Pirate chasing firm moves abroad

[DVTimes]

ACS:Law, the controversial law firm that tried to get money from people by accusing them of illegal file-sharing, appears to be back in business.

Ralli Solicitors, which represented some of those accused by ACS:Law during a UK court case, has told the BBC it is now advising a client based in Greece.

"They have received e-mails purporting to be from the law firm," said Ralli solicitor Michael Forrester.

The letters have been sent to overseas addresses.

"The IP addresses quoted do not appear conventional, making reference to country codes outside of the UK," said Mr Forrester.

"Despite this, the letters of claim refer to UK law under the Copyrights, Design and Patents Act," he added.

Compensation

One of the letters seen by the BBC read: "We act as solicitors for DigiProtect Ltd, the owners of copyright of various films and music rights.

"Our client has retained forensic computer analysts to search for and identify internet addresses from which their copyright works are being made available on so-called peer-to-peer programs."

It requests a compensation payment of £1665 or else court action will be taken.

The letter asks that cheques are made payable to ACS:Law and supplies a central London address, which is in an adjacent building to where the law firm used to trade from.

ACS:Law has enjoyed something of a chequered history, and has been accused of taking advantage of tough new laws on piracy in order to make money.

Sole proprietor Andrew Crossley teamed up with companies DigiProtect and MediaCAT, which purported to represent copyright owners.

Together they sent letters to around 10,000 people in the UK, alleging that the IP addresses of their computers had been linked to illegal file sharing.

Individuals were given the option of paying £500 or facing court action.

Many of those contacted said they had never engaged in such activity. Consumer watchdog Which accused the firm of speculative invoicing and claimed that none of the evidence would stand up in court.

Bankrupt

Mr Crossley eventually brought 26 cases to court, but soon after hearings began he tried to have them dismissed.

Judge Colin Birss QC refused to allow proceedings to stop and accused Mr Crossley of trying to "to avoid judicial scrutiny".

He, in turn, left the court mid-way through the case and had his barrister read out a statement in which he said that he no longer wanted to pursue net pirates because he had received death threats.

The case was dismissed and Mr Crossley faced a large bill for wasted costs. The accused have since settled out of court.

Soon after, ACS:Law was wound up and declared bankrupt.

Mr Crossley is currently the subject of an investigation by the Solicitors' Regulation Authority.

"It is unclear how the firm ACS:Law is continuing to operate, despite purporting to close earlier this year and the sole principal recently being made bankrupt. We have advised clients that we may be dealing with an imposter," said Mr Forrester.

ACS:Law was not contactable at the time of writing.


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-14215510