ACS:Law copyright file sharing claims, Gallant Macmillan - and probably some others along the way...

[sek]

I hope, ACS Law, that you are reading this site as this is the one message I really want to you to get:

 

Today I have done the following on behalf of all those who've received your threatening, but groundless, letter:

 

1) Consulted the police on this matter, giving them the contact details provided on your letter - telephone and address.

2) Reported your [problem] to the Office of Fair Trading. [problem] is what it is since you are trying to solicit monies from people as if they are guilty when you have no proof of this. Innocent until proven guilty - ever heard of that, erhm? Guilt on the basis of IP address is ridiculous. IP addresses change every 24 hours (especially if a moden is switched off); can be faked and can be used by others if Wi-Fi security is compromised.

3) Reported your [problem] to Consumer Direct - a government led organisation.

 

You may now yourself be contacted from any of the above three and I suspect they will be more manacing.

[bluesnow]

hello!

i'm one of the ones that recieved a letter yesterday from acs law. i'll be watching this forum for info. i have contacted virgin tech support they know of the problem and advised me to forward the letter to them.

[I've got no money]

Can I suggest t0 anyone who wishes to complain on the basis that they believe that the letter is some sort of fraud that they complain in writing to the Solicitors Regulation Authority, Ipsley Court, Berrington Close, Redditch, B98 0TD

 

Their website is here:-

 

Solicitors Regulation Authority - Protecting consumers of legal services

 

If everybody who gets the letter complains then the SRA will at least have to investigate

 

Trading standards will, I think, be the City of Westminster.

[harrassed senior]

Not forgetting Watchdog:

 

BBC - Watchdog - Got a story

[mr.ton]

I think i/we on here are a scepticle bunch born out of hatred of the DCA's

So we instantly assume that guests on threads are from the dark side so to speak...

Im sure some of them are now & again...but i need to wake up to the fact that they may just be ordinary folk who havent signed up to CAG & are reading in.

If thats the case then welcome to you all & you will get all the advice/help you need on here.

My message to any of guests reading in who are from a DCA (or in this case ACS:Law) is...beware, as CAG will come down on you like a ton of bricks & your criminal industry is finished

[mr.ton]

I hope, ACS Law, that you are reading this site as this is the one message I really want to you to get:

 

Today I have done the following on behalf of all those who've received your threatening, but groundless, letter:

 

1) Consulted the police on this matter, giving them the contact details provided on your letter - telephone and address.

2) Reported your [problem] to the Office of Fair Trading. [problem] is what it is since you are trying to solicit monies from people as if they are guilty when you have no proof of this. Innocent until proven guilty - ever heard of that, erhm? Guilt on the basis of IP address is ridiculous. IP addresses change every 24 hours (especially if a moden is switched off); can be faked and can be used by others if Wi-Fi security is compromised.

3) Reported your [problem] to Consumer Direct - a government led organisation.

 

You may now yourself be contacted from any of the above three and I suspect they will be more manacing.

 

Dont forget trading standards in that list

[harrassed senior]

Gone onto the 'Two Worlds' website, may be my computer but cannot get any of their links to work. I was going to ask them if they are aware of these letters.

 

Being extremely sceptical, I wondered if this was another way of planting a virus etc.

[mr.ton]

We dont know who or what is behind this [problem] or what its purpose/intention is etc...

But as far as this site is concerned...we just need to make as many aware as possible to not pay any monies whatsoever & to report this to all the relevant authorities.

[andydd]

It's a [problem] see; Infringement of Copyright Notice - 'Two Worlds' - P2Pfreak.com

 

 

HHmm..It appears NOT to be a [problem] as such.

 

A [problem] would be just sending out completly random letters to anyone and ACS having no connection with copyright infringement.

 

It appears that ACS are working for a small number of companies and they track down people who they alledge are downloading their software..however it appears that the sytem is flawed, there are many other sites that list hundreds of people who appear to be completely innocent.

 

There are a few points to note:-

 

It appears that everyone who received a letter does have internet access installed at their home.

 

Many are with virgin media, however virgin media does not use staic Ip address, so IP address are liable to be changing all the time.

