Judicial Affairs

Digital Millennium Copyright Act
DMCA Compliance Information
What happens when the university receives a DMCA copyright infringement complaint?
What is Fair Use?
Additional DMCA Links and Resources

Digital Millennium Copyright Act

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), enacted in 1998, updated copyright law to encompass the growing use of computers and the internet, and intellectual property in digital forms. Copyright law protects the intellectual property of the original author(s) of a work in any medium. Copyright law is a federal law and does not vary from state to state.

Campus computer networks are often used to reproduce and distribute copyrighted music, movies, television shows, pictures, and software through the use of peer-to-peer (P2P) networks. P2P file sharing applications allow a computer to connect to a P2P network, and once connected, make it possible to download and share files with other users on the network. P2P networking has been around for many years, but file sharing applications such as LimeWire, KaZaA and BitTorrent have made it easy to trade files with people around the world.

In April 2003, members of the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) began filing civil suits, first against students at Michigan Tech, Princeton University, and Rennselaer Polytechnic Institute seeking substantial damages for copyright infringement. (Those cases were quickly settled, with each of the student defendants agreeing to pay more than $12,000 in damages.) The RIAA quickly expanded their efforts to include other campuses, including Iowa State University. The RIAA has pursued litigation against ISU students for copyright violations; 24 students in 2007 received pre-litigation letters. It is important to us that our students understand that this can and does occur, and that they have enough information to prevent it from happening to them.

When Iowa State University receives a complaint from a copyright holder, we notify the individual involved and pass along any information received from the copyright holder to that individual. We do not supply any information to the copyright holder about the individual involved unless a valid subpoena is presented.

Below are links to information about copyrights as well as the DMCA.

U.S. Copyright Office Summary of DMCA (PDF)

A Primer on Distance Learning and Intellectual Property Issues

EDUCAUSE Statement on Copyright Office Interim Regulations for 'Service Providers'

U.S. Copyright Office - Library of Congress

DMCA Compliance Information

Pursuant to the Act, Iowa State University has designated the following agent for notification of copyright infringement claims:

Mike Bowman
Director of IT Security and Policies
201 Durham Hall
Ames, IA 50011
294-2588
mbowman@iastate.edu

What happens when the university receives a DMCA copyright infringement complaint?

  1. The notification goes to Instructional Technology Services (ITS) and is reviewed to determine if it meets the DMCA requirements.
  2. The registered user of the machine connected to the identified Internet Address (IP#) at the time of the observed incident is determined.
  3. If the registered user is a student, the identification information and the DMCA complaint are sent to Judicial Affairs (http://www.dso.iastate.edu/ja/) in the Dean of Students Office. Otherwise the complaint is handled by the DMCA agent.
  4. An email is sent by the Office of Judicial Affairs to the user who registered the machine. The email includes information about copyright infringement, specifics included in the complaint, and requires the user to remove any unauthorized copyrighted material from their computer and to respond within 48 hours.
  5. If there is no response or the complaint is not satisfied within 48 hours, then network access for the machine is disconnected until the complaint is resolved.
  6. First offenses are recorded but do not include University judicial action.
  7. Second offenses involve judicial charges for Misuse of Computers, a violation of the Student Disciplinary Regulations, and require a hearing with a representative from Judicial Affairs. If found responsible through the judicial process, students face disciplinary sanctions such as conduct probation, network restriction or termination of network access, or other possible conduct decisions.
  8. Third or subsequent offenses are likely to result in termination of network access.

What is Fair Use?

You may have heard of “fair use.” It is discussed in the Copyright Act. Fair use is a concept that allows use of limited portions of a copyrighted work, without the permission of the copyright owner, for purposes such as scholarship, research, and criticism. Fair use does not mean that if you think it's fair that you should be able to use a work, it's okay. Rather, whether a particular use of copyrighted material is a fair use must be judged according to the four criteria in the Copyright Act:

  1. Purpose and character of the use (why do you want to use it?).
  2. Nature of the copyrighted work (what kind of work is it?).
  3. Amount and substantiality used (how much do you want to copy?).
  4. Effect on the potential market for or value of the work (will your copying contribute to decreasing the value or demand for the work?).

For example, it's fine to quote from a book when writing about it, but it's not okay to reproduce the entire book.

Unfortunately, the four factors listed above do not always provide very clear guidance. Fair use must be determined on a case-by-case basis. Fair use does not mean if you own/have owned a hard copy of some media (movie, TV show, software, music CD, etc), that you should be allowed to download this file. You own only the license for that hard copy you purchased, and downloading the file is still a copyright violation (more information available at http://www.copyright.gov). Fair use can be tricky to define, so here are some links that do a pretty good job of explaining it.

Additional DMCA Links and Resources

Below are additional links to information about Peer-to-Peer File Sharing, Copyright Law and the DMCA.

http://www.copyright.gov/legislation/dmca.pdf
http://www.chillingeffects.org/index.cgi
http://www.it.iastate.edu/security/p2p/
http://www.it.iastate.edu/talkaboutit/filesharing/
http://policy.iastate.edu/policy/it/ethics/
http://www.riaa.com/faq.php
http://www.mpaa.org/piracy.asp
http://security.uchicago.edu/guidelines/peer-to-peer/ (Disabling Peer-to-Peer File Sharing)
http://law.richmond.edu/ipi/whatdoyouthink.htm
http://www.techtransfer.iastate.edu/en/for_iowa_state/educational_resources/copyrights.cfm (Copyright Basics)
http://www.dso.iastate.edu/ja/presentations/dmcabrochure.pdf
Legal Downloading Sites(PDF)

For additional questions, please contact Sara Kellogg in the Dean of Students Office at 294-1021.