# articles

feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77343
title: Can You Trust Your VPN Provider…?
uri: Can-You-Trust-Your-VPN-Provider
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/axdzazYu-eA/
content:
<p><img src="media/f408e481.cameraspy.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/cameraspy.jpg" alt="cameraspy" width="170" height="164" class="alignright size-full wp-image-49625" />Roughly a year ago a new VPN provider entered the market with a rather generous offer. </p>
<p>The company offered free VPN connections for all, no strings attached. As a result thousands of people flocked to the new service and installed the toolbar-supported client in order to be protected from the prying eyes of their ISP and third-party monitoring outfits. </p>
<p>While a free VPN does indeed sound like a good offer, it was surprising to see how easily people were prepared to hook up to the servers of a totally unknown company. The VPN service in question, which shall remain unnamed, was operated by an unknown offshore company that appeared to come out of nowhere.</p>
<p>Did all these new users really trust this &#8220;unknown&#8221; company with all their traffic? Would they even know if the VPN service began storing all kinds of sensitive information sent through the VPN?</p>
<p>The above example is not limited to free or new VPN providers. Everyone who uses a VPN service puts an incredible amount of trust in the company they sign up with. While the highest encryption standards offer protection against direct monitoring, VPN providers can still see everything you do, if they want to. </p>
<p>So how do you know if you can trust your provider?</p>
<p>The honest answer is that you don&#8217;t. Earlier this year we published an overview of several <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/vpn-services-that-take-your-anonymity-seriously-2013-edition-130302/">VPN providers who keep no logs</a> at all. These sound like a great and safe option, but then again, you have to trust the answers they provided.</p>
<p>Perhaps it&#8217;s a disappointing conclusion, but despite all the state of the art encryptions these VPN companies offer, complete security remains a matter of trust. In reality this means that you have to carefully vet the VPN service you sign up with, asking yourself whether you really trust company X with all your data.</p>
<p>For an industry that&#8217;s worth hundreds of millions of dollars a year it is quite a surprise that these concerns haven&#8217;t been addressed more systematically. But perhaps this may change in the future. </p>
<p>TorrentFreak talked to several providers about the idea of setting up an independent foundation to do regular audits on a variety of security aspects. Nearly all providers welcomed such an initiative and would happily pay to be screened. </p>
<p>The screenings could range from an inspection of their privacy policies, through to an independent review of the technical backend, to a complete audit of the company structure. These audits are already <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payment_Card_Industry_Data_Security_Standard">commonplace</a> for credit card processors and would help to build trust in the VPN industry.</p>
<p>Of course these audits are no guarantee against companies changing their policies afterwards, but it&#8217;s a huge improvement over the complete absence of objective information there is now. For now, however, we are not aware of any concrete plans to start up an independent audit foundation. </p>
<p>To the VPN-using readers out there, feel free to let us know how you approach this hot topic. What are the steps you take to determine whether your VPN provider can be trusted? Feel free to let us know in the comments below.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/can-you-trust-your-vpn-provider-130929/">Can You Trust Your VPN Provider&#8230;?</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77326
title: Legal Movie Site Founder: Don’t Punish Pirates, Serve the Customer
uri: Legal-Movie-Site-Founder-Don-t-Punish-Pirates-Serve-the-Customer
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/b0_HsnEa0i4/
content:
<p><img src="media/31a0f46d.spain-flag.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/spain-flag.jpg" width="200" height="133" class="alignright" />Internet users in Spain are very happy to download music and movies without permission, a situation which has led the country to be admonished by entertainment companies and even the United States government.</p>
<p>Recently Spain has been trying to repair its image and last week the government approved <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/bittorrent-admins-face-six-years-in-jail-after-spanish-govt-approves-new-law-130921/">a new bill</a> which if passed will see operators of file-sharing sites jailed for up to six years.</p>
<p>While the U.S. will welcome any kind of clampdown, many believe that there is no legislative way out of the problem. Spaniards are used to the culture of copying and site admins will be able to sidestep the new law by moving their operations overseas.</p>
<p>Recently a new and interesting voice has entered the debate. <a href="https://www.filmin.es/director/carles-pastor">Carles Pastor</a>, a film and TV producer for many years, recently launched a brand new search engine designed to direct Internet users towards legal video content.</p>
<p>At first glance Beodee looks very much like the new wave of torrent and streaming sites, but this site is financially supported by Spain&#8217;s Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports. During its launch earlier this month, Pastor expressed confidence that by catering to the needs of the many thousands currently downloading movies for free, the site can help in the fight against piracy.</p>
<p><center><img src="media/9272abfc.beodee.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/beodee.png" alt="beodee" /></center></p>
<p>In an <a href="http://www.lasprovincias.es/agencias/20130928/mas-actualidad/cultura/escuchar-espectador-receta-productor-para_201309280954.html">interview</a> yesterday, Pastor expressed optimism that things can move forward but stressed a need to &#8220;totally reinvent&#8221; the movie business model to reintroduce those currently using unauthorized sources, adding that chasing down pirates and passing new legislation is not the answer.</p>
<p>&#8220;The whole sector cannot be dying at the same time as you see more movies [being produced] than ever,&#8221; he noted. &#8220;We should instead maximally conform to consumer needs.&#8221;</p>
<p>Pastor is hoping to achieve the above through his new platform. Beodee currently indexes around 6,700 feature films, TV shows and documentaries and offers a price comparison service for users looking to find content right now at the cheapest possible price.</p>
<p>The producer acknowledges that things won&#8217;t be easy. Spaniards aren&#8217;t exactly famous for willingly paying for content but he hopes that with a good service and fair price matters will improve. There are, however, further significant obstacles to overcome, such as restrictions on offering movies still in cinemas and pricing interference from &#8220;large North American producers&#8221; which limits competition.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, Pastor hopes that with increased marketing and competition, Internet download platforms and search engines like his will help bring an end to the monopoly. Beodee currently has expansion plans for France, Germany, Holland and several Latin American countries. To our knowledge no comparable service operates in the United States.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/legal-movie-site-founder-dont-punish-pirates-serve-the-customer-130929/">Legal Movie Site Founder: Don&#8217;t Punish Pirates, Serve the Customer</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77362
title: How Can Somebody Who Loves Culture Possibly Defend The Copyright Monopoly?
