Recording Industry Steps Up Campus-Piracy Alerts, Straining College Technology Offices

By JEFFREY R. YOUNG

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George Washington University usually receives five to 10 notices per week from the Recording Industry Association of America complaining that a specific song or movie is being illegally traded by a computer user on the campus. But in the past week alone, the university has received 123 notices.

Colleges and universities around the country are reporting similar increases in complaints from the industry group. Because most colleges investigate every incident and take action against the online pirates, the surge is putting a sudden strain on their resources as the semester winds down.

"We have not seen a nationwide spike like this," said Kevin L. McLaughlin, director of information security at the University of Cincinnati. "This is new."

Mr. McLaughlin said his office usually received 25 to 30 notices per year from the association, known as the RIAA. But he's gotten 13 in the past two weeks.

"We're not sure why we have seen this increase," he said, adding that the college had taken steps to limit the trading of large files on the residence-hall networks. Officials at Cincinnati, he said, feel they have done a good job of preventing copyright violations. "We sent an e-mail to our contact at RIAA, and we've also left him a voice mail."

"I would hope that RIAA would start communicating with folks, letting them know what we can do to combat" any new forms of piracy that the group may now have detected, he added.

Cara Duckworth, director of communications for the industry group, said in an e-mail interview on Tuesday that the group was not doing anything particularly new.

"We are always making an effort to more effectively and efficiently detect infringing activity on the Internet, as we are continuously looking for ways to improve our ability to find and act on incidences of theft online," she said. "Having said that, there's been no change in our procedures."

She said the group was always communicating with college officials on the issue, both on a one-on-one basis and through its role on the Joint Committee of the Higher Education and Entertainment Communities Technology Task Force, to find solutions "that best fit the needs of schools to curb the mutual problem of online music theft."

Scott A. McVey, associate director of system and network support at George Washington, said that if the number of notices continued to rise, it would add hours of additional work each week for his employees.

"When we're dealing with a hundred of these notices, it's a big hit," he said.