Unusual University E-mail...

Sorry I haven't been able to reply, I'm surprised this many people actually care enough to try to help me out.

I haven't replied to the e-mail, confessed guilt, or even acknowledged that I recieved the e-mail. I may have downladed songs while living in the dorms last year, connected through the university's internet access. I bought this laptop through the school, and it is still the same one I use every day. I'm living off-campus this upcoming year and will no longer require to use their internet for any reason.

It seems to me like a good majority of you say that I should deny it unless a police officer is present, in which case I will not say a word. It looks like all the school wants to do is make me go to a class, say 'I'm sorry' and get it over with. I also will NOT take my laptop for them to inspect unless I am legally forced to.

As of now, after reading through all the posts, I think it might be best for me to reply to the e-mail, say I will attend the class, but not confess my guilt. I'm thinking I will just apologize for the misunderstanding, say that I have not knowingly downloaded any copyrighted material, but that I will do a clean sweep of my computer to make sure that IF I ever use the school internet again, this won't be a problem.

I'm afraid that if I don't reply or do anything, and wait to be approached personally, I will either lose my scholarship (which is the only reason I can attend school under my financial situation) or have to take legal action, etc. which is beyond my knowledge. I am not very computer savvy at all, and I don't think I'd be able to afford court, etc.

If this sounds like a pretty stable plan so far, let me know...I really want to make sure I don't screw up by doing the wrong thing.

Johnmike, I really hope you're right that this is just a dispute between the university and me, and not a legal issue.

Thank you everyone who has replied, I am still thinking this through and have not decided 100% what I will do as of yet, but all the advice is greatly appreciated!

reply to post by Alexander_Supertramp


Check out the eff.org

Also, backup the files in a hard copy form, then remove the files from your laptop. Also, check with your student legal council for more possible options. Have fun man.

Alex, dude, I'm telling man, talk to your parents, anything you do may have repricussions on them, especially if your live in NY.

Camain

After reading through these posts again, I have some more questions some of you seem more than able to answer...

In order to sign on to their internet connection in the dorms, I had to be plugged in to an ethernet cord in the wall (DSL) and then sign in on a program we had to download called Cisco Clean Access Agent, in which our username and password were the same that required logging in onto the website, which each student chooses.

That said, would the school be able to prove it was me that did the downloading? Sorry if the information I gave isn't detailed enough for anybody to be able to answer that, I am just not very knowledgeable with regards to computers and the internet. Also, if I need to give out more information, just ask and I will do my best to answer or figure out the answers. Thanks again everyone.

reply to post by camain


I do not live in NY. I just finished reading the school policies in its entirety, and it does say

A student may be charged with offenses as a principal directly involved in the crime or as an accessory.

I will tell them once I respond to the e-mail, depending on what the response I get back is.

For noncompliance with penalties or remedies, the offender shall be suspended until he or she has complied....The intentional misuse of computing, networking, or information resources may result in a loss of computing privileges and sanctions under the student conduct code

This was also from the policies website I was referred to. It doesn't sound like legal action will be taken, but then again there could be some fine print I have overlooked. And it sounds to me like if I don't respond, I would be in worse trouble?

If I say that I am unaware of how this illegal downloading happened, is there any way they could prove it was me, or any way I could get in trouble without having to be proven?

[edit on 3-8-2008 by Alexander_Supertramp]

Just maintain that you were unaware of it, but go through anything they tell you. Safest route, most logical, and really the best of both worlds. You'll be fine.

reply to post by Alexander_Supertramp


What was unusual about this mail? You were downloading illegaly, they monitor the traffic, and you got caught. Please tell me whats unusual about this and why you seem so surprised. If you were using your login to access the network then yes they can trace it back to you, the only way out of that is claiming someone used your username and password.

If the wireless is open to all students without a unique login (which would be very odd) then they'll maybe be able to trace it back to your laptops MAC address, which is easy enough to change. In the end i suggest you just take your licks as you did something wrong.

[edit on 3-8-2008 by ImaginaryReality1984]

Ok here's what you do,

Firstly , you contact them & arrange a meeting in which you tell them that you often lend out your laptop to others so they can do work too & that you use a wireless signal (if you don't) a wireless booster.
Say you haven't got any really good protection software & have been told that makes your laptop susceptible to others.