uri: How-Can-Somebody-Who-Loves-Culture-Possibly-Defend-The-Copyright-Monop
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/9hegY9sctMM/
content:
<p>One of the most perplexing accusations that are thrown at me and other copyright monopoly critics is that we &#8220;hate culture&#8221;. This is not just weird in a Westboro-Baptist-Church kind of way (&#8220;if you don&#8217;t subscribe to our dogma, you must hate our way of life, freedom, liberty, and fluffy kittens too&#8221;), but it is also completely at odds with reality.</p>
<p>It is precisely because I love culture, knowledge, and freedom of expression that I relentlessly criticize the copyright monopoly. It is the biggest inhibitor of creativity by a wide margin in today&#8217;s society, according to pretty much every single piece of research that wasn&#8217;t funded by the copyright industry itself.</p>
<p>Let&#8217;s focus on two areas today: availability of culture and compensation to artists.</p>
<p>In the first area, we can observe that there is more culture available than ever today, not because of the copyright monopoly, but despite it. People create like never before, despite the fact that it is often illegal to do so. Fortunately, most people-be-artists have a deep and healthy disrespect for this monopoly construct that would prevent them from making culture: 100 hours of video are <a href="http://www.youtube.com/yt/press/statistics.html">uploaded</a> to YouTube every minute. That&#8217;s 6,000 times more than realtime upload. That means people-be-artists are creating programming today for 6,000 worldwide TV channels that run 24-by-7, just for one video site. Most of it is illegal by today&#8217;s copyright monopolization.</p>
<p>But it gets worse. When you look at the culture available through the old system based on the copyright monopoly, you find that there&#8217;s a huge black hole in our culture heritage where it&#8217;s not interesting to publish culture that&#8217;s a few decades old. It&#8217;s only when the copyright monopoly expires that the culture becomes available again through new publications. There is a <strong>cultural black hole of the copyright monopoly</strong> that takes away upwards of 90% of our culture from the 1900s. This was clearest illustrated by Paul J. Heald who did research on the catalog of Amazon Books, and found that books that are 20 years old mostly aren&#8217;t available anymore, not until the copyright monopoly expires &#8211; 90% of our culture <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/07/the-hole-in-our-collective-memory-how-copyright-made-mid-century-books-vanish/278209/">vanishes</a> because of the copyright monopoly:</p>
<p><center><br />
<h5>Image credit: <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/07/the-hole-in-our-collective-memory-how-copyright-made-mid-century-books-vanish/278209/">Paul J. Heald / The Atlantic</a></h5>
<p><img src="media/01914e3f.book-editions.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/book-editions.jpg" alt="book-editions" width="575" height="280" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77364" /></center></p>
<p><strong>Today&#8217;s system based on the copyright monopoly creates a black hole of culture that ensures 90% of modern culture dies and never becomes available again during a human lifetime. How can somebody who claims to love culture possibly defend that? This is a system that somebody who despises every form of culture would typically create: a monopoly that first makes it illegal to create, and which then makes sure 90% of culture dies and becomes unavailable in a few years.</strong></p>
<p>The second objection to copyright monopoly reduction or abolition tends to be &#8220;how shall the artists get paid&#8221;. This objection is bordering on obscene coming from somebody who defends today&#8217;s order based on the copyright monopoly, where 99% of artists don&#8217;t get signed by a big publisher, and of those who do, less than 0.05% ever see any royalties. (These numbers <a href="http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120625/01011219455/some-facts-insights-into-whole-discussion-ethics-music-business-models.shtml">come</a> from the recording industry, but based on experience, it is safe to assume that book publishing see similar numbers.)</p>
<p><strong>Today&#8217;s system based on the copyright monopoly ensures that 99.995% of struggling artists are never paid a cent. How can somebody who claims to love culture possibly defend that system?</strong></p>
<p>What today&#8217;s system does, though, is to enrich the parasitic middlemen inherent in the system &#8211; the vested interests who fraudulently claim to &#8220;speak for artists&#8221;, but in reality, are robbing them blind (stories of how these parasitic middlemen publishers have been outright <a href="http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120305/04332117978/how-big-music-companies-are-stealing-hundreds-millions-royalties-artists.shtml">stealing</a> the rest of the money from those last 0.005% of artists are almost an everyday occurrence).</p>
<p><strong>So in summary, the copyright monopoly prohibits would-be-artists from making culture, it prevents art and culture from reaching the public, it isolates artists from their fans, it prevents artists from getting money for their art, and it ensures that 90% of modern culture dies a premature death. This construct can only be defended by people who claim to love culture if they are afflicted by a religious-grade denial of rational thought.</strong></p>
<p>It&#8217;s time to take the bull by the horns and challenge the copyright monopolists on this core issue, whether they actually care for culture at all. The copyright monopoly kills culture and artistry, and that&#8217;s a known fact backed up by hard data.</p>
<div style="border:2px solid #3F3F3F;width:521px;padding:15px;padding-top:8px;padding-bottom:4px;margin-top:20px;margin-bottom:10px;border-radius:10px">
<h3 style="margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:10px">
