My wife is super freaked out about this letter because we have a home business that relies heavily on internet access. I'm a bit worried but mostly just scared straight as they say.
The letter has a few paragraphs from Qwest and has 10 complaints attached. This is the first I've heard from Qwest even though they have collected 10 complaints about me apparently. The portion from Qwest reads:
Dear XXXXXX
The purpose of this warning is to inform you that Qwest has received multiple
notices of copyright infringement sent pursuant to the Digital Millennium
Copyright Act ("DMCA") in connection with your account. The DMCA, passed by
Congress in 1998, allows copyright owners to notify a service provider such as
Qwest of alleged copyright infringement carried out on the provider's network.
Copies of the DMCA notifications Qwest received are included below.
Please be reminded that unauthorized posting of copyrighted material is a
violation of Qwest's Acceptable Use Policy (AUP) which prohibits use of the
Qwest Network and Services in any manner that would infringe, dilute,
misappropriate, or otherwise violate the intellectual property rights of others.
Additional offenses may result in termination of your services.
Disconnection of a bundled service may result in loss of your bundle
discount, or may impact your ability to access 911 through Voice over IP
(VoIP) service.
If you believe the enclosed DMCA notices were sent to Qwest in error, you may
contact the copyright owner directly within the next five (5) days and email a
copy of your correspondence to Qwest at abuse@qwest.net. Qwest will give
consideration to this challenge in enforcing its AUP. If you choose not to
challenge the notices, we will assume for purposes of enforcing our AUP that
they were not sent in error.
The usage of the word "warning" and "additional offenses" lead me to believe that Qwest does not intend to cut off my service at this time but I'm not positive and I'm still pretty worried about it and also the possibility of ending up on the wrong end of a lawsuit.
The applicable portion of the Qwest Acceptable Use Policy reads:
Suspension; Termination. Any User which Qwest determines to have violated any element of this AUP may be subject to a suspension or termination of service. Qwest will suspend service for violation of the AUP on the most limited basis as Qwest determines is reasonably practical under the circumstances to address the underlying violation. Qwest will attempt to notify Customer prior to suspending service for violation of the AUP (which may be via email or any other notification); provided, however, Qwest may suspend service without notice if Qwest becomes aware of a violation of any applicable law or regulation or activity, including but not limited to a violation of the AUP, that exposes Qwest to criminal or civil liability or that exposes the Qwest network or Qwest customers' network or property to harm. Such harm to a network may include, but is not limited to, risk of having an IP address placed on blacklists. Qwest may take such further action as Qwest determines to be appropriate under the circumstances to eliminate or preclude repeat violations, and Qwest shall not be liable for any damages of any nature suffered by any Customer, User, or any third party resulting in whole or in part from Qwest's exercise of its rights under this AUP.
The complaints included in this e-mail are:
Complaint #1 Resident Evil: Degeneration December 16, 2008
Complaint #2 Hellboy 2: The Golden Army November 4, 2008
Complaint #3 Hitman August 30, 2008
Complaint #4 Bioshock Sept 6, 2008
Complaint #5 The Witcher Sept 17, 2008
Complaint #6 Resident Evil 4 PC DVD Game Sept 19, 2008
Complaint #7 Mass Effect Sept 21, 2008
Complaint #8 The Witcher Sept 21, 2008 (repeated from complaint #5)
Complaint #9 Resident Evil 4 PC DVD Game Sept 22, 2008 (repeated from complaint #6)
Complaint #10 Sleepy Hollow Oct 17, 2008
How concerned should i be? Should I offer any sort of response under these circumstances? This probably doesn't matter but it does seem to me that the two duplicates are pretty close together. A second complaint was logged within 5 days in both cases.