Right now, if a website operator intentionally and illegally streams copyright works, then that operator can be criminally charged with either (1) misdemeanor violations of 17 U.S.C. 506(a)(1)(A) and 18 U.S.C. 2319(b)(3) that could result in a maximum sentence of less than one year in prison/violation or, (2) felony violations of 18 U.S.C. 1961-68 that could result in a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison/violation.
BUT if the same website operator were intentionally aiding, abetting, conspiring to cause, or causing the illegal downloading of the same works, then existing law would let prosecutors deal with intermediate cases by charging a pirate-website-operator with felonies that could result in, (for example), an intermediate sentence of 5 years/violation. See, e.g., 506 U.S.C. 506(a)(1)(B); 18 U.S.C. 2319(c).
This quirk of existing law makes no sense: in streaming-piracy cases, it forces prosecutors cases to charge either less-than-a-year misdemeanors, or 20-year felonies—even though they would have several intermediate options had the same piracy case involved downloading. The report noted merely proposes that the intermediate charges that the law already provides in cases involving Internet-piracy-by-downloading should also be available in cases involving Internet-piracy-by-streaming. If there is some substantive problem with this notion of proportionality, then this article has failed to identify it.