<div style="float:right;height:130px;width:39px;margin-left:20px;margin-right:10px"><img src="media/98818a80.Rick_Falkvinge_39x130.jpg" data-original-source="http://falkvinge.net/wp-content/themes/WpNewspaper/images/falkvinge/Rick_Falkvinge_39x130.jpg" style="border:none;-moz-box-shadow:none;-webkit-box-shadow:none" class="quimby_search_image"></div>
<p><span style="color:#3F3F3F;font-size:125%">About The</span> <span style="color:#FF3C78;font-size:125%">Author</span></p>
</h3>
<p style="font-family:PTSansRegular,Arial,Sans-Serif;font-weight:400;line-height:150%;margin-bottom:14px"><small>Rick Falkvinge is a regular columnist on TorrentFreak, sharing his thoughts every other week. He is the founder of the Swedish and first Pirate Party, a whisky aficionado, and a low-altitude motorcycle pilot. His blog at <a href="http://falkvinge.net">falkvinge.net</a> focuses on information policy.</small></p>
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<p><small>Book Falkvinge <a href="http://falkvinge.net/keynotes/">as speaker</a>?</small></p>
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<p><a href="http://twitter.com/Falkvinge" class="twitter-follow-button">Follow @Falkvinge</a></p>
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<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/how-can-somebody-who-loves-culture-possibly-defend-the-copyright-monopoly-130929/">How Can Somebody Who Loves Culture Possibly Defend The Copyright Monopoly?</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77381
title: Breaking Bad Finale Clocks 500,000 Pirated Downloads
uri: Breaking-Bad-Finale-Clocks-500-000-Pirated-Downloads
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/HWeFlb8pKCU/
content:
<p><a href="media/5ae3f6eb.bb.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/bb.jpg"><img src="media/5ae3f6eb.bb.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/bb.jpg" alt="bb" width="250" height="185" class="alignright size-full wp-image-75363" /></a>One of the main motivations for people to download and stream TV-shows from unauthorized sources is availability.</p>
<p>If fans can’t get a show through legal channels they often turn to pirated alternatives.</p>
<p>However, the series finale of Breaking Bad shows that there are more factors at play. Despite the availability of legal options, in many countries there are those who still prefer to download a copy from unauthorized sources.</p>
<p>Data gathered by TorrentFreak shows that 12 hours after the first copy of the episode appeared online, more than half a million people has grabbed a copy through one of many torrent sites. Never before have so many people downloaded a Breaking Bad episode, making it a strong contender for a top spot in our most-pirated TV-shows of the year chart.</p>
<p>So where are all these pirates coming from, and why aren&#8217;t they going for the legal options?</p>
<p>Based on a sample of more than 10,000 people who shared the site via a BitTorrent client, we see that Australia is once again in the lead with 18 percent of the total. This means that a large group of Aussies prefer to torrent the episode instead of watching it on the pay TV network Foxtel.</p>
<p>In the U.S. and the U.K the legal availability on Netflix couldn&#8217;t prevent people from pirating the final Breaking Bad episode either. With 14.5 and 9.3 percent these countries are second and third respectively. India and Canada complete the top five with 5.7 and 5.1 percent of the total. </p>
<p>Looking at the list of countries below it&#8217;s clear that piracy is still rampant, even in countries where people do have the option to watch the show legally. </p>
<p>One of the explanations for this defiant behavior is that these downloaders simply prefer to torrent the show out of habit. As <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/subscribers-pirate-game-of-thrones-even-though-they-already-paid-for-it-130925/">reported earlier</a>, even among those who have a Netflix subscription, many prefer to grab a copy via torrent sites as they find it more convenient. </p>
<p>In other cases people may find a pay TV subscription too expensive, or they simply prefer to watch the show at their own leisure instead of following rigid TV-schedules.</p>
<table class="css hover" summary="Breaking Bad Downloads">
<caption>sample N=13,945</caption>
<thead>
<tr>
<th width="10%"><strong>#</strong></th>
<th width="22%"><strong>Country</strong></th>
<th width="22%"><strong>%</strong></th>
<th width="22%"><strong>City</strong></th>
<th width="22%"><strong>%</strong></th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tfoot>
<tr>
<td colspan="5">torrentfreak.com</td>
</tr>
</tfoot>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td><strong>1</strong></td>
<td>Australia</td>
<td>18.0%</td>
<td>Melbourne</td>
<td>5.4%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>2</strong></td>
<td>United States</td>
<td>14.5%</td>
<td>London</td>
<td>3.3%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>3</strong></td>
<td>United Kingdom</td>
<td>9.3%</td>
<td>Sydney</td>
<td>3.0%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>4</strong></td>
<td>Canada</td>
<td>5.7%</td>
<td>Brisbane</td>
<td>2.0%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>5</strong></td>
<td>India</td>
<td>5.1%</td>
<td>Athens</td>
<td>1.5%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>6</strong></td>
<td>Netherlands</td>
<td>2.4%</td>
<td>Perth</td>
<td>1.4%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>7</strong></td>
<td>Poland</td>
<td>2.4%</td>
<td>Madrid</td>
<td>1.2%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>8</strong></td>
<td>Philippines</td>
<td>2.3%</td>
<td>Warsaw</td>
<td>1.2%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>9</strong></td>
<td>France</td>
<td>2.2%</td>
<td>Dublin</td>
<td>1.2%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>10</strong></td>
<td>South Africa</td>
<td>2.1%</td>
<td>Adelaide</td>
<td>1.1%</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>Going back to the download figures, we can report that at the peak more than 85,000 people from all over the world were sharing a single copy of the Breaking bad finale via a public BitTorrent tracker. If we count the four most-shared copies out there this number totaled more than 190,000. </p>
