dVPN Alliance

These draft letters are for informational purposes only and do not constitute legal advice. We are technical developers and can not give any legal advice or help with any legal issues. Our aim is to provide general information for node runners. Different factual situations and different legal jurisdictions will result in different suggestions or actions, which should be taken. Therefore, please do not act on this information alone and if you have any specific legal or other problems, issues, or questions, seek a complete review of your situation with a lawyer licensed to practice in your jurisdiction.

Response to Internet Service provider (ISP) regarding copyright infringement (EU):

 [Depending on your situation, you can choose one of the drafts bellow]

Option A:

To whom it may concern,

I am responding to your ticket regarding abusive behavior for the following IP Address [Address].

First of all, I’d like to thank you for reaching out and reporting this behavior.. Unfortunately, I am not able to further process your request because this IP Address is an exit node within a decentralized VPN Network.. That means that I am routing anonymized, encrypted traffic from the decentralized VPN Network to the Internet without processing or filtering. The result is that, unlike most other Internet traffic, the final IP address that the recipient receives is not the IP address of the sender. Decentralized VPN Network protects users against hazards such as harassment, spam, and identity theft. I hope, as an organization committed to protecting the privacy of its customers, you'll agree that this is a valuable and relevant technology.


From your letter I can see that you claim this IP Address is hosting copyrighted material, which is not the case. No service can be hosted on this IP Address since it only relays outbound connections to the Internet. If you mean that the movie is pirated via BitTorrent or similar sites, this could be the case but I currently cannot limit this.

Furthermore, the European Union Copyright Directive (“EUCD”) safe harbors likely protect you from liability arising from this complaint. The notice is likely based upon misunderstandings about the law and about the software I am running to contribute to this distributed network.

As you may know as part of the European Union Copyright Directive 2001/29/EC exceptions are provided per Article 5, these exceptions are mandatory for each member state. These exceptions allow for “Temporary acts of reproduction referred to in Article 2, which are transient or incidental and an integral and essential part of a technological process and whose sole purpose is to enable: “a transmission in a network between third parties by an intermediary”. These Laws protect both Internet Service providers and similar intermediaries who simply relay traffic.

The notification you received is certainly not proof of any copyright infringement; a notice claiming infringement is not the same as a determination of infringement. I have not infringed any copyrights and do not intend to do so. Therefore, you should continue to be protected under the EUCD Article 5 without taking any further action.

Since I simply route traffic, in this case I cannot assist in the investigation due to the way decentralized VPN Network works, I do not see a way to help with this ticket. If you have any recommendations, please let me know so we can further discuss it.

Very truly yours

Your customer, [name]

Option B:

To whom it may concern,

I am responding to your ticket regarding abusive behavior for the IP Address [Address].

First of all, I’d like to thank you for reaching out and reporting this behavior.. Unfortunately, I am not able to further process your request because this IP Address is an exit node within a decentralized VPN Network.. That means that I am routing anonymized, encrypted traffic from the decentralized VPN Network to the Internet without processing or filtering. The result is that, unlike most other Internet traffic, the final IP address that the recipient receives is not the IP address of the sender. Decentralized VPN Network protects users against hazards such as harassment, spam, and identity theft. I hope, as an organization committed to protecting the privacy of its customers, you'll agree that this is a valuable and relevant technology.

From your letter I can see that you claim this IP Address is hosting copyrighted material, which is not the case. No service can be hosted on this IP Address since it only relays outbound connections to the Internet. If you mean that the movie is pirated via BitTorrent or similar sites, this could be the case but I currently cannot limit this.

As you may know, European Union E-Commerce Directive 2000/31/EC Article 12 gives protection to information transmitters, who are providing information society services, this protection is mandatory for each member state. Article 12 states that: “Where an information society service is provided that consists of the transmission in a communication network of information provided by a recipient of the service, or the provision of access to a communication network, Member States shall ensure that the service provider is not liable for the information transmitted, on condition that the provider: (a) does not initiate the transmission; (b) does not select the receiver of the transmission; and (c) does not select or modify the information contained in the transmission”.

The notification you received is certainly not proof of any copyright infringement; a notice claiming infringement is not the same as a determination of infringement. I have not initiated any transmissions, I did not select the receiver of the transmission and I did not modify any information contained in the transmission.

Since I simply route traffic, in this case I cannot assist in the investigation due to the way decentralized VPN Network works, I do not see a way to help with this ticket. If you have any recommendations, please let me know so we can further discuss it.

Very truly yours

Your customer, [name]

Response to Internet Service provider (ISP) regarding copyright infringement (US):

To whom it may concern,

I am responding to your ticket regarding abusive behavior for the IP Address [Address].


First of all, I’d like to thank you for reaching out and reporting this behavior.. Unfortunately, I am not able to further process your request because this IP Address is an exit node within a decentralized VPN Network.. That means that I am routing anonymized, encrypted traffic from the decentralized VPN Network to the Internet without processing or filtering. The result is that, unlike most other Internet traffic, the final IP address that the recipient receives is not the IP address of the sender. Decentralized VPN Network protects users against hazards such as harassment, spam, and identity theft. I hope, as an organization committed to protecting the privacy of its customers, you'll agree that this is a valuable and relevant technology.

From your letter I can see that you claim this IP Address is hosting copyrighted material, which is not the case. No service can be hosted on this IP Address since it only relays outbound connections to the Internet. If you mean that the movie is pirated via BitTorrent or similar sites, this could be the case but I currently cannot limit this.

Furthermore, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act's ("DMCA") safe harbors likely protects you from liability arising from this complaint. The notice is likely based upon misunderstandings about the law and about some of the software I run.

