A congressional committee sent letters Wednesday to the University of Wisconsin and 19 other universities identified as having received the highest number of illegal-downloading infringement notices for the purpose of gathering information.
Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, and four other bipartisan representatives signed the letter aimed at determining if universities are doing enough to prevent illegal file sharing.
"Universities have a moral and legal obligation to ensure students do not use campus computers for illegal downloading," Smith said in a statement. "These schools do not give away their intellectual property for free, and they should not expect musicians to do so."
Beth McGinn, a spokesperson for Smith, said the letters were sent with economic concerns in mind. She said illegal movie downloading costs $20 billion in gross domestic product, 141,000 jobs and $841 million in lost tax revenue.
"When we sent the letters to these schools, we asked them to fill out a survey to respond to whether they're taking the right steps to stop this," McGinn said.
The 20 schools have until May 31 to respond, but if Congress does not receive "acceptable" feedback, McGinn said lawmakers will "be forced to act."
Brian Rust, spokesperson for UW's Division of Information Technology, said UW would participate in the study and provide documentation of the extensive steps taken to dissuade students from copyright infringement.
"We're glad that they're asking us before action, but I don't think we are as irresponsible as their press release and letter implies," Rust said. "UW-Madison and all of our peer institutions have gone to great lengths to notify people, warn people and post notices via e-mail."
Rust questioned whether the committee completely understands the complexity of sharing prevention without intruding on the educational initiatives that use similar technologies.
"There are many legitimate uses of file sharing," Rust said. "If we prevented anyone from sharing music files, what would happen to music appreciation classes that involve downloaded legitimate files? They'd be pretty unhappy, and we'd hear about it."
The Recording Industry Associate of America, which is taking legal action against 53 students in the UW System, supported Wednesday's congressional action.
"We recognize the many pressing issues facing administrators today, but we cannot afford to turn a blind eye to theft on such a massive scale," RIAA Chairman and CEO Mitch Bainwol said in a statement. "After extensive hearings and inquiry, members of Congress are right to expect answers. We welcome this effort to document the commitment and resources that universities are putting forth to address this problem."
McGinn said Smith and the other representatives are scrutinizing the universities independently of the RIAA.
"It's Congress' responsibility to look out for the bigger picture," McGinn said. "The RIAA has their bottom line for the industry. The [congressional] bipartisan agreement says we need to protect intellectual property on any front."
Other schools included in the Congressional action included Big Ten schools Michigan, Michigan State and Purdue, as well as UCLA, Duke, Pennsylvania, Columbia, Boston University, North Carolina State and 11 others.
