Tennessee Makes it Illegal To Share Your Netflix Password | Hacker News Reader

Tennessee Makes it Illegal To Share Your Netflix Password

news.yahoo.com

98 pointschopsueyar82 comments

In other news, the lawnmowing industry has successfully lobbied the state government to pass a groundbreaking law making it a criminal offence to loan your lawnmower to a neighbour. The practice of lawnmowersharing is claimed, according to an industry-funded study, to cost the industry $10 billion a year in lost revenue.

"Now that everyone who wants to enjoy a mowed lawn has to come clean and buy or rent their own lawnmower, we can finally put an end to the harmful piracy that has been driving the lawnmowing industry to the brink of collapse," said Dr. Lawrence Angelo, an industry spokesperson.

The barbecue industry is watching this closely as it attempts to secure passage of a law that would uphold barbecue terms-of-use restrictions preventing barbecue owners from flagrantly cooking food for dinner guests without a multi-user licence.

The scenarios you're describing seem a lot more like libraries loaning out physical copies of books, each of which can only be used by one person at a time. I think loaning out your NetFlix password is more akin to cable theft than to loaning out physical objects. If you're giving out your password to all of your friends, you're basically acting as a content distributor.

Still, I see no reason why this needs to be a law. NetFlix terms of service should cover it.

If you're making that distinction, then "theft" is probably not the right word to use.

They're not stealing from the person who loaned them the password, but "theft" is definitely the right word.

Theft results in a perment loss. Tresspassing is probably much more apt.

But, from the perspective of the online services there is a simple real world analogy that actually happens. Having 10+ people live in the same rented appartment. The lanlord is being paid, but his costs are larger than a single renter due to an increased useage of the property. Still, netflix is probably not the proponents of this law it's all about the RIAA and MPAA who hate the idea of unlimited content on the cheap.

I don't want to split hairs, but if I steal cable for a month, the cable company permanently loses the money I should have paid for a month of cable. Just because they don't lose the 1s and 0s they're selling doesn't mean there's no permanent loss.

My apartment has a rental agreement about how many people are allowed to live there. If I break the agreement by allowing ten friends to live there I lose my apartment. If I loan my NetFlix password to ten friends, I see no reason why they shouldn't just terminate my account.

but you are making the mistake that you would have paid for the service if you did not pirate the cable.

I very clearly wrote should have paid, not would have paid.

I agree - should have paid. People will always try to extract the last ounce of value out of anything, businesses and individuals are guilty of this - I just don't like seeing businesses using their relative size advantage to gain a legal advantage over individuals.

There is a big difference between cable an netflix. With cable you could tap a wire and they could not notice your use sage without significant effort. With netflix they can drop any account that uses more IP's or bandwidth than they want. Basically every time they serve up content they get to decide is this a valid use of the service, and with a little IP tracking there is little to stop this.

PS: It's easy enough to say in the TOS, any account that has more than N IP's downloading movies at the same time get's blocked and it's password reset.

Don't Netflix servers block you from accessing content from different devices using same credentials simultaneously? That's pretty much a library situation.

You can stream on up to four devices at a time, depending on your plan.

I guess they assume it will be in the same household or family, but it certainly doesn't have to be the same IP.

FYI in the 1800s, the publishing industry tried to shut down public libraries by lobbying governments to make it illegal for people to read books without first paying for them.

Did they want to make it illegal for people to read books without paying for them, or did they want to make it illegal to loan them out? There's a world of difference, particularly now that we're extrapolating that to digital media.

Yeah, it's crazy!

Or what if, when you paid for a gym membership, they wouldn't let you lend your gym membership card to someone else so they could get in too? Or if you buy a parking permit for my car and they won't let you shift it to someone else's car when you're away? Or if you go to a buffet and get "all you can eat" and they won't let you give your food to three friends?

Oh wait, they already do that. In fact, pretty much any time you pay a membership fee for a "use this as much as you like" service, it's impossible and/or illegal to share your membership with other people. It's just common sense -- "all you can eat for a fixed price" business plans only work if you don't share.

