File Sharing Could Threaten Personal and National Security

File sharing on the Internet might be illegal, but that doesn’t stop most people from using popular file sharing programs to download files. But a new report says file sharing can also threaten personal, corporate and national security.

In an article on the Electronic News website, Colleen Taylor says the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) “has released a report that concludes that the distributors of five popular file sharing programs – namely BearShare, eDonkey, KaZaA, LimeWire and Morpheus – repeatedly deployed features that ‘they knew or should have known’ could cause users to share files inadvertently.”

The report identifies five features in recent versions of the programs that could cause users to inadvertently distribute to others downloaded files or their own proprietary or sensitive files.

“Computer programs that can cause unintended file sharing contribute to copyright infringement, and they threaten the security of personal, corporate, and governmental data,” Jon Dudas, Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property, said in a statement.

The report says distributors of file sharing programs deployed features that could cause inadvertent sharing even after they were repeatedly warned these features could facilitate identity theft and breaches of personal and national security.

“The report also shows that inadvertent sharing has had severe consequences for governments, corporations and individuals,” Taylor says. “In a 2005 information bulletin, the Department of Homeland Security warned that inadvertent file sharing could compromise national security.”

To read the full article, click here:
www.edn.com/article/CA6424471.html?partner=enews&nid=2555