<p>While these are record numbers for Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones still takes the crown for the largest BitTorrent swarm ever recorded with more than <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/games-of-thrones-season-finale-sets-new-piracy-record-130610/">170,000 people</a> sharing a single copy. </p>
<p>Interestingly, TV-insiders are not really that outraged by the massive copying of their work. Instead, recent comments from people connected to the industry suggest that piracy may actually help them.</p>
<p>Game of Thrones director <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/piracy-doesnt-hurt-game-of-thrones-director-says-130227/">David Petrarca</a> previously said he believes that the buzz created by pirates eventually leads to more paying subscribers, and last week Time Warner CEO Jess Bewkes said <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/game-of-thrones-piracy-better-than-an-emmy-time-warner-ceo-says-130808/">that it&#8217;s better than winning an Emmy</a>. </p>
<p>Breaking Bad already won an Emmy earlier this month, but can they raise the bar a little higher? We&#8217;ll know at the end of the year. </p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/breaking-bad-finale-clocks-500000-pirated-downloads-130930/">Breaking Bad Finale Clocks 500,000 Pirated Downloads</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77375
title: Proxy.sh VPN Provider Sniffed Server Traffic to Catch Hacker
uri: Proxy-sh-VPN-Provider-Sniffed-Server-Traffic-to-Catch-Hacker
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/ZZrNJjAv6j0/
content:
<p><a href="media/3f37a159.proxyshlogo.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/proxyshlogo.jpg"><img src="media/3f37a159.proxyshlogo.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/proxyshlogo.jpg" alt="proxyshlogo" width="180" height="95" class="alignright size-full wp-image-77387" /></a>As privacy escalates into one of the Internet&#8217;s hottest topics, yesterday TorrentFreak published <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/can-you-trust-your-vpn-provider-130929/">an article</a> which asked a simple question &#8211; can you trust your VPN provider?</p>
<p>Our general conclusion was that in the absence of third-party auditing, at the moment it is probably a case of a user assessing a VPN provider&#8217;s attitudes, relying on feedback from existing customers, and then making an educated decision on perceived risks versus potential benefits.</p>
<p>It appears that the article&#8217;s timing was coincidentally spot on. On Saturday VPN provider Proxy.sh, a company that has built up a decent reputation with good pricing, quality of service and a no-logging policy, made a surprise announcement. It concerned a server the company operates out of Illinois in the United States which had been temporarily shut down and reopened.</p>
<p>&#8220;We are unfortunate [sic] to announce that there have been abuse complaints about hacking activities on our U.S. Illinois 1 node. We have been saddened to learn that these actions were harmful to individuals (human beings). As a result, we will open this node again and monitor it with Wireshark for a period of 7 days,&#8221; Proxy.sh announced.</p>
<p>The paragraph requires very little explanation except to underline the fact that a VPN provider has just confessed to spying on customer traffic. Shock of that aside, there was no mention of any legal process, court order, police action or other similar outside influence compelling Proxy.sh to do so.</p>
<p>Bizarrely the VPN provider then went on to give the alleged hacker a public warning.</p>
<p>&#8220;If you are the hacker, please stop your activities and leave our network. You are not welcome here. Our heaven is reserved to those who are not harmful to other human beings. If you do not leave, we will find you and report your activities to NGO and press officers,&#8221; Proxy.sh continued.</p>
<p>Then, in an attempt to let other customers know that they shouldn&#8217;t worry, Proxy.sh gave the following assurances.</p>
<p>&#8220;For all others, the heaven is still safe for you, dear ones. We will completely remove Wireshark after 7 days and restart the node so that everything is erased (RAM-switch). All other nodes are left unaffected by these actions,&#8221; they conclude.</p>
<p><center><img src="media/08edd851.proxysh.logging.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/proxysh.logging.png" alt="proxysh.logging" width="531" height="342" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77393" /></center></p>
<p>Providing Proxy.sh&#8217;s announcements were roughly around the times that the sniffing software was deployed, the company was capturing packets on its Illinois server between 19:46 on Saturday evening through to Sunday morning at 06:35. At this time the VPN provider posted an update to say that Wireshark had been removed.</p>
<p>A source told TorrentFreak that the monitoring was triggered after Proxy.sh received a complaint from someone who claimed they were being harassed by a Proxy.sh user. The VPN provider then allegedly took it upon themselves to try and sort out the problem. It&#8217;s not clear what happened next but apparently the person responsible for the abuse was either found or stepped forward, prompting an apology and an end to the matter.</p>
<p>While some may argue that Proxy.sh was only trying to act responsibly by ending the abuse and acted properly by giving advance notice to its customers that a server would be monitored, the episode is likely to be damaging to the company.</p>
<p>First of all, the announcement was made <a href="https://proxy.sh/panel/serverstatus.php?view=resolved">on the company&#8217;s website</a>, hidden away from easy viewing. Users of the VPN were very unlikely to view the message as the service is accessed through software on their computers. Second, the correct avenue for dealing with these issues is through law enforcement or the courts and the realization that a provider spied on its users (and admitted it) simply because it felt like doing so is quite remarkable.</p>
