It started off at a decent pace a month ago with regular newsworthy statements and events making the headlines, but his week the extradition hearing of Kim Dotcom appeared to drop into a much lower gear.

The hearing, which will determine whether Kim Dotcom, Mathias Ortmann, Finn Batato and Bram van der Kolk are extradited to the United States, got underway in September. However, legal argument has persistently bogged the hearing down, with repeated claims by the defendants that the U.S. government is doing everything possible to prevent them from engaging in a fair fight.

Proceedings should have drawn to a close today but given how things have played out, that definitely isn’t going to happen.

After claiming that the U.S. seizure of the defendants’ funds made it impossible to hire expert witnesses in the United States, Dotcom’s lawyer Ron Mansfield asked the court to consider submissions as to why the case should be paused or even thrown out altogether.

While those have been underway for some days now, according to 3News lawyers for Dotcom and his former associates are now expected to make further submissions on additional points. Allowing for a response from the Crown, that process could take several more weeks to complete.

As to when the hearing will end, that appears to be known by no one, including lawyers for Dotcom. Earlier today, Ron Mansfield QC filed submissions asking Judge Nevin Dawson for an indication of how long the case is likely to last. Dawson is reportedly due at a jury trial elsewhere early November but the extradition hearing is likely to last beyond then.

After being present mostly every step of the way, this week Kim Dotcom has been largely absent from proceedings. Earlier in the week it was reported that the Megaupload founder has been suffering from back pain and as a result didn’t turn up in court.

Today Dotcom was absent from court again, an event which prompted questions from Judge Dawson. Dotcom’s lawyer Ron Mansfield said his client had been awake all night with back issues that are “causing him significant grief”.

However, lawyer Grant Illingworth, who represents Mathias Ortmann and Bram van der Kolk, was present today. He warned the court that the U.S. interpretation of extradition law threatened to make Judge Nevin’s considerations almost irrelevant.

“[The U.S. is seeking to] reduce your honor’s role to a mere rubber-stamping exercise. The US [approach] would render the extradition process largely meaningless,” he told the Judge.

The hearing will now run into a fifth week.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

The BBC’s online catchup service iPlayer has been a great success, both in the UK and abroad.

While the service is intended for UK viewers, who have to pay a mandatory TV license, it’s also commonly used overseas. Recent research suggests that 60 million people outside the UK access iPlayer through VPNs and other circumvention tools.

Traditionally the BBC hasn’t taken any measures to prevent unauthorized use, but this changed very recently. Over the past several days TF has received several reports from VPN users who can no longer access iPlayer from UK-based VPN servers.

“BBC iPlayer TV programmes are available to play in the UK only,” is the notice they receive instead.

This effectively stops foreigners and expats from accessing the service, but it also affects license paying UK citizens who use a VPN to browse the Internet securely. They will now have to disconnect their VPN if they want to access iPlayer.

The BBC informs TF that the VPN ban was implemented to keep iPlayer ‘pirates’ at bay. The company is doing its best to keep company and school VPNs open but advises regular users to connect their VPN service in advance if they want to access iPlayer.

“We regularly make updates to our technology to help prevent access to BBC iPlayer from outside the UK which breaks our terms of use,” a BBC spokesperson tells us.

“BBC iPlayer is freely available to users across the UK without a VPN, and we also seek to ensure users of private VPNs such as those used by schools and companies in the UK have access.”

The BBC admits that this may affect privacy conscious UK license payers as well, but says it doesn’t have the ability to discriminate between legal and unauthorized VPN users.

Several VPN users are not happy with the change and have voiced their complaints. The issue is also causing concern among VPN providers, which are looking for options to circumvent the blockade.

IPVanish informs us that it has applied a ‘fix’ which has solved the problem for now. Similarly, TorGuard offers customers a new UK IP-address upon request, which helps, at least temporarily.

“Let the game of whack-an-IP begin,” TorGuard’s Ben van der Pelt tells TF.