"Republican Gov. Bill Haslam [who signed the bill] told reporters earlier this week that he wasn't familiar with the details of the legislation, but..."

I feel like this says it all.

What fraction of legislation do you think that the "best" governor understands?

Any and all that he signs, or he shouldn't be signing it into law.

>>What fraction of legislation do you think that the "best" governor understands?

> Any and all that he signs, or he shouldn't be signing it into law.

I think that you're answering a different question, namely what should a governor do. I asked about what real governors actually do, suggesting that the governor in question is typical and that none are significantly better.

Do you have any examples of governors who behave as you (and I) think that they should? If not....

This is unfortunately the rule, not the exception. If you ever have checked out any of these laws that go before a US legislature they are generally hundreds of pages long and a very dry read. Even the legislator that is sponsoring the bill likely has not read the whole thing in detail, but only the summary prepared by his team of aides, and has relied on many other people to write up his drafted law. Probably the only people that read and can understand these new laws in full are prosecutors and other lawyers.

This is really all too common. You always hear politicians say things like "Well I'm not familiar with that issue specifically...so many pieces of legislation pass by my desk I really can't review them all." It's true that you can't expect one person to comprehend every issue at a deep level. But politicians shouldn't be rubber stamping things just to build up enough "credits" to get their next piece of legislation passed through.

You know what, every time I hear such an excuse, I can't help thinking: well, why not a github for those laws. At least, we can "diff" them and follow up with who actually submitted the "patch". At least in that way we have certain accountability there.

This is such an excellent idea for citizenship that it would probably be made illegal because of its potential to embarass the lawmakers (or otherwise hold them directly and irrefutably accountable for their actions). If only there was a way... wikilawleaks ... hmmmm...

How on earth would people legally sell netflix passwords in bulk anyway? This was something that needed to be addressed on the state level because no other laws were being broken in the process? But spam is okay?

The lobbyist force these industries have must be insanely powerful and expensive. Well, one more law that the people arresting and judging you are probably breaking themselves or their kids are.

I'm pretty sure the future of law enforcement is to make sure everyone is breaking some law at some point and they can basically arrest and prosecute you at any time, so you best obey, citizen.

That's not what the law is meant to prevent. It's meant to prevent me from sharing my online service (Netflix) account with my mother. It's meant to persuade me to tell my mother to get her own account. Clearly these people don't love their mothers.

Doesn't NetFlix specifically allow you to have mutliple users on an account? I'd be curious if NetFlix was actually involved in the lobbying that became this law.

http://www.netflix.com/FAQ?p_faqid=2902 says you can have up to six devices authorized for one account, and you can use up to [# of discs in your plan] simultaneously, to a maximum of 4.

http://www.netflix.com/TermsOfUse#instant specifies that this is "within your household".

I'm pretty sure your use of Netflix terms of service is between you and Netflix, not you and local law enforcement. It's a private contract.

Does this law have provisions for "enablers"? Can Tennessee go after NetFlix for encouraging users to break the law (multi-user accounts)?

More importantly, if there is a dragnet investigation and a dorm room gets arrested for sharing NetFlix with each other, can they still go to jail if they abided by the TOS?

From the exact same Tennessee law, a person commits the offense of theft of services who: "(3) Knowingly absconds from establishments where compensation for services is ordinarily paid immediately upon the rendering of them, including hotels, motels and restaurants, without payment or a bona fide offer to pay."

Your stay at a hotel or meal at a restaurant is private business between you and that hotel/restaurant. Local law enforcement only gets involved if you choose not to pay.

The lobbyist force these industries have must be insanely powerful and expensive.

Is Tennessee really the most expensive legislature to buy?

Not sure, but it is home to Nashville, which has become the epicenter of recorded music in America.

> I'm pretty sure the future of law enforcement is to make sure everyone is breaking some law at some point and they can basically arrest and prosecute you at any time, so you best obey, citizen.

That's not "the future", it's been true for a long time.

I don't see what justification there is for this being a law. It's simple enough to make it part of the Terms of Service, and then terminate the accounts of anyone who's logged in on more than 10 IP addresses at the same time.

