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Kyoto Prefectural Police High-Tech
Crime Office and Horikawa Police Station announced on April 10, 2003 that
they raided the house of a male, "A" (18 years old), living
in Shinjuku-ku on suspicion of breach of copyright law (an infringement
of "Right of Public Transmission" and "Right of Making
Transmittable") and arrested "A". Police alleged that "A"
abused the digital data storage and publicizing services called "online
storage services" and stored MP3 music files copied from commercially
available music CDs in the server without authorization of the right holders,
making the music files transmittable for download to the public.
The police also disclosed that they arrested a
male temporary staff, "B" (31 years old), living in Oyama City,
Tochigi, on suspicion of breach of copyright law (an infringement of Right
of Public Transmission), alleging that he abused the same services and
copied game software onto the server without authorization of the right
holders and made them transmittable for download to the public. The case
has been sent to the Kyoto Sub-District Public Prosecutor's Office, and
"B" has already received a summary order.
Online storage services enable not only free
access to the data , which were stored in the Internet-connected server,
via computers without restriction, but also make available the sharing
of files among group members using password for publicizing to the public.
These services are now rapidly disseminating due to the improved availability
of broadband and constant Internet access. It has been feared that storing
copyrighted works using these services would encourage the infringement
of copyright and neighboring rights, and unfortunately, this case made
this concern a reality.
Since around September 2002, "A" abused
the online storage service, such as NTT Communications' ShareStage, by
storing dozens of MP3 music files that had been converted from commercially
available music CDs. After establishing a group by inviting members from
the general public, "A" made the files transmittable for download
to these members. The collective copyright management organization, JASRAC;
the RIAJ member company, AVEX INC.; and the member's affiliated company,
Defstar Records Inc. lodged a criminal complaint. Based on this, the Horikawa
police conducted investigations, which led to the arrest of "A".
The copied music in question were "Voyage"
by Ayumi Hamasaki of AVEX INC. and "Grandfather's Clock" by
Ken Hirai of Defstar Records Inc. Furthermore, as "Remind" by
FLAME of the RIAJ member company PONY CANYON INC. was also found among
the music stored in the server, they plan to lodge an additional complaint
later.
"B" is also alleged to have abused ShareStage
since around October 2001, stored the software program "Super Mario
Advance" for the GameBoy Advance, for which Nintendo has the copyright,
invited the general public to join a group, and then made these programs
transmittable for download to the group members.
Knowing that the service charge (data storage
fee) for ShareStage is free up to a certain amount, "B" acquired
17 IDs and uploaded 179 software titles for the GameBoy and GameBoy Advance
until February 25 2003.Police raided B's house on February 25 2003, confiscated
game software-recorded CD-Rs, and arrested him for further investigation.
B was sent to the Kyoto Sub-District Public Prosecutor's Office on March
7 and received a summary order of a 300,000-yen fine from the Kyoto Summary
Court on the same day.
In addition to this case, there seems to be no
end to infringement of copyright and neighboring rights abusing new technologies
and services on the Internet. The three institutions, ACCS, JASRAC and
RIAJ have been promoting the awareness of copyright rules through PR and
educational activities at every opportunity. However, at the same time,
they are deeply concerned that if such infringements as this case should
continue, it would not only cause great damage to the creators and the
content industry as a whole and nip cultural creation in the bud, but
also rob general users of the opportunities to enjoy varied contents.
We would, therefore, ask for further understanding of the people on this
matter. Further strengthening the collaboration with each other, the three
institutions determine to take decisive countermeasures against the infringements
of copyright, using every possible means including legal actions.
Association of Copyright for Computer Software (ACCS)
http://www.accsjp.or.jp/
Japanese Society for Rights of Authors, Composers and Publishers (JASRAC)
http://www.jasrac.or.jp/
Recording Industry Association of Japan (RIAJ)
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