According to the University of Manitoba’s copyright office, some piracy notices warn students that they could lose their scholarships or even be deported if they fail to pay a fine. It is known that mainly US-based copyright owners write to students on a regular basis, demanding cash settlements for alleged copyright infringement.

The university forwards notices to students, but some of the letters are “tantamount to extortion”: aside from threatening infringers with multi-million dollar lawsuits, some notices suggest that students could lose their scholarships if they don’t pay their fines. Moreover, some porn producers have told foreign students that they could face deportation if they don’t settle. Of course, none of these are real consequences that could ever happen in Canada, but many students are really freaked out.

The students must remember that notice senders do not know who notices have been delivered to, as there’s nothing in current law that compels the university to hand over their identities. At the same time, students can compromise themselves by negotiating directly with notice senders, which is not advised.

The University of Manitoba is not the only educational institution that reports such a problem – for example, the University of Calgary is in a similar position. The latter says it’s been receiving copyright notices over the past 2 years, and is going to crackdown on illegal file-sharing across campus. It has already held a meeting to discuss how it is going to deal with illegal downloading, though the problem isn’t straightforward.

Thanks to TorrentFreak for providing the source of the article.