U. intolerant of internet piracy

It might sound like fun to be a pirate. But if it’s the type of pirate that steals music by illegally downloading off of Penn’s internet network, this captain should expect more than rum and wenches.

“Penn proactively monitors its networks,” Information Security Officer Joshua Beeman wrote in an e-mail. Content is examined when Penn is “responding to a valid legal request, or to an emergency,” he specified. All of Penn’s “allegations and the enforcement are being driven by the copyright holders, and not by Penn.”

But this does not mean the University does not catch and convict music pirates. According to Beeman, keeping with all laws such as anti-piracy and copyright are “of the highest priority to the University,” and all members of Penn’s community could “face civil suit, criminal charges, and/or penalties and fines.”

A College junior who preferred to remain anonymous was fined for sharing music she didn’t even download. When she went home for winter break her freshman year, her siblings borrowed her laptop to illegally download music. But when she returned to school with a file-sharing program on her computer, within a week she had received a warning from the University.

She was surprised to receive the warning, because she “wasn’t actively downloading anything.” But the program’s settings were set to automatically share files, despite her intentions.

Deleting the program did not solve her problems. After another two warnings, she had to pay a fine.

“At the time I was extremely annoyed because I wasn’t even actively doing anything — I just happened to be on campus,” she said.

Although she felt that the issue was “handled very well,” she was also surprised and embarrassed by the conviction. When the Office of Student Conduct representative “commented on the music that was being downloaded,” she felt that her privacy had been violated.

The Honor Council — co-chaired by Aaron Roth — has the responsibility of representing the student body when students challenge sentences from the OSC, including those for illegal downloading. In Roth’s experience, people tend to download “because it’s free and easy.” Music piracy for Roth is another example of students choosing what is easy instead of thinking about the possible consequences of their actions.

The students do realize that internet piracy is illegal, Roth said, but “most people do think that they won’t get caught or they won’t get convicted because it happens so infrequently.”

What students don’t realize is that “it can happen and it has happened,” he added.

According to Kevin Nam, an Engineering freshman and ITA, “Penn used to be notorious for piracy.” But recent crackdowns have made students “afraid of being caught” and significantly decreased download rates. These stricter policies affect the ITAs’ training: from the beginning, ITAs are informed that piracy is a “big deal” and is not tolerated at Penn, said Nam.

Beeman added that the University expects its intellectual property to be respected as copyrighted material. For him, “it seems only reasonable and fair then that we should be respectful of others’ copyrights.” Instead, the Office of Information Security’s website lists legal alternatives such as Pandora and SHOUTcast that students can turn to for music.

The College junior wished this information was available to her two years ago. “I didn’t know I was doing that — I was really misinformed,” she said.

Note: This article was updated from its original version to clarify the role of Aaron Roth and the Honor Council in hearings involving students and the OSC.

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