The RIAA also announced the launch of an amnesty for the less substantial file-swapper.
Both actions had been widely anticipated following a carefully planned RIAA summer campaign to tackle the illegal downloading of copyrighted music over file-sharing networks such as KaZaA.
The RIAA announced in June that it would be turning its attention to individual pirates, not just the file-sharing networks that facilitate file swapping. Since then it has served a flood of subpoenas under the controversial US Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), ordering ISPs to identify targeted individuals.
A reported 1,600 file-swappers have been highlighted by specialised software that scans the public directories available to any user of a peer-to-peer network. These directories, which allow users to find the material they are looking for, list all the files that other users of the network are currently offering to distribute. When the software finds a user who is offering to distribute copyrighted music files, it downloads some of the infringing files, along with the date and time it accessed the files.
Additional information that is publicly available from these systems allows the RIAA to then identify the user's ISP. The RIAA can then serve a subpoena on the ISP requesting the name and address of the individual whose account was being used to distribute copyrighted music.
Under the DMCA, ISPs must provide copyright holders with such information when there is reason to believe copyrights are being infringed. The RIAA is then in a position to sue – and this week began doing so.
The RIAA has also taken what some see as a peace offering for alienated music fans, and yesterday announced the "Clean Slate" programme through which file-swappers will be able to obtain an amnesty from action, upon certain conditions.
These conditions include the signing of a notarised amnesty form, which requires that the user will admit to having illegally shared copyrighted music over the internet and will promise to delete the downloaded songs from their computers, CD-Rs or other storage facilities. The user must also promise not to download copyrighted songs again.
If the file-swapper makes the promise and is then caught breaking his promise, this may be reflected in the sum of damages claimed by the RIAA.
According to CNet news.com RIAA President Cary Sherman commented, "Our goal is not to be vindictive or punitive." He added, "It is simply to get peer-to-peer users to stop offering music that does not belong to them."