Advice on Sky Broadband > Court Order...

toon_mad

toon_mad

toon_mad

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Ok, so my mother is with Sky Wireless Broadband, she has been for maybe a year and a half or so. Anyway, today she gets a high court judgement letter saying she ows £1000 for piracy, the main item been works or something which apparently was downloaded using a torrent client.

Now i know there is a torrent client on her pc, ive used it to download non-copyright materials from myself such as icon sets, wallpapers etc.

what we dont understand is:

a) she has had no warning letters, or letters to say any such act of piracy has occured. I was to believe your ISP had to give you 3 warnings or something first.

b) how do we know if anyone else has breached her internet and downloaded from there pc?

So whats the best advice anyone can reccomend?

she doesnt even use the internet hardly at all, it seems a bit extreme that they are going to punish her for something she hasnt done wrong, without even been cautioned or told to stop for if she had done wrong.

appreciate comments in advance.
 
Is the wifi secured? Has she ever had works on the pc? If not I'd consider fighting 100%, they have to prove BEYOND reasonable doubt that she commited the offence
 
3dcandy said:
Is the wifi secured? Has she ever had works on the pc? If not I'd consider fighting 100%, they have to prove BEYOND reasonable doubt that she commited the offence
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i dont even know what works is to tell you the truth, and she barely knows how to open her emails on her own let alone download works and use it.

sky set it up for her, im not sure if there was any key or not, i dont remember ever having to put a password in, even after doing a clean install of xp on her pc.

swanseajack said:
Let me guess ACS law, they are sending thousands of letters to people.

Google the name.
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will do thanks...

edit: mams letters was from ACS Law, and after searching google i found this site: http://www.ispreview.co.uk/story/20...nding-wrongful-isp-piracy-threat-letters.html, they sound like scum whoever they are, she has to pay £295, or £1000 if it goes to court, just like what most people in that link say.
 
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If it is ACS law then don't admit anything, they seem to working on the scare the crap out of people who have no idea etc.

There are plenty of sites about these crooks.

Good luck :)
 
been reading some more of the comments in the link i posted, some fascinating ones. my mother said something about works, and then someone on that site posted this:

Likewise - letter today, IPS address not mine, two stamps, alleged download of evacuate the dancefloor; presumed this was a scam - what happens if we all do nothing?
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and..

i had the same letter 4 evacuate the dancefloor("the work")
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i wonder if thats what she meant by works, either way from reading a lot of the posts they sound like scum and they wont be getting a penny. :o
 
Just send a polite reply telling them you didn't do anything. If they send the questionnaire, well, http://www.ispreview.co.uk/story/20...make-file-sharers-incriminate-themselves.html Besides ip mistakes are common, pair of pensioners up north got the same letter as you, except they had neither a pc nor internet :)

Edit: Wait, when you say "high court judgement" do you mean to say it's deliberately trying to pass its self off as letter from the crown prosecution? (and how can judgement be passed without trial or evidence? :rolleyes:)
 
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Azuse05 said:
Edit: Wait, when you say "high court judgement" do you mean to say it's deliberately trying to pass its self off as letter from the crown prosecution?
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This is the bit I find interesting.
I wonder as regards their wording, it is almost as if they are using the old dodgy baliff dodge of implying they are something they are not. As in the court judgement has already been made (in reality the only judgement made was to allow them IP data) not that anyone has been found guilty of anything at all.

Send them a suitcase full or turd in the post, and only put one stamp on it, so they have to pickup the postage to receive :)
 
Mind posting a image of the letter? obviously blank out any of your mother's details.

As they definitely should not be posing as a high court summons
 
If they are sending as if they are on behalf of the law then you have to report them ASAP as fraudulent and get them shut down.

Ignore their letter, i would'nt do it the justice of responding.
 
From of mine got a letter from ACS Law the other day as well about downloading a song.


She is on Sky broadband at home too!
 
Azza, have you tried googling ACS Law? you only need to partially type it in google and the auto search list brings up ACS Law Scam!


after reading tons of posts of people experiencing same letters (all sky customers too), im at a loss of what we should do next. some people are saying ignore there letters, and some are saying write back.

also, she has had no contact from sky regarding any of this which i find rather odd, seeing as they are the ISP.

im going to see her tomorrow to see the letter for myself and will take a copy of it. do you think its worth writing back or just ignore?

cheers all!
 
Yeah I have done don't worry.


I seen some one say that they had rang up Sky, and the person at Sky said they had not given out any information to ACS Law.

Maybe ring up Sky yourself and ask what it's about, if they have given out info etc?
 
Has anything more come of this then?
I too just received the same letter for the 'evacuate the dance floor' crap.
I really do not fancy paying a £300 fine for a song that i have not have shared.
 
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Frankly the best place to go would be over to which? http://www.which.co.uk/campaigns/file-sharing-fears/index.jsp who've been running the campaign against ACS. They've kept it basic, and their template reply is deliberately succinct.

Anyone with the most basic understanding of the law will never tell you to ignore an accusation of (technically a civil) offence. It's the daftest thing anyone can do particularly if they've innocent. However this isn't an accusation, it's intended to scare you - or anyone - into parting with money out of fear of reprisal (which they can't even prove). The technical name for this practice is extortion which is why they, along with a couple other "legal" firms have been under investigation from the SRA for over two years.

That link above also points to them and i strongly suggest that you do loge a complaint for two reasons. One; the complaint will be recorded should ACS ever try to claim you failed to respond/take it seriously. Two; until someone mounts a legal challenge, and any such challenge would simply face the music industries money-powered legal machine, they're simply going to continue chasing everyone they can for cash unless the SRA stops them.

Oh and if you do reply they'll probably send you a questionnaire which you have no legal obligation to fill in and need to remind them it's the accusers responsibility to prove guilt, not the accused to prove they innocence. If you get it, you'll see it's an attempt to get you to incriminate yourself or rather, rule out every possible defence in court but you'll probably bin it when you reach the question asking if you'd ever mind your computer to undergo forensic analysis...
 
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