LimeWire chairman: P2P concerns overblown
by Morpheus on 05/08/09 at 9:30 am
LimeWire chairman: P2P concerns overblownMusic industry behind FUD, says Mark Gorton
News
By Jaikumar Vijayan
August 3, 2009 08:46 PM ET
Computerworld – Lime Group Chairman Mark Gorton found himself in the hot seat last week during a hearing on the problem of inadvertent data leaks on peer-to-peer (P2P) networks including his company’s, LimeWire. The hearing was held by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.
Furious lawmakers blasted Gorton over what they claimed was his company’s continued failure to ensure that users of LimeWire software did not share files inadvertently. The scathing criticism came in the wake of testimony by two witnesses at the hearing. Robert Boback, CEO of Tiversa Inc., a P2P networking monitoring service, disclosed how he had discovered highly sensitive government data, ncluding presidential motorcade routes, on LimeWire networks.
The other witness was Progress and Freedom Foundation’s Thomas Sydnor, who said his experiments with LimeWire’s P2P software had revealed it to be extremely susceptible to inadvertent file sharing. The disclosures led to committee chairman Edolphus Towns (D-NY) saying he would soon introduce a bill seeking to ban the use of P2P software on government networks.
In a conversation with Computerworld, Gorton flatly rejected some of the testimony. He claimed that concerns about data leaks on P2P networks are being fueled and orchestrated by music labels concerned more about copyright infringement on P2P networks than anything else.
via LimeWire chairman: P2P concerns overblown.
