When it comes to our right to privacy, one question comes to mind: “Can we trust our ISP’s?” In the case of the biggest lawsuit to date on file-sharing, I have to say, not really. Any party can easily access our whereabout and doings on the Internet. Even with a court order, should our lives be exposed to anyone who wants to see? A question many privacy group might ask. There is a thin line between legality and privacy.

In May of 2011, Voltage pictures targeted more than 24000 BitTorrent users for the possible cause of copying and distributing of the film “The Hurt Locker.” In the past month, Voltage Pictures demanded, through a court order, that three Canadian ISP’s provide the accounts associated with certain IP address. The deadline was for this monday, September 12, 2011. As far as we know, all ISP complied with the court order without any fight. If Voltage Picture win all their cases, they might get earnings up to 48 millions dollars–multiply 2400 by the minimum fine, which is $2000. The film total gross was 49 million dollars worldwide.

Here is the problem about this lawsuit. The movie only cost 12 million to make. It made 12 million on its first weekend. Until today, it made more than 400% profit. Now they just want another 400% from the download population. I call this greed and theft. I’m not saying that piracy is right, but it is also wrong to make a 400% profit and ask for more. I don’t think they need another Ferrari in their garage.

What’s the message they’re trying to get through with this lawsuit? There is about 2 billion internet users. Those 24 000 make only 0.000012% of the entire internet population. Suing a percentage like this is like screaming somewhere in America wishing for someone in Asia to hear you. It will not do anything, but I guess that what capitalism is all about. The rich gets away from steeling from the people. With piracy, the people are their own Robin Hood. They will steel from the rich and give it all away. Until something drastically changes, it will be always like this.

Don’t expect to hide behind privacy laws if you do something illegal, but it would be nice to know that someone is fighting for your freedom to privacy instead of giving it away at first glance. I would love to believe that my whereabouts and my doings are kept only for me, but let’s be frank, when you put anything or do anything in public(the Internet), you open your world to the world itself. Always protect yourself and trust no one.  Not even the ones who promises privacy protection.