Supreme Court rejects ID-handover debate

Ixne, Sherrif and GristyMcFisty used our news submit to tell us about the latest in the ongoing struggle of the music
labels profits, over a netizens privacy in the US legal system. Looks like the
labels have just about hit the end of the road.

The recording industry may not agree, but the U.S. Supreme Court thinks personal privacy is far more important that music piracy," Red Herring reported. "On Tuesday, the high court refused to entertain an appeal of a unanimous 2003 decision by the District of Columbia Court of Appeals that held that copyright holders cannot force Internet providers to identify file sharers using a mere subpoena. Industry watchers see this as yet another blow that the recording industry has taken in its fight against online file sharing -- a fight it is slowly losing. The lawsuits in question were between New York's Verizon Internet Services and the Recording Industry Association of America  (RIAA), headquartered in Washington, D.C..

This is something that is missed by many and is so
important. We know it is illegal to share copyrighted content without
permission. But, the real issue is privacy and whether or not the copyright act
can be used to strip this protection from the American public. The question is
whether it is right for your identity to be exposed prior to a hearing and
receiving permission from a judge to request that information. The RIAA can
sue, they have done so hundreds of times, so that is not a problem. But to gain
the identity of an individual, the Supreme Court has done the right thing and
said they should have to get permission from a judge first, period
paragraph. You can read the whole story over at Yahoo! 

Source: Yahoo!