DirecTV uses smartcards and special readers to allow its
subscribers to receive the company's satellite programmes. A pirate
industry has grown up around this, involving the use of modified
smartcards and readers, which allow users to illegally intercept
the programmes.
DirecTV has sued the sellers, programmers and manufacturers of
the cards, readers and programming devices, and also those running
web sites that promote these items. Now, following the lead of the
music industry, DirecTV is taking direct action against the users
themselves.
But one method used by the company is to sue, or threaten to
sue, the individuals who purchased items from the web sites closed
down by DirecTV, without any investigation into the reason why the
items were purchased.
As a result the company has, according to an article at
Securityfocus.com, mailed "tens of thousands of these demand
letters, and filed lawsuits against over 8,700 people around the
country". The end result, according to the article, is that people
are told to pay around $3,500 to settle the threatened
litigation.
But some people bought items from the now-defunct web sites for
reasons other than the illegal downloading of TV programmes,
according to the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Smartcards can be used for experiments in access or security,
says the civil liberties group, but researchers and hobbyists are
being threatened with legal action for purchasing the controversial
equipment.
The EFF and Stanford Law School's Center for Internet and
Society Cyberlaw Clinic last week launched a web site resource to
aid those threatened by a DirecTV lawsuit.
"DirecTV has threatened a smart card programmer trying to secure
his art installation, as well as network administrators and
engineers, all of whom are using smart cards for legitimate
purposes like security or access control," said EFF Staff Attorney
Jason Schultz.
"The DirecTV
Defense website provides resources to help technology purchasers
who aren't doing anything wrong stand up to DirecTV's intimidation
tactics because simply using smart card technology is not a
crime."