It's fundamentally different from the old "theft of cable" laws where the service provider doesn't have full control over the signal/content.

Yes. This is completely addressable using technology. No need to turn people into criminals. Why can't they just prevent any one account from viewing more than N videos simultaneously? Could make N 1 by default, and then charge people for family packs where N is higher than 1.

They already limit the number of concurrent streaming videos. Last time I checked, N == 1. (Other packages might have different options.)

Then that, with the IP limit should be sufficient. Their goal should be to minimise the abuse without turning their customers into criminals.

I'm pretty sure my housemates have had multiple simultaneous streams on their shared account.

one-disc plans allow one stream. two-disc plans allow two simultaneous streams. four streams is the maximum.

My wife and I have a one disc plan and have streamed two videos simultaneously.

Maybe our account is different, but my girlfriend and I have watched shows on two different devices simultaneously.

Maybe they limit it by IP? We were both at home.

I used to have a rosy glass over democracy as I came from China. However, news like this really pissed me off. A lot of those representatives are not working for the people who voted them, but rather the big corporates or whichever lobby groups. How come lobbying is even legal in the first place? It's actually glorified bribery. Please forgive me if I'm being a bit cynical here.

It's not at all cynical. The issue here is that influential people get listened to more than regular problem, especially those who will invite their congressman onto their personal yacht to discuss matters.

However, if you hold a democracy as true to its ideals as possible, than the opinions of the ignorant are as prominent as the knowledgeable. (The media already promotes the ignorant heavily, but that's another issue...) Clearly this is not ideal if you don't have time to listen to everybody.

Where do you draw the line? Obviously US-style lobbying is too much, but you don't want to go too far. And various forces will work against you if you try to iterate on this legislation until it works.

It's not at all cynical. The issue here is that influential people get listened to

Should be a period right there!

How many people protesting this online will actually write their congressperson and complain? Lobbyists get listened to because they say something. It's hard for someone to hear you if you're silent!

Lobbyists are just advocates for a cause. It is illegal for lobbyists to pay bribes.

It is pretty easy to undo this type of legislation. All you have to do is send a direct mail campaign against a few state senators with the title "Joe Sentator is turning your child into a criminal... Have you ever shared an online password? Joe thinks you deserve 1 year in jail." It would probably cost around $10k to roast a few state senators, and neutralize the music industry lobby. It's just that nobody really cares enough to spend the $10k.

My issue with this approach is that those senators or whatever level of representatives won't be punished by doing so. A common technique I observed these years is that they will initially propose a shooting-for-moon bill/bylaws/regulations, then everyone gets concerned and asks them to undo it. They will tone down and pretend to listen to the public, but counter-argue with some "authoritative" proofs given by certain professors or whatever scholars/lawyers/domain experts (often bought out by the same lobby group), then they concede with lesser intrusive proposal but still achieve their hidden goal. They will always look calm and charming, that on the contrary makes the angry public look irrational and ignorant. Most of the time, they can get away as the winner. Even if they didn't pull it off, they didn't lose anything. It is like they are playing an "I'm not touching you" trick to the public.

If you follow the recent Internet UBB issue in Canada, you will see how it pans out. Nobody in CRTC is going to resign for doing such a ploy.

>> It is illegal for lobbyists to pay bribes.

In the US the bribes are in the form of campaign contributions. No money comes from the lobbyist, but if the legislator performs, contributions appear from various PACs (Political Action Committee) and corporations. With millions flowing to individual cmpaign committees, I despair that meaningful reform is impossible.

Much legislation is written by lobbyists (or their clients) because the issues are too complex for legislators or their staffs to understand. Is anyone surprised that some clause favoring the client or inductry is burried in the hundreds of pages?

The actual bill [0] modifies Tennessee Code 39-14-104 [1] (reproduced in the bill at "Under present law") in order to include "entertainment services" as a subset of "services".

