US judge rules in downloaders' favor in porn-copyright case.

Hard Drive Productions, Inc., a US-based porn production house, had asked the District Court for the Northern District of California to force Internet service providers (ISPs) to provide them with the details of computer users they believed to have illegally downloaded one of their films, particularly the movie “Amateur Allure – Natalia.” The company monitored illegal downloads of the dirty picture for a two-month span, then took the IP addresses linked to the transfer and told the court that they needed the names linked to the numerical Internet-IDs. Hard Drive Productions had asked for the names of 90 Internet subscribers they believe to have browsed the Web for illegal copies of the clip, but a judge responded that the information the plaintiffs were working with was not enough to prove guilt.

Furthermore, the presiding judge said he had reservations against helping Hard Drive Productions because he believed their lawyers did not want to actually litigate with alleged copyright infringers. Instead, he ruled, he was weary that they were just trying to scare suspects into settling and spending upwards of thousands of dollars to make any court matter be dismissed.