Winny Developer Found Guilty of Copyright Violations
Isamu Kaneko is a former research assistant at the University of Tokyo’s graduate school. He frequently wrote on the “Download Software Board” of the popular Japanese bulletin board site, 2channel. Because of his post number 47, Kaneko came to be known as “Mr. 47.” He released the Winny program on his website in September 2003, and provided a thread to Winny in “Download Software Board.”
In Winny, the users do not have any identification and they are unable to track where the files are sent from. However, they can check the downloading status of the file they have selected to download. The users can also download the file indirectly by forwarding it to the third party first and receiving it later. This “forwarding” function encourages the users to forward the files to those who have a fast transmission speed, thus speeding up the effective distribution of the files and increasing the anonymity.
Winny also permits the users inside of a firewall who cannot upload files to participate in the network. Furthermore, Winny has a unique system of grouping (clustering) the users by keywords for effective search, transmission and reception of files. Users searching with a similar keyword are automatically clustered together to reduce unnecessary downloading and searching traffic.
In November, 2003, two Japanese users were arrested and accused of sharing copyrighted game software and movies via Winny. In May, 2004, Kaneko was arrested for suspected conspiracy to commit copyright violations by assisting the two users above. Kaneko is the first software developer to be held responsible for the unlawful activities of the other users, and the ruling in this case has attracted a lot of attention.
The presiding judge said, “Although the defendant did not intentionally bring about the state of copyright infringement, and did not gain any economic benefit, he cannot be exonerated from criticism for continuing to provide the Winny program despite being aware of the risk that copyright holders’ profits would be damaged.” Kaneko is sentenced to pay a fine of 1.5 million yen. He has appealed the ruling to the Osaka High Court, his lawyer said.
The arrest of a P2P software developer is rare and the future effect of this conviction will be carefully watched.