Privacy Act of 2003 (S.745) that aims to protect our Social Security numbers from identity thieves. The bill would impose  civil penalties  for the acquisition and use of another person’s social security number and criminal penalties for obtaining any individual’s social security number for purposes of locating or identifying an individual with the intent to physically injure, harm or use the identity of the individual for any illegal purpose.

Interestingly, the bill also prohibits most governmental entities from printing our social security numbers on checks. It also bans the requirement that we disclose our social security number for purchase of commercial goods or services in most circumstances. So, if this bill passes, you may not have to disclose your social security number for routine purchases.

There is a lot more to the Privacy Act and it bears watching in the coming months. It is on line at the Library of Congress Website.