**What is the Digital Millennium Copyright Act?** It is a nation-wide act that makes it illegal to republish copyrighted information by downloading, uploading or file sharing any type of media. If caught, violators can receive fees of more than $750 for each violation.

Three University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee students are learning the hard truth behind downloading illegally.

After the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) sent out 16 pre-litigation settlements to University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee last semester, most of the students settled, but three named lawsuits remain said a spokeswoman from the RIAA.

The lawsuits are a part of the RIAA’s crackdown on college students that started in February and has rolled out hundreds of letters to students each month since.

Cara Duckworth, a spokeswoman for the RIAA, said they hope the students choose to settle before going to trial, where students would receive much higher penalties. Duckworth said so far none of the downloading cases have gone to trial.

If the case went to trial, the three violators could receive penalties of more than $750 for each copyright violation. For 100 downloaded songs, the penalty could be more than $750,000.

The three students have varying numbers of downloaded files from 469 to 139, according to court evidence against them.

John Wartman, the attorney at the University Legal Clinic, said none of the 16 students talked to him their legal cases. He said if a student had addressed concerns about their case, he would have first explored any possible defenses. The most likely defense being that someone else downloaded the files onto the computer, Wartman said.

If there was no defense, Wartman said he would look over the settlement options with the student and establish the safest route of action.

When UWM officials originally received the RIAA letters in March, they would not release the names of students to the association until they received a subpoena, said Bruce Maas, UWM chief information officer.

In May the university finally received the subpoena and sent out notices to individual students on May 9. Then it was up to the students to decide what to do.

The RIAA could not contact individual students until the university gave them the names to match up with the Internet Service Provider (ISP) numbers. UWM is the ISP for the computers on campus, including the personal computers of dorm residents and those using the university’s wireless.

A survey by Student Monitor from spring 2006 found that more than half of college students download music and movies illegally. Another market research firm, NPD, found college students alone accounted for more than 1.3 billion illegal music downloads in 2006.

While the university has not received any legal notices from the RIAA since March,

As of Sept.13, the university has caught 39 students illegally downloading so far this semester, according to Steve Brukbacher, university information security coordinator.

The information was accessed from a new database that started in September to help track violators. Out of the 39, 12 came in overnight on Sept. 12 and the violator’s location was not yet identified. The remaining 27 violators were mainly from students living in dorm rooms, but four were from students hooked up to the campus wide wireless system, Prowlnet, one was from someone working in a university office, and one couldn’t be identified.

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