<p>TorrentFreak approached Proxy.sh for an official statement but we have yet to receive a response.</p>
<p><strong>Update:</strong> Statement from Proxy.sh</p>
<p><em>&#8220;We are very opened about our activities and we do not support or promote activities that may be harmful to human beings. We have been contacted by a family about someone using our network and harassing their daughters. As per stated in our ethics policy, we condemn activities that are harmful to human beings.</p>
<p>We have decided to install a monitor on our Illinois 1 node so as to locate the hacker. Few hours after we announced this move to our public, the hacker came to us to apologise. We then completely removed the Wireshark installation.</p>
<p>This situation shows that we are actually really not logging anything and that we will always tell our members when we have to log one of our nodes or our entire network, either for maintenance and small internal affairs such as this.</p>
<p>The situation also shows that the only solution we have to help law enforcement agencies find problematic use across our network, is to clearly install a logging capacity on it. As a result, we are able to either comply or shut down the servers we have in a particular location (it happened to us in Czech Republic few months ago).</p>
<p>We will only intervene into our traffic when we believe there have been activities infringing our ethical terms &#8211; that is when activities harmful to human beings (not corporations or entities) are taking place on our network. In such case, we do not privilege law enforcement agencies but rather communication, transparency and assistance from NGOs.&#8221;</em></p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/proxy-sh-vpn-provider-monitored-traffic-to-catch-hacker-130930/">Proxy.sh VPN Provider Sniffed Server Traffic to Catch Hacker</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77372
title: Top 10 Most Pirated Movies of The Week
uri: 2013-09-30-Top-10-Most-Pirated-Movies-of-The-Week
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/3RZfg7C0O0Y/
content:
<p><a href="media/47b4a00e.after-earth.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/after-earth.jpg"><img src="media/47b4a00e.after-earth.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/after-earth.jpg" alt="after earth" width="300" height="196" class="alignright size-full wp-image-77018" /></a>This week we have four newcomers in our chart. </p>
<p>After Earth is the most downloaded movie for the second week in a row. </p>
<p>The data for our weekly download chart is collected by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only. All the movies in the list are BD/DVDrips unless stated otherwise.</p>
<p><a href="http://TorrentFreak.com/category/dvdrip/feed/"><strong>RSS feed</strong></a> for the weekly movie download chart.</p>
<table class="css hover" summary="Most downloaded movies on BitTorrent">
<caption>Week ending September 22, 2013</caption>
<thead>
<tr>
<th width="12%"><strong>Ranking</strong></th>
<th width="15%"><strong>(<a href="https://torrentfreak.com/top-10-most-pirated-movies-of-the-week-130916/">last week</a>)</strong></th>
<th><strong>Movie</strong></th>
<th width="18%"><strong>IMDb Rating / Trailer</strong></th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tfoot>
<tr>
<td colspan="4">torrentfreak.com</td>
</tr>
</tfoot>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td><strong>1</strong></td>
<td>(1)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/after_earth/">After Earth</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1815862/">4.9</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUcNyzu4IdM">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>2</strong></td>
<td>(&#8230;)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/bounty_killer_2013/">Bounty Killer</a> (Webrip)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2369396/">4.7</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ciGAjiPlvYk">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>3</strong></td>
<td>(&#8230;)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/curse_of_chucky/">Curse of Chucky</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2230358/">5.9</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lw8rBxYC1Dw">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>4</strong></td>
<td>(&#8230;)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/white_house_down/">White house Down</a> (Webrip)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2334879/">6.4</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wonLfgO5p8">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>5</strong></td>
<td>(2)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/this_is_the_end/">This Is The End</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1245492/">7.6</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yma-g4gTwlE">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>6</strong></td>
<td>(5)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_hangover_part_iii/">The Hangover Part III</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1951261/">6.0</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KLAkxSjs8ZY">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>7</strong></td>
<td>(3)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/world-war-z/">World War Z</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0816711/">7.2</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HcwTxRuq-uk">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>8</strong></td>
<td>(6)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/were_the_millers/">We&#8217;re The Millers</a> (Webrip)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1723121/">7.2</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Vsy5KzsieQ">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>9</strong></td>
<td>(4)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/jobs/">Jobs</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2357129/">5.5</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FrvkCS0ZGPU">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>10</strong></td>
