[TorrentFreak] - Judge: An IP-Address Doesn’t Identify a Person (or BitTorrent Pirate) - Page 2

That's only marginally true...I know that for Charter/Cox and a few others, you're actually locked into that specific IP VIA a DNS and it actually takes many HARD resets to rotate your IP ~ We're talking about server-side resets not, user-side...So, it's very rare that your IP actually switches unless you're using a proxy.

If you actually read the document, the defendant says that he offered his PC, employment records and everything he had to the prosecution to search but, they declined claiming that their IP evidence was enough...Which, it isn't because they didn't actually find anything.

So, while I do agree that an IP cannot/should not be used as evidence, you forget that it still can be used as a "weapon" for probable cause...So, they still can generate enough "evidence" to lawfully get a search warrant...The only question is, if they'll find anything or not...Which, is actually how it should be so...

The US government and its issuance of Social Security Numbers would disagree.

Anyhoo, I am glad that this was realized, but on the other hand, it's not like it matters. If it's not going to be an IP address, it's going to be a MAC address, which is easily associated with an owner and/or user--that is, until the next series of litigation/evaluations by judges.
Edited by guyladouche - 5/7/12 at 10:21am

MAC Addresses can be spoofed very easily I don't see them being used as a way to identify a person.

love it....a step in the right direction. though sure that in the next day or 2 will have a post going against all this and 4 steps moving backwards lol

A spoofed MAC address does not equal a person/owner, but a non-spoofed one does correspond to a user/owner. How many "normal" users that blindly download copyright-infringing material actually spoof MAC addresses, either on their NIC or on their router device?

This all assumes that a situation presents itself where an investigating team confiscates someone's computer, matches its NIC MAC to a logged MAC correlating to some sort of illegal activity. It is not an easy-to-envision situation now, but it doesn't negate the fact that a physical address of a physical item can absolutely be tied to a physical person. Or at least, it's not difficult to do so.

So if a spoofed mac address cannot be used, then neither can a normal mac address. Reason? There is no evidence to suggest it was them. I can spoof your mac address. If you torrent something, it might be your actually MAC address, but I have your MAC address as well.

There can be no evidence of faked MAC addresses, so MAC address are even worse than IP's. And are useless...

Re-read what I wrote. A non-spoofed MAC address does correspond to a physical computer (NIC) with a physical owner/user. The fact that someone can change a MAC address of some NIC to be the same as someone else's doesn't change that. The argument here is that an IP address is not tied to a specific computer or person. A MAC address IS (regardless of how someone might be able to alter theirs). But how can one argue that a MAC address is not tied to a specific computer when a MAC address itself originates with a physical component in a computer?

edit--Another thing to consider--I can "spoof" my SSN, my driver's license number, my phone number, etc.--does that make any or all of those things null and void in terms of identifying a person with them?
Edited by guyladouche - 5/7/12 at 3:13pm

I don't have time to read the entire article yet (will do so later, and posting susbcribes me), but I want to point out that the article quote has a grossly incorrect conclusion (which you would expect from the source's obvious bias). Being wrongfully accused means one is innocent; this judgement simply means that the IP address cannot be tied to a specific person with certainty. The accused identified with the IP address may still very well be guilty! Torrentfreak has the surface believability of Faux News and SemiAccurate, etc.

I think he might have meant that even if they were to use hardware MAC addresses to identify the person, it wouldn't be very efficient as the pirate can easily change their MAC address. (I don't think he meant that other people connecting to your Wi-Fi and changing their MAC addresses would be a problem).

Edit: Scratch that, didn't read the follow-up responses.

If MAC becomes the new way of identifying pirates, the pirates will most definitely easily learn how to change their MACs the second they are subpoenaed, or they'll come up with a torrent/other client that constantly changes their MAC address every so often. That would make the copyright owners/ISPs go insane when they see millions of different MAC addresses all over the place. They would be helpless. I think the judge's decision is just implying that an IP address ALONE can't prove the guiltiness of a pirate. They would still need evidence that the pirate has the content in question on their hard drive, or that they trafficked it someway (whether by selling burned copies and having witnesses or whatever). If the IP address is completely disregarded, I see many more pirates getting off easy in court battles. Who is to say that you own a laptop? A pirate can use their laptop, connect to their Wi-Fi network, torrent all the stuff they want, and stream it over their shared network to their desktop/TV. When it comes time that they are subpoenaed: "Huh? I don't pirate anything... check my home computer. Nope, I don't own any computer other than my desktop."
Edited by Stealth Pyros - 5/8/12 at 9:40am

Yea, spoof this!