New technology brings new forms of litigation in its wake.  Internet technologies such as BitTorrent have made commonplace the unauthorized copying of music and movies on a massive scale.  Content owners, in response, have begun to file massive lawsuits against thousands of John Doe defendants.

These lawsuits inevitably run into serious problems.  Armed only with the IP addresses of alleged infringers, the content owners must subpoena records from ISPs, which are understandably resistant.  Personal jurisdiction is a problem, and joinder of defendants across numerous jurisdictions is frowned upon.  Attributing an IP address to an individual is a difficult evidentiary task.

Perhaps the greatest problem, though, is the high incentive for content owners to adopt scare tactics rather than pursue legitimate cases.  Content owners can make a substantial profit even if they never plan to pursue their unlikely-to-succeed lawsuits by sending out letters to suspected infringers demanding a sum to settle, threatening otherwise to name them in litigation.

Both courts and targeted defendants, however, have begun to strike back at the attorneys who support their clients’ engaging in such unsavory practices.  Here are some notable examples, warning signs to attorneys who think they can casually profit off of the “copyright troll” business model:

Evan Stone – Texas attorney fined $10,000 for sending subpoenas in spite of the court’s instructions not to.

Andrew Crossley – British solicitor fined £76,326.55 and suspended for two years for unethical practices surrounding his sending of about 20,000 letters to alleged infringers.

David Gore and Brian Miller – Partners at the British firm of Davenport Lyons were fined £20,000 and suspended three months for unethical actions surrounding their sending of over 6,000 letters.

Kenneth J. Ford – Charged with forging a court order and defrauding a client, filing over 22,000 John Doe copyright infringement lawsuits concerning pornography.

Righthaven – Ordered to pay $5,000 in sanctions and to include transcripts detailing the reasons for the sanctions in other pending cases because of its misrepresentations to the court over the assignment of copyrights it was suing over.

Hard Drive Productions – Defendants are suing Hard Drive Productions for declaratory relief and attorney’s fees for filing frivolous suits and demanding settlements.