<td>(&#8230;)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/dead_in_tombstone_2013/">Dead In A Tombstone</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2268419/">4.5</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKRUKJ40SeI">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/top-10-most-pirated-movies-of-the-week-130930/">Top 10 Most Pirated Movies of The Week</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77416
title: BitTorrent Launches ‘NSA-proof’ Serverless Messenger App
uri: BitTorrent-Launches-NSA-proof-Serverless-Messenger-App
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/Z_hIBPcLi5Q/
content:
<p><a href="media/4444a58e.bittorrent-chat.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/bittorrent-chat.png"><img src="media/4444a58e.bittorrent-chat.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/bittorrent-chat.png" alt="bittorrent-chat" width="207" height="90" class="alignright size-full wp-image-77418" /></a>Over the past months the revelations of Edward Snowden have dominated the news.</p>
<p>Internet privacy suddenly became a mainstream topic and all the negative news has increased the demand for encrypted and secure communications. </p>
<p>Responding to this, several developers quickly jumped in with new tools to prevent the public from having their conversations spied on or their data breached. Pirate Bay founder Peter Sunde announced a new <a href="https://heml.is/">encrypted messaging service</a> for example, and Kim Dotcom&#8217;s Mega has <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/dotcoms-mega-debuts-spy-proof-messaging-this-summer-email-follows-130711/">similar plans</a>. </p>
<p>Today BitTorrent Inc. announced a new project that will also increase people&#8217;s security. The San Francisco-based company just launched <a href="http://labs.bittorrent.com/experiments/bittorrent-chat.html">BitTorrent Chat</a>, a secure messenger app that allows people to communicate without storing the conversations on any central servers. </p>
<p>The new tool is based on BitTorrent technology and is offered free of charge to help people regain complete control over their own data. </p>
<p>&#8220;This year alone, more than 6 million people have been impacted by data breaches. The right to own your own conversations online: it’s not a given. It should be,&#8221; the company says. </p>
<p>&#8220;So over at Labs, we’re working on something that could solve for conversation security. BitTorrent Chat applies distributed technology to the idea of IM. Our goal is to ensure that your messages stay yours: private, secure, and free.&#8221;</p>
<p><center><a href="media/23492010.bt-chat1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/bt-chat1.jpg"><img src="media/23492010.bt-chat1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/bt-chat1.jpg" alt="bt-chat" width="590" height="310" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77423" /></a></center></p>
<p>While BitTorrent Chat doesn&#8217;t store any conversations on a third-party server, it does need a central location to get the conversation going. To speak in BitTorrent terms, people have to connect to a tracker to know where the message should be sent. </p>
<p>TorrentFreak asked for further details on what central servers are involved in bootstrapping the conversations and what encryption the new tool uses,  but the company could not immediately provide further details on these issues.</p>
<p>The new messenger app is not the only &#8216;breach safe&#8217; tool the company is currently working on. Earlier this year BitTorrent launched its <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/bittorrent-starts-cloud-supported-file-sharing-service-without-limits-130215/">Sync application</a> which provides a secure alternative to centralized cloud backup solutions such as Dropbox and Google drive. </p>
<p>Those who want to give BitTorrent&#8217;s Chat application a try can head over to BitTorrent Labs to <a href="http://labs.bittorrent.com/experiments/bittorrent-chat.html">sign up for the private Alpha</a>.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/bittorrent-launches-nsa-proof-messenger-app-130930/">BitTorrent Launches &#8216;NSA-proof&#8217; Serverless Messenger App</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77443
title: One in Four Australians Are ‘Cheap’ Movie Pirates
uri: One-in-Four-Australians-Are-Cheap-Movie-Pirates
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/T0U4qr-cPDE/
content:
<p><img src="media/12bdbb91.running.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/running.jpg" alt="running" width="200" height="133" class="alignright size-full wp-image-52725" />When it comes to pirating movies and TV-shows Australia is consistently listed as one of the top countries, despite its relatively small population of 22 million people. </p>
<p>Considering the above, it doesn&#8217;t come as a big surprise that<a href="http://www.ipawareness.com.au/research/2013"> a new study</a> found that one in four Australians pirates movies and TV-shows. </p>
<p>The research in question was commissioned the local Intellectual Property Awareness Foundation (IPAF), a movie industry outfit which also lists the MPA(A) and the Hollywood-funded AFACT on its board.</p>
<p>IPAF uses the results to conclude that &#8220;pirating is not the social norm.&#8221; What they mean to say is that not 100% of the population pirates, but then again, not everyone is interested in movies or TV-shows to begin with. </p>
<p>Teens between the ages of 16 and 17 pirate the most (31%) and nearly twice as much as those between 12-13 years old (17%). A quarter of all adults also admit to pirating a movie or TV-show at least once per month, and 11% downloads or streams illegal content at least once a week. </p>
<p>In addition to showing how prevalent piracy is in Australia, the research also asked respondents about the advertisements they see on pirate sites. The results reveal that most pirates recall gambling (51%) and sex related (44%) ads. </p>
