Quote:
Originally Posted by FatDog
I can explain this:
When you boot your cable modem - you are dynamically assigned an IP address. All your internet traffic is tagged with this number. All the records per day are tagged with this address. If the guy who did download Boardwalk Empire cycled power on his modem, then you cycled power on yours - you now have his old IP number. When they searched - they found HIS activity weeks earlier but that you now have this number.
The computer-savvy pirates cycle their power every few days to help obfuscate the tracking of their activity. The smarter pirates use VPN services which encrypt their packets and their ISP only sees activity between their PC and the VPN service so they cannot see what sites you are accessing because the VPN server is really hitting the sites.
The assigning of IP addresses is automatic but logging the re-assigning of IP addresses go into files that only network engineers see and typically toss out after a few days/weeks. It's not part of the normal billing system that ISPs track. They usually can only see who has each IP address at this moment - not what you had a few days or weeks ago.
|
Oh, I know how it all works. It is a poor system, which is prone to inaccuracy. They should use something more static, like MAC addresses, at least in combo with the IPs. MAC addresses can still be spoofed, but it would trip up far more people. That way, if you have a situation like mine, compare the MAC addies, and see someone else had used the IP. This is still info that the Media Industry's antipiracy squads can get, and this is still info that the ISPs can log. Relying on one number, that is prone to change is highly problematic.
Quote:
Originally Posted by DianNC
I don't get it. And, at the risk of sounding uninformed, why don't they go after the websites that are providing the material?
Monitoring a private individual's internet usage seems inordinately intrusive to me. Are the sites that are making these downloads available not also complicit in illegal acts???
|
With how things are now, most sites are in areas that are harder to do anything about legally speaking (very very very few are in the US), and also with the way P2P networks have gone, most technically just point you to who can get you the files. Think of it this way, if this was the drug trade, the sites would be the guy who tells you where to go to score. "Go talk to Johnny at 123 Stockton St, and ask for 'Herbal Suppliments'. Tell him Bobby sent you." Laws are having to be drafted and changed to account for this.