Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site ucla-cs.ARPA Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!ittvax!dcdwest!sdcsvax!bmcg!cepu!ucla-cs!wales From: wales@ucla-cs.UUCP Newsgroups: net.tv,net.legal Subject: Illegal satellite dish cleanup in San Francisco area? Message-ID: <645@ucla-cs.ARPA> Date: Thu, 2-Aug-84 11:33:35 EDT Article-I.D.: ucla-cs.645 Posted: Thu Aug 2 11:33:35 1984 Date-Received: Fri, 3-Aug-84 05:24:34 EDT Organization: UCLA CS Dept. Lines: 34 I read in the paper the other day that a pay-TV company in the San Francisco Bay area has sent nasty letters to several thousand people in their area, accusing them of pirating HBO signals via illegal satellite dishes. The accused pirates have been told to dismantle their receiving equipment, sign an agreement to stop illegal interception of signals, and pay a $300 "out-of-court settlement", or else they will be sued (for a lot more than $300, I assume). The company claims that the "pirates" were identified via an "electronic and photographic survey", details of which were not disclosed. What I want to know is: (1) Does a private party in the U.S. currently have a legal right to own and operate his own satellite dish? I assume the answer is a quali- fied "yes" (provided he restricts the set of stations he receives), since at least one company here in the L.A. area has been advertis- ing private satellite-dish installations on the radio for some time. (2) Assuming that a dish is not inherently illegal, how is it possible to figure out what the owner of a given dish is listening to without invading the residence and conducting an on-site search? Or is the pay-TV company in question simply saying to itself, "Mr. Jones has a dish pointed at satellite X, and HBO is one of the signals broadcast by satellite X, therefore Mr. Jones is probably pirating HBO"? I do not currently own a satellite dish, by the way. -- Rich Wales UCLA Computer Science Department 3531 Boelter Hall // Los Angeles, CA 90024 // (213) 825-5683 ARPA: wales@UCLA-LOCUS.ARPA UUCP: ...!{cepu,ihnp4,trwspp,ucbvax}!ucla-cs!wales