TorGuard is hugely disappointed with BBC’s broad blockade, and the fact that the broadcaster is willingly throwing many legitimate consumers under the bus.

“It amazes me that an increasing number of streaming services are willing to sacrifice hundreds of thousands of legitimate members over VPN usage. One can only assume this will hurt BBC iPlayer subscriber numbers as most people will simply look elsewhere,” Van der Pelt says.

In part the VPN blockade is being implemented to appease foreign broadcasters who buy programming from the BBC. If this content is easily available online foreign TV companies may lose part of their audience.

Earlier this year the BBC shut down its international version of iPlayer. This allowed people from oversees to access it for a small fee, but also caused concern among local rightsholders.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

It’s been a week of drama for brand new music discovery tool Aurous. Just four days after its launch on Saturday the RIAA sued the creator of the software and demanding $3m for their trouble.

Legal paperwork has been steadily filed ever since, but today came the most significant development yet. Following a request from plaintiffs Atlantic Records, Warner Bros, UMG, Sony and Capital Records for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction, a judge in a Florida district court has now issued his response.

In an order issued this morning, Judge Jose E. Martinez granted the labels’ motion for a temporary restraining order.

“Defendants and their officers, agents, servants, employees, attorneys, and all persons who in active concert or participation with each or any of them, or who are aiding and abetting their conduct, are hereby RESTRAINED and ENJOINED until further Order of this Court,” Judge Martinez writes.

As a result, Sampson and everyone associated with the Aurous project are now forbidden from “infringing, or causing, enabling, facilitating, encouraging, promoting and inducing or participating in the infringement of, any of Plaintiffs’ copyrights protected by the Copyright Act, whether now in existence or hereafter created.”

Those restrictions include, but are not limited to, any further making available of the Aurous software in any form. Sampson and his co-defendants are also restricted from transferring any domain names to third parties.

To protect Sampson in the event that he’s been wrongfully restrained by the court, the labels were ordered to post a bond of $5,000 as security for any costs or damages.

The request from the labels for a preliminary injunction was denied pending a maximum 30 minute hearing now scheduled for October 28, 2015.

“The parties shall confer prior to the hearing to determine how to split the allotted time. lf the parties are unable to agree on how to split the allotted time, the Court will decide how to split the allotted time,” the Judge warned.

It’s unclear whether Sampson has been served with a copy of the order already but in any event the Aurous software currently remains available via Aurous.me.

“Our legal team is actively working to secure our place in the music eco system,” Sampson said earlier today on Twitter. “Rest assured we want to be around a long time.”

At the moment the RIAA appears to have little interest in those efforts.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

Last year BMG Rights Management and Round Hill Music sued Cox Communications, arguing that the ISP fails to terminate accounts that are frequently used to pirate content.

The case revolves around data gathered by anti-piracy outfit Rightscorp, which previously sent millions of infringement notices to Cox paired with a settlement request.

Cox chose not to forward these notices in order to protect its customers from “harassment.” The copyright holders now claim that this refusal is in violation of the DMCA, and have asked the court for a summary judgment arguing that the ISP failed to terminate repeat infringers.

This week digital rights groups Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and Public Knowledge (PK) joined the case as interested parties. The groups teamed up to submit an amicus curiae brief outlining the possible negative consequences for consumers.

If Rightscorp and their clients have their way, ISPs would have to terminate subscriber accounts based on unverified evidence without any judicial oversight.

“It is simply unthinkable that a person could be deprived of a basic, vital service, practically essential to contemporary societal participation, based on nothing more than unadjudicated, unverified, unreliable allegations of civil wrongdoing,” EFF and PK write (pdf).

“But that is precisely what Plaintiffs seek in this case: disconnection of Internet service of ‘large numbers of subscribers’ based on automatically generated, robosigned claims of copyright infringement.”

According to the groups the rightsholders rely on a false interpretation of the DMCA’s safe harbor provision, which is detrimental to the public interest.

