IRMA monitoring and Passing IPs to Eircom

watty

This is interesting ruling:

The Swiss Federal Court has ruled that software which identified the internet protocol (IP) address of unauthorised music uploaders broke data protection law.

The court backed that country's data protection commissioner, who said that Logistep violated Switzerland's Data Protection Act when it used the software. The IP addresses were personal data, the Court said, and processing that data without the knowledge or permission of the person concerned was a breach of the law, it said.

via http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/09/13/ip_address_trace_ruling/

Bear in mind that Switzerland is not part of EU and only recently decided that joining the UN was OK.

Moriarty

It's interesting, when the judge presiding over the IRMA v eircom case earlier this year ruled that an ip address was not personal/private data. I've no idea how closely Switzerland's other laws relate to our own though, so I'm not sure how relevant this result could be here.

Sponge Bob

It think they can run their snooping service but not within Switzerland. Does not mean much really.

I am aware of an Irish file sharer who was caught rotten because they used a shared folder technique. In this particular shared folder was some employer related stuff although the computer is a desktop belonging to the worker at home. The employer was sent a stiffy based on the contents of the folder.

The employer is absolutely hopping and has roundly threatened the snooper 'or its agents' in Ireland from proceeding any further or divulging any information they picked up on their internet travels particularly where it concerns them. Next serve is to to the filepolizei.

Once that fuss dies down the employee will no doubt find themselves on the carpet.

watty

The problem is Static IPs *DO* uniquely identify a user.

If a user is using DynDNS, then even a technically dynamic IP can identify a user.

Even if an IP is technically dynamic it may be re-assigned very infrequently or only if a modem is changed.

I'm not sure the courts in France and Ireland have not got it wrong. Maybe there was not well enough briefed technical advice.

I'd agree with this

The Court recognised the economic interest that copyright holders had in stopping the illegal sharing of material in which they had rights, but said that that interest did not justify what it called a significant intrusion into the privacy of each affected user.

I have no sympathy with Freetards. But I think IRMA needs a court order for EACH IP before they look up the ISP. They should have to prove to a Court for EACH IP that the IP (+ date + time) was used in Crime or Copyright infringement before submitting that IP to a third party.

On web sites I administer I look up IPs of those wishing to register very often. The resulting search details are never passed to 3rd party. However if a new registration is 100% a spambot the email address, user name and IP is submitted to a spam database. We say so on the the rules aka T&C.

Link only works if you are NOT logged in

19. Username, email and IP address of those signing up to "spam" (unsolicited advertising) will be forwarded to Blacklisting Databases and the Account banned forever. We reserve the right to permanently block any IP address/Host name, IP block, Username, email address or email domain.

via http://www.techtir.ie/user/register
Also in Rules link on left panel, works no matter if logged in or not http://www.techtir.ie/rules


It's a complex issue. I think IRMA goes a step beyond what user management of a web site does as it is 3rd party monitoring without user knowledge or permission (unlike above example), not just passing on IP like Spam database reporting.

Cabaal

Didn't the data controller rule in Ireland that an IP address is not personal data?
Given as you said Switzerland is not even part of the EU I don't see this having any affect on Ireland

watty

Yes. The Data Controller did rule that. But is it always the correct decision?

Yes. The Swiss ruling only affects Switzerland. But Monitoring carried out in Switzerland, Swiss based IPs/Users or Swiss based servers (even if you are here?).