Today’s guest blog is written by Dan Glickman, Chairman and CEO of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA).

Consider the following questions:

1. Does your home computer contain information that you feel strongly about protecting, such as your social security number, financial information, tax records?

2. Do you use your computer at work to swap movies, music and other files over the Internet? Does your company have an interest in protecting confidential internal data?

3. Do you always lock your front door when you leave the house for work every morning? When you go to sleep at night?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, you’ll want to read further.

Just as you secure your home by locking your door when you’re away or sleeping, you also should secure your personal information when you’re online. Recently, the Washington Post reported that Supreme Court Justice Stephen G. Breyer and a number of high-powered Washington lawyers were among the 2,000 victims of an information leak when their private data, including names, Social Security numbers and dates of birth, were unintentionally exposed over the popular peer-to-peer network, LimeWire. The data breach occurred when an employee with Wager Resource Group, an investment firm in McLean, Virginia representing the Supreme Court Justice and others, chose to share music and movies on his company computer and in the process inadvertently shared the personal data of the firm’s clients. The article reports this private information was downloaded by other LimeWire users around the world, from Washington to as far away as Sri Lanka and Columbia.

This story underscores the real dangers that exist when using peer-to peer (P2P) networks – which are often used to illegally download music and movies. When P2P users log on to file-sharing networks, connecting their computers with a host of others to exchange content, they often are unaware of the information access they are granting, which can lead to damaging consequences, as this case illustrates.

Supreme Court Justice Breyer and the hundreds of other unsuspecting victims of information leaks caused by P2P file-sharing are now “at a very high risk, almost imminent, of identity theft” Robert Boback, an executive hired to contain the breach, said in the article. Victims of data disclosures are thus vulnerable to unauthorized financial activity and fraud – unnecessary risks when numerous online legal downloading Web sites currently exist, offering premium music and film content to consumers. When Internet users decide to trade and illegally download movies and music on popular P2P sites like LimeWire and the many other available networks, they should be aware of the dangers that exist when using these programs and ask themselves, is it worth it?

To view Brian Krebs full article from July 9 in the Washington Post please click on the following link:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/08/AR2008070802997_pf.html

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 16th, 2008 at 12:41 pm by copyright and is filed under copyright opponents, internet, p2p, piracy, property rights. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.