As you know, the DMCA creates four "safe harbors" for service providers to protect them from copyright liability for the acts of their users, when the ISPs fulfill certain requirements. (17 U.S.C. § 512) The DMCA's requirements vary depending on the ISP's role. You may be familiar with the "notice and takedown" provisions of section 512(c) of the DMCA; however, those do not apply when an ISP merely acts as a conduit. Instead, the "conduit" safe harbor of section 512(a) of the DMCA has different and less burdensome eligibility requirements, as the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals held in RIAA v. Verizon (see https://www.eff.org/sites/default/files/filenode/RIAA_v_Verizon/20030121-riaa-v-verizon-order.pdf) and the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals confirmed in RIAA v. Charter (see https://www.eff.org/document/8th-circuit-decision).

Under DMCA 512(a), service providers like you are typically protected from damages for copyright infringement claims if you also maintain "a policy that provides for termination in appropriate circumstances of subscribers and account holders of the service provider's system or network who are repeat infringers." If you have and implement such a policy, and you otherwise qualify for the safe harbor, you should be free from fear of copyright damages.

The notification you received is certainly not proof of any copyright infringement; a notice claiming infringement is not the same as a determination of infringement. I have not infringed any copyrights and do not intend to do so. Therefore, you should continue to be protected under the DMCA without taking any further action.

Since I simply route traffic, in this case I cannot assist in the investigation due to the way decentralized VPN Network works, I do not see a way to help with this ticket. If you have any recommendations, please let me know so we can further discuss it.

Very truly yours

Your customer, [name]

Comment/Forum Spam

To whom it may concern,

I am responding to your ticket regarding abusive behavior for the IP Address [Address].

First of all, I’d like to thank you for reaching out and reporting this behavior.. Unfortunately, I am not able to further process your request because this IP Address is an exit node within a decentralized VPN Network.. That means that I am routing anonymized, encrypted traffic from the decentralized VPN Network to the Internet without processing or filtering. The result is that, unlike most other Internet traffic, the final IP address that the recipient receives is not the IP address of the sender. Decentralized VPN Network protects users against hazards such as harassment, spam, and identity theft. I hope, as an organization committed to protecting the privacy of its customers, you'll agree that this is a valuable and relevant technology.

However, be aware that the abusive actions might be done only by one bad actor amongst many legitimate decentralized VPN Network users who use your forums. You might have luck getting rid of that person by temporarily limiting account creation to require Gmail accounts before posting, or improving your service to defend against the attack from the Internet at large. Brute force login attempts can be reduced/slowed by CAPTCHAS, which is the approach taken by Gmail for the same problem. In fact, Google provides a free CAPTCHA service, complete with code for easy inclusion in a number of systems to help other sites deal with this issue: https://developers.google.com/recaptcha/intro?csw=1.

Very truly yours

[name]

E-Commerce fraud

To whom it may concern,

I am responding to your ticket regarding abusive behavior for the IP Address [Address].

First of all, I’d like to thank you for reaching out and reporting this behavior. Unfortunately, I am not able to further process your request because this IP Address is an exit node within a decentralized VPN Network.. That means that I am routing anonymized, encrypted traffic from the decentralized VPN Network to the Internet without processing or filtering. The result is that, unlike most other Internet traffic, the final IP address that the recipient receives is not the IP address of the sender. Decentralized VPN Network protects users against hazards such as harassment, spam, and identity theft. I hope, as an organization committed to protecting the privacy of its customers, you'll agree that this is a valuable and relevant technology.

This does not mean that nothing can be done, however. For serious incidents, traditional police work techniques of running stings and investigating to determine means, motive and opportunity are still very effective. Therefore you should ask your local police force for help.

Very truly yours

[name]



Real time discussion guidelines

If you are contacted directly by a complaining party for a real time discussion for any abusive behavior you can follow the guidelines below. It shouldn’t be construed as a legal advice, therefore always consider hiring a professional to assist you in any legal matter:

  1. Be prepared to summarize and answer basic questions about running a node in decentralized VPN Network. Assume the person with which you're going to converse knows nothing about decentralized VPN Network or running a node. Assume this same person isn't going to trust anything you say:
    1. In serious cases, such as harassment email or death threats, it is often helpful to draw an analogy to situations in the physical world where an action is perpetrated by an anonymous individual (such as delivering the notice via postal mail).
    2. Remind them that traditional police work can still be used to determine who had the means, motive, and opportunity to commit the crime.
  2. During the conversation make sure you explain a few points:
    1. You are not the perpetrator of the issue and you are not the source of any material he has received.
    2. You are concerned about the complainant’s problem.
  3. In many cases, your ISP will be involved as a conduit for the 3rd party complainant. Your ISP wants to know:
    1. Your server is not compromised.
    2. Your server is not a spam relay.
    3. Your server is not a trojan/zombie.
    4. You are a competent server administrator and can address the issue. Minimally, you can at least discuss and respond to the issue intelligently.
    5. The ISP is not at fault and not liable for your actions. This is normally the case, but the poor abuse person dealing with the issues just wants to hear it isn't the ISPs problem. They will move on after they are comfortable.
  4. Discuss options:
    1. The ISP/Complainant may very well demand to see log files. Fortunately, by default, nothing sensitive disclosed. You may want a new ISP if they demand access to log files ad hoc.
    2. The ISP/Complainant demands you leave decentralized VPN Network. You may want a new ISP as a result.
    3. The ISP/Complainant states they will firewall off the traffic to the main ports only. You may want a new ISP as a result.
    4. Start using decentralized VPN Network Whitelisting functionality to limit the range of traffic from your node. 
  5. After all has been discussed, offer a follow up conversation within a week. Make sure your agreed upon changes are implemented. Neither the ISP nor Complainant may want to do this, but the fact that you offered is in your credit. This may help them feel "comfortable" with you.

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