<p><center><img src="media/e3238831.pirate-ads.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/pirate-ads.png" alt="pirate-ads" width="590" height="250" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77459" /></center></p>
<p>This leads IPAF to conclude that pirate sites &#8220;provide a store front for the gambling and sex industries.&#8221; Teens are exposed to these ads as well and the group warns parents of the hazardous effects these banners can have on their children.   </p>
<p>&#8220;Parents need to be aware that children who access illegal sites to download unauthorized movies and TV shows may be exposed to graphic pornographic advertisements, unregulated gambling sites, scams and viruses,&#8221; the report reads.</p>
<p>The report further finds that more than half of all Australians (55%) supports blocking access to pirate websites. Even among persistent pirates, 44% are in favor of website blocking, a result that will obviously be used in ongoing lobbying efforts to block pirate sites Down Under.</p>
<p>Finally, the report suggests that the majority of all pirates are immoral cheapskates. When given the choice between a legal alternative and piracy, pirates often choose the latter.</p>
<p>&#8220;The primary motivator for Australians of all ages pirating movies and TV shows is that it is free. The argument for free content overshadows their moral and ethical concerns,&#8221; the report reads.</p>
<p>Interestingly, this is a biased interpretation of what the data shows. </p>
<p><center><a href="media/33d8522b.aussiedownload.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/aussiedownload.png"><img src="media/33d8522b.aussiedownload.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/aussiedownload.png" alt="aussiedownload" width="590" height="351" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77453" /></a></center></p>
<p>As can be seen above, respondents were asked what they would do if their favorite TV-show was available for $2.99. More than half (54%) of the persistent pirates answered that they would still pirate it while 28% said they would pay. </p>
<p>It&#8217;s clear that many people would indeed continue to pirate, but the research didn&#8217;t actually ask why. </p>
<p>Perhaps the results would have been different if the TV-show was covered by an $8 monthly subscription or if it was more competitively priced? Adding to that, money is not the only factor &#8211; it was previously revealed that many people continue to pirate even <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/arrested-development-pirates-skip-netflix-out-of-habit-130529/">after they pay</a> for a Netflix subscription.</p>
<p>The questioning is misleading in this case, to say the least, and the other responses clearly illustrate this. Why else would 22% of the lapsed downloaders and 5% of the non-downloaders suddenly start pirating when a legal option becomes available?</p>
<p>Nevertheless, spearheaded by Hollywood, Australia can prepare itself for yet another push for stricter legislation to deal with these freeloading pirates.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/one-in-four-australians-are-cheap-movie-pirates-131001/">One in Four Australians Are &#8216;Cheap&#8217; Movie Pirates</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77445
title: Russia’s Facebook Prepares YouTube-Style Anti-Piracy Filter
uri: Russia-s-Facebook-Prepares-YouTube-Style-Anti-Piracy-Filter
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/1X8d7zdi8p4/
content:
<p><img src="media/2dca634d.vk.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/vk.jpg" width="180" height="180" class="alignright" />The United States Trade Representative, the MPAA and in particular the RIAA/IFPI have very few positive things to say about vKontakte.</p>
<p>The social networking giant allows its 40 million daily users to upload their music collections meaning that the site has become one of the world&#8217;s largest sources of unauthorized music to be found anywhere on the planet.</p>
<p>Making matters worse for the labels is that content stored on vKontakte has often been made available for download through numerous other apps and websites utilizing the company&#8217;s API.</p>
<p>As a result vKontakte has been branded a &#8220;notorious market&#8221; by the USTR and put under pressure by the likes of the IFPI, who say that the huge Internet business has built itself up on infringing content. Following years of inaction, there are now signs that vKontakte is beginning to listen.</p>
<p>In June 2013 before the implementation of Russia&#8217;s new anti-piracy law, reports surfaced that music was becoming <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/users-encrypt-music-uploads-as-copyright-holders-blitz-russias-facebook-130618/">harder to find</a> on vKontakte with results for some leading artists drawing blanks.</p>
<p>The company put this down to copyright holders sending many more takedown notices than ever before. Indeed, it soon became apparent that some companies had previously been given moderator access to remove their content from vKontakte directly. Nevertheless, rumors began to circulate that vKontakte might have deployed some other kind of anti-piracy system.</p>
<p>The company has since admitted that it has developed a technology designed to stop users from uploading content that has previously been marked as infringing.</p>
<p>&#8220;For each track which receives a copyright holder complaint we create an acoustic impression,&#8221; said vKontake spokesperson Lobushkin George. &#8220;Downloading the exact same copy will be difficult.&#8221;</p>
<p>The system is not without its flaws. One local artist, Noize MC, complained that he would like to make his music available on the social network but since someone already marked someone else&#8217;s upload as infringing, the system now bans him from doing so. Another artist, DJ Dmitry Diamonds, said that after sending in a complaint of someone infringing his copyrights his own uploaded music disappeared from his official page.</p>
<p>But despite the teething problems, it appears that vKontakte intends to expand the system. </p>
