Important Appeals Court Ruling States Clearly That Merely Having An IP Address Is Insufficient For Infringement Claims
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20180829/00360440535/important-appeals-court-ruling-states-clearly-that-merely-having-ip-address-is-insufficient-infringement-claims.shtml
Tons of copyright lawsuits (and even more copyright trolling shakedowns that never even reach court) are based on one single bit of data: the IP address. We've seen numerous district courts reject using a bare IP address as evidence of infringement, but now we have a very important (even if short and to the point) ruling in the 9th Circuit that could put a serious damper on copyright trolling.
In this copyright action, we consider whether a bare allegation that a defendant is the registered subscriber of an Internet Protocol (“IP”) address associated with infringing activity is sufficient to state a claim for direct or contributory infringement. We conclude that it is not.