Not only is there no legal requirement for ISPs to terminate accounts based on allegations from copyright holders, the notices themselves are lacking as well, the groups say.

They point out out that when a connection is used for copyright infringements, this doesn’t necessarily mean that the person who pays the bills is responsible.

“The notices identify not the person who allegedly infringed, but rather the person paying for the Internet connection through which the infringement allegedly occurred. Besides being legally wrong, it is concerningly bad policy to attribute the acts of a third party to the Internet connection subscriber.”

In addition, EFF and PK note that the infringement notices are bundled with settlement requests, which they liken to abusive debt collection practices.

The groups urge the court to keep the interests of Internet users in mind. If these notices indeed result in account terminations, many innocent subscribers may lose Internet access without any form of trial.

“Denying Cox [safe harbor] protection […] would potentially open consumers up to extortive demands, declare them guilty as ‘repeat infringers’ without trial or jury, and deny them access to a necessary service, perhaps innocently, perhaps without cause,” EFF and PK write.

Cox also submitted several counterarguments earlier. Among other things, the ISP highlights that Rightscorp’s evidence is not enough to prove copyright infringement. Additionally, Cox is not convinced that the plaintiffs are the proper rightsholder for all the works they cite.

Before moving forward, the Court still has to rule on whether EFF and PK’s brief will be accepted. What’s clear, however, is the case will have a strong impact on how ISPs handle copyright infringement notices in the future.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

Around the world Internet service providers are being placed under pressure to do something about the millions of customers who download and share copyright infringing content.

Major ISPs in the United States, for example, are currently participating in the so-called “six strikes” scheme operated by the major studios and recording labels. Under this project users are given up to six warnings before a range of measures are applied to their accounts.

The measures – which copyright holders insist need to be punitive – are problematic for ISPs. Consumers keep their companies and punishing them too hard isn’t good for business, especially since disappointed customers can simply sign up to a new provider.

However, according to a report coming out of Italy, a local ISP is so concerned about threats coming out of Hollywood it is now threatening to discard customers who download and share copyright infringing material.

According to news outlet Repubblica, one of its readers who subscribes to an ISP in the north of the country received correspondence after being caught downloading movies and TV shows by various Hollywood studios.

“We have received numerous reports of misuse from multiple rights holders (Viacom, Paramount, MGM and other distribution companies) by direct means or from their legal offices,” the mail begins.

“They contain precise details about the material downloaded, download times, the IP address used, the ownership rights of the person making the report, contact details and valid certificate digital signatures plus confirmation of the authenticity of the sender and message content.”

Of course, these kinds of warning notices are nothing new and millions are sent every month. However, the ISP warns that if it does not take measures to stop the infringements, it could be considered “an accomplice to the offenses”. On that basis alone it must take action.

“We ask you to kindly give us feedback within 48 hours. In the case of failure [to respond] or incorrect feedback we’ll be forced to proceed with the cancellation of the service,” the correspondence concludes.

In a comment, copyright lawyer Guido Scorza said that while the ISP’s threats are unusual, they are permissible.

“The conduct of the provider is curious but not illegal. In the event that the ISP cancels the user agreement you could outline, however, an abuse of rights,” Scorza explains.

“Withdrawing unilaterally due to Internet problems is one thing, doing it because a third party claims that a customer is responsible for piracy is something else. Only a court can decide if a user is a pirate or not,” the lawyer says.

Repubblica hasn’t yet named the ISP in question but did speak to its CEO who told the publication that it receives hundreds of complaints from rightsholders and their lawfirms. The notice being sent out to subscribers underlines the company’s position.

“What is required now from us is to ensure that the connection is no longer used for illegal downloading activity and to protect the connection in the event that [the customer] is sure he has never downloaded anything,” it reads.

The question of ISP liability is a thorny one, but increasingly the world’s largest entertainment companies are moving towards an insistence that repeat infringers must be dealt with. Clearly some are taking those threats to their logical conclusion.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.