July 2nd, 2010 
Cliff Riseborough As of this month, a provision of the Higher Education Opportunity Act of 2008 kicks in to being. That provision states that colleges and universities have to (from Skunkpost) :
effectively combat the unauthorized distribution of copyrighted material by users of the institution’s network" without hampering legitimate educational and research use
Any school that doesn’t can face the risk of losing some or all of their federal funding.
Many schools have already put steps in place to help combat the problem, simply since students were using university systems and bandwidth to share music, movies and games. For those that don’t have any programs in place, they’ve been stuck in scramble mode to institute something since the whole provision became required on Thursday.
Many colleges worried they would be asked to monitor or block content. But the provision says schools can get a great deal of flexibility, as long as they use at least one "technology-based deterrent."
Their options include taking steps to limit how much bandwidth can be consumed by peer-to-peer networking, monitoring traffic, using a commercial product to reduce or block illegal file sharing or "vigorously" responding to copyright infringement notices from copyright holders.
My issue with this provision is that it’s the colleges and universities that have to foot the bill to deal with users that the RIAA or MPAA, not any actual legal authority, says are a problem. And since they don’t want to possibly affect their own future funding, there could be often a ‘shoot first, ask questions later’ kind of mentality when it comes to enforcement.
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