Note that the bill does not make it illegal to share your password. It only makes it illegal to "avoid payment" or give services to "another not entitled" to them. Netflix TOS allow you to have up to six devices associated with your account, and to run simultaneous streams up to the number of discs in your plan [2] within your household [3]. This usage remains legal under the bill.

[0] http://wapp.capitol.tn.gov/apps/billinfo/BillSummaryArchive....

[1] http://www.michie.com/tennessee/lpext.dll?f=templates&fn... and navigate to 39 then 14 then 104.

[2] http://www.netflix.com/FAQ?p_faqid=2902

[3] http://www.netflix.com/TermsOfUse#instant

It's interesting that the law seems to conspicuously exclude from its definition of "services" any services provided to businesses. So, for example, it is not a criminal offense in TN if a client stiffs me on a contract programming or webdesign gig--- that remains a mere contract dispute. I can pursue it (if I wish) by bringing a civil suit, but the public prosecutor is not going to haul DeadbeatClientCorp into criminal court for stealing my services. Not sure why a Netflix TOS violation should be treated differently.

I'm not seeing where services delivered to businesses are exempted.

Tennessee Code 39-14-127 (a)(2) is pretty explicit about being stiffed for services.

Why not just get it over with and send everyone to RIAA-run prison camps?

That's a bit over dramatic. Just because the RIAA sponsored or endorsed a bill doesn't mean its necessarily a bad thing.

Can you provide a reason why it's unreasonable for a company to want each person (or even household) who uses their service to have a separate subscription?

That being said, I haven't read the bill, and only know what the article says about it.

Using criminal law to deal with it seems like a fairly over-the-top, dramatic step to take. It's not necessarily unreasonable for a company to want each person to have a separate subscription, and they can even mandate it in their terms of service, and take action to terminate the accounts of people violating it. But criminal prosecutions for sharing accounts?

The article does say that it is mostly to combat people harvesting and selling large number of accounts/passwords which seems reasonable to me. It is scary that they could go after people sharing with a friend with up to a year in jail though.

  > The article does say that it is mostly to combat people 
  > harvesting and selling large number of accounts/passwords
  > which seems reasonable to me.

It seems reasonable that there be a law against that?

Reasonable: Netflix TOS allows them to terminate your account if you're found in violation.

Unreasonable: TN law allows criminal charges to be brought against you, potentially incurring fines and jail time and almost definitely incurring legal fees.

Reasonable?: Netflix will terminate the stolen account you're "borrowing" and you never get penalized.

chopsueyar makes a good point: how will they even prosecute the real criminals?

We really need help from the Republicans here. They passed laws so that any time someone wants to do something useful with taxpayer money (build infrastructure, provide government services), the first step becomes a 10-year-long "alternatives analysis" stage. We need the same thing for new laws. As an example, before this law can take effect, we need to decide exactly how much it will cost to investigate, prosecute, and imprison violators. And, we need to decide where that money is going to become from? Should we legalize child rape to free up those investigators to go after Netflix ToS violations? If yes, then make it a law. If no, then let Netflix worry about its own profits.

Unfortunately, there is nothing preventing the law from being applied in your 'scary' scenario.

Additionally, if I share my password with my wife, and her sister 'borrows' it from my wife, and she gives it to three friends, and they each give it to three friends, who is responsible under this law? How do you prove it?

Also, it is just really poor business to solve a problem using legislation which could easily be solved using software.

This law may even be in conflict with the licensing agreements between Netflix and the studios. If Netflix and a studio had worked out an arrangement where up to 4 simultaneous users can stream from a single account, who is the Tennessee legislature to declare otherwise.

This could be an interstate commerce issue, too.

> Using criminal law to deal with it seems like a fairly over-the-top, dramatic step to take.

Indeed. A company is perfectly entitled to want each member of a family to buy their services, what they are not (morally) entitled to is to use coercion (in the form of laws backed by threats of violence) to get people to do so.

A company is morally entitled only to that revenue that people would willingly give it in the absence of force or fraud.

While this doesn't necessarily make the bill unreasonable, I'd say there are much better market approaches.

