Beginning late last month, the Recording Industry of Association of America (RIAA) began filing hundreds of subpoenas demanding that Internet service providers disclose the names of subscribers who are "offering for download over the Internet files containing copyrighted sound recordings."

The subpoenas consist of three documents, linked below.

• A subpoena letter informing ISPs that a subscriber is suspected of illegal file sharing.
  
  
• An attachment identifying the subscriber by IP address and his or her user name on a peer-to-peer file-sharing networking (such as KaZaA), a short list of "representative recordings" being shared and the date and time the files were being shared.
  
  
• A declaration outlining the legal authority for the subpoena and its purpose -- "to obtain the identity of the alleged copyright infringer."

Editor's note: Linked copies of the documents have been edited only to remove specific personal information of those involved in the subpoena process.