Wired has partly debunked a Record Industry Association of America claim it is working with Internet service providers to cut off accounts of people illegally sharing music online.
The RIAA said two weeks ago it would halt its litigation campaign against individuals pirating copyright music by downloading and uploading it for free to and from sites on the Internet. The trade group has sued about 30,000 people since 2003.
ISPs say they aren't working with the RIAA
Instead RIAA said a series of agreements with leading service providers would allow it to terminate accounts of people caught illegally taking music three times.
But Wired said when contacted by Threat Level, service providers said they were not working with RIAA. The magazine quoted a spokeswoman from Verizon saying the telecom firm was not working with the RIAA.
A spokesperson for the National Cable & Telecommunications Association could not confirm any deals between his members and the trade group.
“All I can tell you right now is that we have an agreement on principle with several leading ISPs but not all, and the agreement on principle is confidential,” RIAA spokeswoman Cara Duckworth said in an e-mail, according to Wired.
Many of the RIAA suits settled out of court. The only one that went to trial resulted in a mistrial.