 

When pushed, ACS will claim that even if YOU didnt download the offending file if someone (i.e hack into your wifi, friend, family, flatmate, lodger) did using the account in your name then you are liable, of course this is complete testicles !

 

There are many people who say that the softawre was NEVER downloaded via their network at all, this means that ACS made a mistake or as people know, some P2P sites throw in random Ip address, or people can disguise their own or use one belonging to someone else.]

 

ACS appear to have never chased anyone through the courts (although there is mention of this happening in Germany).

 

Atari were a client but when they realised innocent people were being hassled they cancelled their contract.

 

Ive also just notice that ACS's (new) office is next to mine !. I may go and see if i can have a nose

Edited May 8, 2009 by andydd
Removing offensive language

[I've got no money]

Dont forget trading standards in that list

 

Please Please Please

 

Don't forget the Solicitors Regulation Authority

[mr.ton]

Its a [problem] as far as im concerned

Demanding hundreds of pounds upfront in return for legal action not being taken is scandalous in my view.

Only a court has the power to obtain monies off people..these rogues dont.

[andydd]

Its a [problem] as far as im concerned

Demanding hundreds of pounds upfront in return for legal action not being taken is scandalous in my view.

Only a court has the power to obtain monies off people..these rogues dont.

 

I agree, but by '[problem]' what i meant was that i could today send 100 letters out claiming that they have illegaly downloaded my latest album 'Andydd Sings badly', and they must send me £500, complete rubbish of course but many people are terrified of any sort of legal action and some may even pay up !

 

There is mention on one of the links in thios thread that there are 400 people who have banded together to fight this so will be interesting to see the outcome.

[cerberusalert]

The software that has been used to 'harvest' these ISP addresses is unproven. The company operating it are not recognised in several EU countries as internet forensic experts. At least two countries, Switzerland & Italy have thrown similar cases out of court.

 

Add to that, anyones ISP address can be 'cloned' & any P2P sharer worth their salt would be using a program which hides their ISP address or would download through a third party website. So all in all they would have difficulty proving anything in a UK court.

[mr.ton]

I would really love to see 1 of these threatograms printed up on here (editing out personal details of course)

[jd47804]

I have also received the letter from ACS:Law y'day demanding £606.

 

The firm certainly exists, I phoned up the firm after and got a voicemail and I believe what it says on the Law Society website. Have anyone actually emailed this [email protected] character to verify that his firm has not been hijacked?? As of some you have noticed, the domain name of the website and the email is different, this smells fishy.

 

I did some web search, there is this fella called Mchael Coyle who allegedly is defending people ([email protected]). I am going to email him to see what he has to say.

 

Setting aside whether this is a [problem] or not a [problem], let assmue it is genuine for a second. I don't want any trouble (I am going to be away aboard for a while), so I sent an email to ACS:Law yesterday to see if they are prepared to settle for substantially less than £600, something like 10x the costs of the game in question (£120). They said in their letter that they want to deter people, ask for a token compensation and cover costs. Deterrence is achieved by asking people to sign the undertakings, 10x the game costs should be the token compensation. As regard to costs, I don't believe it will costs them hundreds of pounds per claim for all the stuff they said they did in the letter.

 

I am waiting for a response on this.

 

I will only settle on the basis that I am not admitting any guilt, I am merely try to avoid a long drawn out process (I know some of you might object as a matter of principal). However, if they think by settling then they can keep on issuing letter for money then I will fight and employ a lawyer.

 

As some of you have said, all they have is just an IP. I am not a lawyer but I think they will probably need more to prove that I have been distributing (i.e., upload and allowing others to download, rather than purely downloading) the game in question, for example, for how long it was available and how many bytes has been sent. I think the needs to prove that the game in question has been reside on the hard disk is also important in my view.

 

I will probably lodge this incident with the Solicitors Regulation Authority on the basis of the threatening nature of the letter.

[mr.ton]

JD..do not part with any monies whatsoever

Long process or not - dont.

