Verizon faces lawsuit after record labels say it profits from piracy

A group of record labels that include Universal, Capitol, Warner and Sony has filed a lawsuit against Verizon, accusing it of “contributory and vicarious copyright infringement.” Verizon “knowingly provides its high-speed service to a massive community of online pirates,” the companies said in their complaint. Apparently, the plaintiffs have sent the internet provider “hundreds of thousands” of copyright infringement notices over the past few years, identifying subscribers who’ve been using Verizon’s network to share copyrighted music via peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing networks.

Verizon, they said, acknowledged that it received their notices. The company allegedly chose to ignore them and continued to provide internet services to “thousands of known repeat infringers so it could continue to collect millions of dollars from them.” Since it didn’t terminate the accounts of the alleged copyright infringers, Verizon “obtained a direct financial benefit” from their “continuing infringing activity,” the plaintiffs argued. The labels are asking for damages worth up to $150,000 for each work infringed. Based on the list posted by Ars Technica, 17,335 titles are involved in the case, which means Verizon could be fined for as much as $2.6 billion.

Back in 2018, music labels also sued Cox Communications for allegedly refusing to fully terminate the accounts of users who were pirating music. A US District Court jury originally sided with the labels and ordered Cox to pay $1 billion in damages. But earlier this year, an appeals court overturned the verdict and found that the provider didn’t profit directly from its users’ activities. A group of record labels also sued Charter Communications in 2021 over over song piracy and similarly accused the company of turning a “blind eye” to music piracy.