For example, Netflix limits the number of devices you can connect, logs what you watched, and uses your watching habits for recommendations. So, if I were to share my account with others, they'd see everything I watched and anything they watch would alter my recommendations. For those reasons alone, I keep my Netflix account to myself.

So up to a year in jail is not unreasonable?

Hah! While trying not to pick a fight with the comment I was replying to, I ended up picking another fight. Guess I can't win :)

Perhaps you are wrong?

i dont get why the RIAA is worried, netflix should be MPAA's doing...

RIAA is criminalizing a lot of things these days. When will it stop?

I'm guessing sometime around when everyone is legally required to have a camera and microphone attached to their head which note everything they see and hear and automatically charge them for any content that they view.

Of course, you would still have to buy movie tickets, DVDs, music, and so forth, despite then being charged every time you view them.

> The bill, which has been signed by the governor, was pushed by recording industry officials to try to stop the loss of billions of dollars to illegal music sharing.

If what this bill criminalizes was already "illegal" sharing, then there was no need for an additional law.

Pretty stupid move as companies could actually use this knowledge of consumer behavior to adjust their pricing and increase their profitability.

See Bakos, Brynjolfsson and Lichtman (1998) http://digital.mit.edu/erik/sig.pdf and Varian (1994) http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~hal/Papers/sharing.pdf

"The Right To Read"[1] was written as a warning, not a how-to guide.

[1] http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html

This sounds pretty ridiculous to me, but yet not surprising. I understand that giving out your password to random people should be illegal, but sharing it within your own house hold should not. I mean, what if it was illegal for your friends to watch TV at your house? We pay the cable or satellite company to give our home service, not us as in a particular person. Netflix I view the same way. When I rent a 2 day rental from Blockbuster, I can let everyone in my house watch it with me and I'm not breaking any laws. I can even let a friend borrow it so long as I can still return it on time. Why wouldn't Netflix be the same way?

I know it should be illegal to sell passwords in bulk, I have nothing against that, but why leave laws like this open so that we can start arresting dads for letting their kids use their Netflix? Stupid...

As already said if it's illegal why make another law? Enforce the one you have.

I feel it like we are one step closer to RMS short story : http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html

Edit: i sent the comment too fast, needed rewrite.

Great, now they are now inventing new crimes to protect Big Content's old business models.

I don't see how this doesn't encourage piracy.

This isn't a new law, but an addendum to an existing law that makes it illegal to leave a restaurant without paying or steal cable television.

http://www.tennessean.com/article/20110602/NEWS/306020033/22...

<sarcasm> When my group of 8 friends are hungry and want to go eat, we hit up the buffet at Ryan's Steakhouse. As a group, we only buy one buffet, but we share it to hell with the others in the group. </sarcasm>

hum.. I don't get it:

Why just NetFlix? We all have tens of other passwords that should earn us a year in prison if shared.

Was this a real problem? Isn't there something more meaningful these legislators should be working on like jobs and our economy? What a charade.

In other news (http://www.japanrailpass.net/eng/en008.html):

"Use of a JAPAN RAIL PASS is strictly limited to the signer (hereafter "you") only."

Surely an outrageous clause like this one can only be the product of big corporations and corrupt politicians. What about "the right to travel"?

That's completely reasonable. As is Netflix putting "only one household" in their ToS.

It'd be unreasonable if there was a specific law on the books in Japan that says if you loan out your rail pass you're branded a criminal (which in the case of Japan means you're deported for life) and get jail time, instead of them just taking it away from you and saying "you broke the terms, no more rail pass for you".

In most public transit systems I have had a pass on, they have the authority to fine you for trying to share a pass... That seems to be what this law is going for. Content providers currently only have the recourse of cutting you off, now they can fine.

I don't think that you necessarily will get jail time. The new law elevates theft of entertainment services to the same level as theft of other services. In practice, I think theft of services is mostly punished by a fine.

But in theory, according to the old law you actually could go to jail for loaning out your rail pass in Tennessee. So actually all the people who are upset about this law should first focus on the existing law.

guys, I think he was being sarcastic

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