[robjam1969]

Jd

 

As per mr.ton , don,t do it. It looks like they will go away if you ignore them, correspond with them and they are half way there! By all means lodge the complaints you mention. Just remember these parasites have no more hold or power over you than I have!

 

hang on in there.

[Veliszar]

Unfortunately guys I have just received one of these letters too.

 

I work for Sky so I called my VIP department a couple of minutes ago and had them check for any activity on my account regarding copyright infringement.

 

There was a note added on 3rd March 2009 stating that a Court Order has been issued to provide the customers address and contact details to DAVENPORT.

 

An email address was provided if any Sky customers need assistance regarding this: [email protected]

 

It just so happens that I own Two Worlds and as mentioned before, if I had downloaded the game before I bought it then I would have known that it was a pile of s**t.

[sosumi]

At this moment ACS Law has 31 guests online.

We have 60.

What's going on?

[mr.ton]

With the greatest repect to all...i honestly couldnt care less if the Queen has received 1 of these letters...DO NOT PAY ANY MONIES to this lot WHATSOEVER...i cant stress that enough.

If a court was genuinley involved, then there are legal proceedures to go through before obtaining any monies off a person, like taking into account all their essential outgoings & costs for food,clothes,travel etc....same principle with the DCA's if it was them going through the courts...and deciding on an amount leftover to repay if anything at all?

That doesnt sound like its happened at all here & why the hole thing stinks worse than a sewer

[sosumi]

With the greatest repect to all...i honestly couldnt care less if the Queen has received 1 of these letters...DO NOT PAY ANY MONIES to this lot WHATSOEVER...i cant stress that enough.

If a court was genuinley involved, then there are legal proceedures to go through before obtaining any monies off a person, like taking into account all their essential outgoings & costs for food,clothes,travel etc....same principle with the DCA's if it was them going through the courts...and deciding on an amount leftover to repay if anything at all?

That doesnt sound like its happened at all here & why the hole thing stinks worse than a sewer

Well said Mr T!

[SomeRandomGuy21]

I have been reading forum all morning and have done my own research on the so called 'ACS:LAW'

Having received a letter yesterday stating that I have download 'a computer game sold under the name 'Two Worlds'. As you are all aware, they have 'evidence'.

I have noticed that the sum for 'Two Worlds' that has to paid is £665.00, which appears the be the same for all cases of 'Two Worlds'

 

However, I have made phone calls to ACS:LAW' and got nowhere. I phoned and gave a fake name, which then got me though to an advisor. The 'advisor' told me what the letter was about without me even giving my reference number. I asked him he knows all of this, to which he replied 'my client deals only with games' to which I replied 'How do you know on which matter I am talking about'. He hung up.

 

The conversation above, occurred after I stated that the given letter was from 'Davenport Lyons', to which they responded 'We are working on behalf of Davenport Lyons'.

 

I find this most suspicious because it did not seem to phase them that it was from 'Davenport Lyons' despite the fact that I have read that the 'Davenport Lyons' company was in fact a [problem] using this very same technique. They were on WatchDog.

 

I ask of you, you to phone ACS and say you received a letter from Davanport Lyons. Record the response on this forum. If it is similar to response, then I suggest that we send the authorities their way and contact WatchDog.

[Delta82]

‘New’ Anti-Piracy Lawyers Chase UK File-Sharers | TorrentFreak

 

Seems the coverage is picking up ... starting to get square eyes and bad head now with all the reading up on Davenport and ACS:Law Ive done over the past 24 or so hours now. (not including sleep time of course )

[Huff&Puff]

Without wishing to appear too paranoid, might I suggest that nobody does visit their website (at least without going through an anonimizing proxy). It would be e great way of harvesting IP addresses if they are running a [problem].

[mr.ton]

I advise all who are reading this (guests included) that have received this threat:

Contact your local police force & the police force for were this ACS:Law are based (please note - do not ring 999 in both instances) - every force has a local/landline number you can ring & get general/basic advice that way.

Contact your local trading standards & the trading standards for the area were ACS:Law are based as well.

Contact the OFT.

Contact BBC Watchdog.

Contact Consumer direct.