Sixteen Northwestern students were contacted by the university after being identified by the Recording Industry Association of America in a nationwide crackdown on unlawful online music sharing on college campuses.

Last week, the RIAA sent pre-litigation settlement letters to NU and 18 other universities, giving students the opportunity to pay a fine rather than facing possible legal consequences.

The university first was informed of the Internet Protocol addresses of those who had violated copyright infringements in June, said John Calkins, assistant general counsel at NU .

“We’re basically functioning as a conduit,” he said, “a way to get the letter from the RIAA to the party that it cannot identify that it wishes to reach and open up the settlements.”

One student, a SESP sophomore who asked not to be identified by name because he said he could be sued if he discusses the case, said he received an e-mail from the university in the summer informing him that the RIAA would sue him if he didn’t settle within a 30-day window.

The RIAA sent him a letter saying he would be charged $750 for each of his 300 illegally file-shared songs – or about $225,000 – in addition to legal fees, if he did not settle. He accepted a $3,000 settlement in July.

Cara Duckworth, spokeswoman for the RIAA, said the association has an active online investigation team that monitors peer-to-peer sharing networks such as LimeWire for copyright infringement.

The team notes the IP addresses and identifies a representative sampling of the illicit files, she said. This information alone serves as the basis of a lawsuit, but the RIAA sends a pre-litigation letter enabling students to pay a discounted rate for copyright infringement than they would if they were brought to court.

The rate is usually $750 per copyright infringement – a song, television show or any type of illegal file sharing. The pre-litigation letters offer a discounted settlement rate before a formal lawsuit is filed.

At NU the average amount a student paid to settle was $3,000, Calkins said.

Stanford University, which received 19 letters, averaged the same amount, said Lauren Schoenthaler, senior university council at Stanford.

Duckworth said settlements are determined on a case-by-case basis.

Still, the SESP sophomore who settled with the RIAA said he thought the payment process was non-specific.

“It’s kinda funny because you just go on the Internet and pay it and do it and they have the Web site set up,” he said. “You don’t speak to anyone or anything like that.”

He said he had LimeWire on his computer but did not realize that his settings were set to share the music, which is not allowed.

“I thought since you aren’t able to use it, (NU) would cut it off,” he said. “So I didn’t really worry about it.”

The student said he paid in the first week of July because he felt obliged to settle.

“I spoke to someone from NUIT and it’s just flat out extortion because obviously you’re not going to court for it because it’s just ridiculous and you’re just forced to pay $3,000,” he said.

Still, one NU student did not settle and the RIAA filed a John Doe lawsuit in August, Duckworth said.

Calkins confirmed, and said NU learned of this because it got a copy of a plea the RIAA filed in federal court in Chicago. Calkins said the RIAA wanted to subpoena the name of the individual, since they only had an IP address.

The RIAA has sent more than 3,000 letters to about 100 different schools since implementing its new policy in February, Duckworth said. In the most recent wave, which included NU, the amount of pre-litigation letters ranged from nine at the University of California, San Diego to 43 letters at North Carolina State University.

“I was happy on the one hand that we weren’t in the top 25 or anything (that would) get us heightened scrutiny,” Calkins said. “But 16 is still not a small number either.”

Calkins said NU is trying to spread the message that copyright laws need to be complied with and that there are serious repercussions, and sent a mass e-mail Monday about the pre-litigation letters.

At Stanford, if students do not comply with the university’s policy, penalties can run as high as $1,000 to get back Internet access, Schoenthaler said. She said she was devastated by the number of letters Stanford received.

“If there were one (letter) that would be upsetting,” she said. “When students at this point in their lives are at risk for a potential lawsuit that is a big deal and it’s really unfortunate it went to that level.”

The SESP student said he was shocked when he received the pre-litigation letter.

“I was definitely surprised because (the letter) said something about a lawsuit and I couldn’t really actually believe that it was real,” he said. “You hear about that happening to other people and then it happens to you.”

Reach Emily Glazer at [email protected].