Tell them you will do what you can to make sure it doesn't happen again & they should (repeat SHOULD not will) offer you some type of deal where they will scrub it off your record as long as from then on you are 100% clean.
If they don't accept that & don't offer you anything , keep the same story and take it up with a favourite teacher if you have one & try to use their influence.

But sir , on a personal note piracy isn't wrong. Sure it's illegal , but it's not wrong. So just be very careful from now on & don't do it on campus etc


Sorry forgot to add , at the moment it is just between you and the university. If it was a company telling them to go after you (from personal experience) the company are not shy about it & will post they sig & name on everything just to scare you.

But deny deny deny unless they can 100% pin it on you, which if you tell them you used to lend it out etc they can't ever be 100% sure.

[edit on 3-8-2008 by The Servant Of Truth]

en.wikipedia.org...

This is the link on it. Basically you put a nanny on your computer. I can and probably is feeding back all the information they gathered from you, including what torrents you downloaded.

Again I can not stress enough, You need to talk to your parents. I don't care if you are 25, with 3 kids from 3 moms. You need to speak with them.

They are very aware of what you did, in my opinion. If the computer is no longer on there network they should have nothing to worry about. Like I said though, this is a very serious situation, and you need legal advice, not advice from a forum.

camain

reply to post by Alexander_Supertramp


I think i figured out why they waited so long to contact you about this. They wanted to make sure that you didn't have ample time to seek advise, and would just agree to their terms because you were scared and wanted to be able to attend school when it starts back up. They're using scare tactics which says a lot about them.

I went back to school after my sons were grown and did it on a scholarship, so i can understand your fear of losing your scholarship. First look over your scholarship and see under what circumstances it can be taken away. It probably has no stipulations about illegal downloading, however it may have stipulations about being on acedemic probation, monitoring or suspension.

My suggestion is the same as before, don't even answer the email until you've gotten some kind of advise, preferably legal. Don't let them rush you with their scare tactics, although it may not be much, you do still have a little time left. Tomorrow's monday, most places have some kind of legal aide department look in your local phone book and locate one in your area, and then call them and see if you can make an appointment to go and see them to obtain legal advise.

You said school starts in 18, well 17 days now, so i would give yourself this whole week to obtain advise and calmly decide what you're going to do. You can reasonably wait until next monday to give them an answer and still have ample time to settle this before the start of classes. Do NOT allow them to use their scare tactics to bully you into a premature decision based on fear. You may stand to lose a lot if this is not handled correctly, especially if they are hiding an attempt to pursue this legally, you never know who they're going to chose to be the one they use to set an example.

Good that you're listening to the advise about not giving them access to your computer, that's the best advise right now.

I'm sure that it's possible that you ocassionally let some of your friends or roommate use your laptop, which means they may have downloaded some things. However they will probably hold to the belief that it's your laptop and you are responsible for what is done with it, also i doubt that they will accept that somebody else downloaded over 900 things on it without your knowledge.

One poster gave you some really good advise take it, talk to your parents about it.

So here's my advise again in a nutshell. You have 17 days left, give yourself until next monday to make your decision calmly, you'll still have ample time before school starts. Find out under what circumstances you can lose your scholarship. Make every attempt to gain legal advise before doing anything. Do NOT allow them access to your laptop. No more downloading. Talk to your parents. Good Luck !

Johnmike: thank you, and I agree that is what seems to be the most logical thing to do. I expect everything will be fine also, I just got a little worried/paranoid when I got the email.

Camain: You're also right, and I will discuss this with my parents. Also, we have many lawyers as friends, so I will try and set up an appointment or talk to one about this situation.

I just got off the phone with a couple of guys from school asking if any of them had recieved this email or had known of someone who had, and surprisingly one of my friends was in the same situation during the school year. If I am in the exact situation as he was, I will just be talked to by an adviser, warned not to do it again, and allow a tech from the school to erase the files. I will firmly state that I do not wish to bring my laptop in but that the university doesn't need to worry about this happening again because I downloaded a good anti-virus program. Hopefully, this will work and I am making a big deal out of nothing.

