The Federal Trade Commission has relieved Limewire, a p2p file-sharing service from an investigation regarding security and privacy issues as it “determined not to recommend any further action by the Commission at this time.” This is pretty good news for the software company, as they’ve taken the necessary measures to appease some of the FTC’s requests.
Brief background:
Users who install Limewire are said to have all their files, private and sensitive, available to the network, some of which are government documents that contain confidential military information. Also, users have their personal information at risk from identity theft. This impending issue caused an upheaval with regulatory officials, and caught the attention of lawmakers, which has caused Limewire to fall under the scrutiny of FTC.
Since the older version of the software is vulnerable to attacks, and is a potential medium of exploitation among its users, Limewire has taken a step towards integrating protection into the recent version of their software. From Limewire:
“The factors noted by the FTC in voluntarily closing the investigation speak for themselves. We have incorporated many safeguards and have taken active steps to educate users of current and older software versions to avoid disclosure of sensitive information. We will remain dedicated to ensuring the security and serving the needs of our global user base.”
This is what persuaded FTC to withdraw the investigation against Limewire, as said in a letter signed by the associate director of the commission, Mary Koelbel Engle earlier this month. The organization is now focused on encouraging users to upgrade for their own safety. In a statement from FTC:
“We remain concerned, however, about consumers who are still using insecure legacy versions and are therefore subject to a risk of inadvertent sharing of sensitive, personal information, We expect LimeWire to continue to advise consumers to upgrade legacy versions of its software because of the potential safety benefits of doing so.”
Hopefully, Limewire can avoid future legal repremands from government branches, as it furthers the security of the users enjoying their software. While this may not be completely possible, future issues shouldn’t be too major as to lead another federal judge or a union of hopping mad music publishers to demand a whooping $450 million payment for damages of privacy intrusion and copyright violation from Limewire and its founder Mark Gorton.
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