The Distributed Computing Industry Association (DCIA) supports the statement made by the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) on Monday, not only with words but also with its actions. The Inadvertent Sharing Protection Working Group (ISPG) is a DCIA-sponsored industry-wide program introduced in July 2008 that has been working with the private sector and FTC staff to address the issues Chairman Leibowitz spoke about in his statement.

Compliance reports began to be compiled and submitted one year ago from top brands representing implementations of P2P technologies ranging from downloading to live-streaming, from open consumer file-sharing environments to secure corporate intranet deployments, and from user-generated to professionally produced content.

Representative examples of these are BitTorrent and LimeWire. In the case of BitTorrent and software programs that use BitTorrent, it is unlikely that a user can inadvertently share data because of the multiple intentional steps involved in converting a file to a .torrent format, uploading it to a tracker, etc. In the case of LimeWire, the company literally rebuilt its software to protect users from accidentally sharing their personal or sensitive data.

The distributed computing industry takes the safety of consumers very seriously. Once this concern was recognized, it responded proactively.

The fact remains, however, that the amount of confidential data that is in distribution on the Internet is cumulative. Material that was accidentally disclosed years ago is still floating around. And more recently leaked data is also accessible. The entire focus of ISPG so far has been to shore up the sources of such unintended file uploads in the first place. Removing items that are already in circulation on the web is a problem of a different order of magnitude and one that this group is just starting to investigate.

The ISPG's best advice now - to parents and children alike - is similar to that given by other Internet software distributors: PLEASE UPGRADE TO THE LATEST VERSION FOR THE BEST PERFORMANCE AND THE SAFEST EXPERIENCE.

For public and private sector institutions that require workers to handle classified information: PLEASE DISCONNECT YOUR COMPUTER FROM THE INTERNET WHILE WORKING ON HIGH-SECURITY PROJECTS AND REMOVE SENSITIVE DATA FROM YOUR DEVICE BEFORE RECONNECTING.

Also, along with actively participating in this program, summarized here, the DCIA encourages file-sharing software distributors to direct users to the Onguard Online website pages dedicated to File-Sharing Safety.

The DCIA was less enthusiastic about news that Senators Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and John Thune (R-SD) misguidedly introduced legislation on Wednesday "to inform Internet users of the privacy and security risks associated with file-sharing software programs."

Such measures tend to be technologically outdated before they can be finalized and signed into law, result in unintended consequences that stifle commercial innovation, and prove to be unenforceable given that the Internet is a global medium.

The industry has moved to address inadvertent uploading of sensitive data by shoring up the entry points in file-sharing software.

This issue has moved now to institutional policies for managing data securely and to the removal of confidential data already in circulation. Nevertheless, the DCIA will engage with Senate staff to minimize collateral damage.

To blanket blame an entire branch of software is just plain ignorant. First off his rant give no indication that he understands P2P, and he even insinuates that users are the cause of the P2P install. Unless it was payloaded through a trojan, the software didn't just get there itself. And if it was a virus which caused the unknown p2p program to install then it's a hole in their own policies which caused this. In the end, he's a moron for shooting his mouth off without even researching his message, and he should lose his job for not even understanding simple concepts. Why is this loud mouth employed when so many highly qualified people are not? Fire his ass for embarrassing the qualified people who work there.

I might be wrong, It would be good if someone could differentiate between p2p as in Limewire, eDonkey, and the rest of these types of p2p which if you allow, shares folders of your choice, vs torrents, in the articles. It seems to me their lumping all the different p2p together. I hope I can assume that people are not sharing folders using torrents.

is one allegation that FTC guy didn't make. In fact, these actions and statements are refreshingly restrained and responsible and limited. Unauthorised, unmanaged file sharing software is a corporate data security risk - of course; authorised use of file sharing should include attention to data secourity - of course; file sharing products should default to secure ("this folder is DMZ") and not insecure ("Take My Documents - Please!") behaviour - of course. But businesses can decide for themselves whether to share somebody's CD collection internally and externally (probably not) or unrestricted adult videos (almost certainly not, even if filmed on site). That isn't the point today. The point is security of customer, employee, and business records.

"contribute to inadvertent file sharing" ?
Just a minute, how can one possibly share files "inadvertently" ?
Would that be by declaring the C drive as the share ?
And what kind of moron, in Federal employ no less, would have the kind of brain to say "go on, share my principle drive in its entirety, no problem" and then be surprised by the result ?
Although I suppose that I shouldn't be surprised, given that government-employed pen pushers of all levels are able to leave sensitive data on trains or buses without any thought of it until they hear about it on the news.
In any case, kudos for blaming the software makers. I wasn't expecting any less.