The use of peer-to-peer networks for sharing files has come under fire during recent months, including the dismantling of Swedish BitTorrent site Pirate Bay, but it turns out even members of Congress need to be kept in check over their file-sharing practices.

Congress on Tuesday introduced the Secure Federal File Sharing Act, which would restrict the use of peer-to-peer file sharing software like Limewire among federal employees.

The new legislation follows multiple embarrassing leaks of sensitive government information by means of open file sharing networks, including the location of a safe house for the First Family, financial files belonging to Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, the electronic schematics to President Obama’s helicopter, and a list of 30 lawmakers currently under investigation by the House Ethics Committee.

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On Sept. 8, 2003, the recording industry sued 261 American music fans for sharing songs on peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing networks, kicking off an unprecedented legal campaign against the people that should be the recording industry’s best customers: music fans. Five years later, the recording industry has filed, settled, or threatened legal actions against at least 30,000 individuals. … But suing music fans has proven to be an ineffective response to unauthorized P2P file-sharing.

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Comcast came clean with the Federal Communications Commission late Friday, detailing how it throttled and targeted peer-to-peer traffic–maneuvers it has repeatedly denied.

The cable concern said it indeed hit “particular protocols that were generating disproportionate amounts of traffic.” The peer-to-peer protocols, Comcast said, include Ares, BitTorrent, eDonkey, FastTrack and Gnutella–vehicles used to transport copyrighted material without the owners’ permission.

On Aug. 1, when the FCC ordered it to abandon its throttling practices, Comcast denied that it was blocking any services, including “peer-to-peer services” like BitTorrent, or engaged in any blocking of services.

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The music industry should embrace illegal file-sharing Web sites, according to a study of Radiohead’s last album release that found huge numbers of people downloaded it illegally even though the band allowed fans to pay little or nothing for it. “Rights-holders should be aware that these non- traditional venues are stubbornly entrenched, incredibly popular and will never go away,” said Eric Garland, co-author of the study, which concluded there was strong brand loyalty to controversial “torrent” and peer-to-peer services.

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On a message board for the group People With An Absurdly Large Music Collection on last.fm, a user with the handle AndretheDark boasts of his hoard of 30,281 songs. It would take him 94 days to listen to each one. With a catalogue of more than 75,000, Pale_Court has him beat. She writes that her music pile takes up 368 gigabytes of space, and counting.

In the era of hard drives measured in terabytes, anything less than 10,000 songs is modest. Eric Garland, CEO of BigChampagne, says larger hard drives are pushing the number of illegal downloads worldwide past the 15-billion-song mark, and some are gorging at the trough with insatiable appetites.

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