Edit to add: chise61, I have decided that it may be best for me to speak to a lawyer concerning this matter. Do you know by chance if they will glance over cases like this for free? (Presuming I cannot get up with the family friends who are lawyers) If not, do you happen to know a general fee that I would be charged for them reviewing my situation?

Once again, thank you everybody for your advice and I will post the results of all of this, in case someone else is in my situation in the future.

[edit on 3-8-2008 by Alexander_Supertramp]

reply to post by Alexander_Supertramp


It's hard to find an attorney that will do anything pro bono, but if they're out there your best bet would be to find them through a community center, or cilvil rights group. There may be a slight chance that your college has an agreement with a legal firm to provide low cost advice to students, however i'd leave that for last being that their loyalties may fall with the school.

Try legal aid first, they base their fees on your ability to pay. If they handle cases like this they will base fees on your income, or your parents income.

Check with your parents they may have access to legal advise through their job. Some companies offer a kind of legal plan as an addition to their insurance plans, one of your parents may have signed up for this service, if so you should be able to obtain advise through them.

[edit to add]

Do NOT sign anything that you do not fully comprehend, you are legally bound to anything that you sign, regardless of the fact that you did not understand what you were signing.

If they contact you again before you have decided how to handle this and seem to be pressuring you to sign anything, simply, but firmly reply that you will not sign any document UNDER DURESS. If you are able to speak with an attorney ask if it is an option for you to sign the document stipulating that you are signing said document under duress, which will help in the case of any future litigation.

Your duress would be the fact that they are in a position to prevent you from attending school and possibly losing your scholarship, and you felt that they were threatening you with the possibility of exclusion from classes.


[edit on 3/8/08 by chise61]

Well...a lawyer is probably not going to tell you too much since this still isn't a real lawsuit or anything, but if you can speak to one briefly for free, or if the money isn't a problem, print out the T&C and the e-mail and ask for a suggestion.

Which you probably already know to do. I'm patronizing you now, but oh well.

Just got off the phone with my friend who had the same thing happen to him. After explaining in detail what the email said, etc. it turns out he had the exact same thing happen to him last semester. Same email, same number, same options. He chose option 2, which I obviously will not choose. In his choice, he said there were about 20 people in the same room with him and one tech guy from the school, and all the guy did was delete limewire. He said he had downloaded 500+ plus songs, but they only told him that they had caught him for 10.

I am now about 95% sure that this is all that will happen to me, minus the extras in the room and the forms I won't sign. However, just to be safe, I will try and get in touch with a lawyer just to see what he says. And again, I will post back the results for future reference to anyone in a similar situation.

reply to post by Alexander_Supertramp


You might have a bot installed in your computer. You brought it from the school, do you suspect the school then had a pre-installed program put into your laptop to track your downloads?

I have no idea what the law is on this one. On another subject, I killed my free wireless by downloading hundreds of GB's in a short time, someone then killed my free internet back to cable now.

I feel for you bud. Where's the freedom?

reply to post by Alexander_Supertramp


Based on the fact you have admitted you HAVE been downloading copyrighted material 'illegally' you best course of action is to delete the offending material, contact the office for an appointment.

The FERPA document is linked Here

Your campus may be compelled by the courts to release information about the locations, filenames (where/when) you downloaded them.

Welcome to Orwell's nightmare come true...my question remains, "who's watching the watchers?".

Ohh BTW, you're lucky, my ex g/f years back was forbidden to use campus networking over a simular incident...until she met with them and explained herself.

There was a story about 1-2 years ago on the local news here about a group of students at a local college being busted for the same thing. What I took away from it was if I'm going to make illegal downloads, don't do it on the school's/university's network.

reply to post by Alexander_Supertramp


Don't sign anything unless you are intoxicated - then you can invalidate whatever statements or forms that drunken signature was attached to.

Don't sing anything at all. You are being subjected to emotional and psychological abuses - that is what matters. They have threatened to destroy tour reputation unless you confess to a crime you did not commit (no one saw YOU physically download anything).

You must create the circumstances that would best punish these criminals and compensate you for damages and losses.

Be a sociopath.

ATS does not condone or allow the discussion of illegal activites.
This thread is now closed.

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