<p>According to content owners who spoke with <a href="http://izvestia.ru">Izvestia</a>, vKontakte will now introduce fingerprinting in order to tackle infringing video uploads at source. Representatives from the social networking site declined to comment but sources at several media companies suggest that the the anti-piracy system will be similar to YouTube&#8217;s Content ID.</p>
<p>At least three media companies have struck deals with vKontakte to publish their content legally on the networking site alongside the ability to remove infringing content with fingerprinting.</p>
<p>&#8220;There is currently only one type of interaction: illegal content is removed in response to a request from us,&#8221; said deputy general director of CTC Media Sergei Petrov. &#8220;We look forward to the new tool, as it can greatly facilitate the fight against pirates.&#8221; </p>
<p>According to Amedia president Alexander Akopova the fingerprinting technology was vKontakte&#8217;s idea. It will remove the need to constantly search the site for illicit content and will also eliminate problems caused by users renaming files.</p>
<p>&#8220;The management of VKontakte made the right move by creating such a system,&#8221; says Akopov. &#8220;I am glad that it was their own initiative.&#8221;</p>
<p>Wide agreements on a filtering and takedown system with copyright holders will help vKontakte avoid many of the perils of the new anti-piracy law introduced August 1. Currently the social networking site can be bombarded with complaints which have the potential to take the site offline if not properly handled, but formal agreements might be enough to keep rightholders happy.</p>
<p>It&#8217;s even possible that these moves will be enough to appease the USTR, IFPI and MPAA. Finding out should be just a few months away.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/russias-facebook-prepares-youtube-style-anti-piracy-filter-131001/">Russia&#8217;s Facebook Prepares YouTube-Style Anti-Piracy Filter</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77487
title: StopFileLockers Anti-Piracy Outfit Announces Imminent Shutdown
uri: StopFileLockers-Anti-Piracy-Outfit-Announces-Imminent-Shutdown
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/XuCeO7_RCAU/
content:
<p><img src="media/a80e1f84.updown.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/updown.jpg" width="180" height="120" class="alignright" />Speaking with TorrentFreak in July 2012, Australian adult industry businessman Robert King <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/one-man-army-on-a-mission-to-destroy-the-cyberlocker-market-120705/">outlined</a> a mission he&#8217;d initiated a few weeks earlier.</p>
<p>“What I hope to achieve is very simple. I want to tear apart the illegal file locker industry by removing its supply of funds and then ultimately removing its supply of network connectivity,” King explained.</p>
<p>Over the months that followed King kept up the pressure. With a team of people (he has never revealed its exact size or membership), King sought out infringing files on hosting sites and used their existence to build up a picture that sites were acting illegally.</p>
<p>Then, using contacts he had built in the payment processing sector, AdultKing (as King is known online) began to hit file-hosting sites in the pocket by reporting them to the likes of PayPal, Visa, Mastercard and a variety of intermediate processors. The aim: to cut sites off from their cash.</p>
<p>For some sites the results were extremely problematic. With no options to process payments, file-hosting sites were not only unable to accept money for user subscriptions, but also had problems sending money out, meaning that server bills went unpaid. Worse still, some who had problems with PayPal due to King&#8217;s work found their funds frozen for six months, a situation that proved terminal for some fringe players.</p>
<p>Some 90 days into the StopFileLockers campaign, King said he had played a part in <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/90-days-of-killing-cyberlockers-50-dead-more-than-500-injured-121006/">194 sites</a> having their payments interrupted and the total shutdown of 54 others.</p>
<p>There can be little doubt that among King&#8217;s targets were sites designed from the ground up to profit from infringing content and for this he gained both moral and financial support from his industry peers. However, in January 2013 <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/dotcoms-mega-anti-piracy-group-moves-to-cut-off-finances-130121/">King began attacking</a> the payment processing abilities of Kim Dotcom&#8217;s brand new Mega.co.nz, the most-scrutinized file-hosting startup in tech history.</p>
<p>There was no way that Mega would do anything to break the law, yet King was determined to harass the company. He failed, Mega continued to grow, and the moral high-ground of the StopFileLockers campaign had been damaged by going after a law-abiding company going about its 100% legitimate business.</p>
<p>In the months that followed King continued his work, although with less fanfare than in the early days. However, a lowered profile did nothing to improve his standing in file-sharing circles. King is almost certainly the most-hated man in the file-hosting business today, which some will attribute to his successes over the past 15 months.</p>
<p><a href="media/feee0104.paypaldenied.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/paypaldenied.jpg"><img src="media/c2b9bca2.paypaldenied-150x115.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/paypaldenied-150x115.jpg" alt="paypaldenied" width="150" height="115" class="alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-53701" /></a>King himself believes that his contribution has been significant, with the suggestion that the StopFileLockers campaign has played a part in the shutdown of hundreds of piracy-related sites and the closure of thousands of PayPal, Payza, Moneybookers and other payment processing options. No official stats or reports are available but it&#8217;s safe to say that the project has been a considerable nuisance to the file-hosting market.</p>
<p>However, it&#8217;s now clear that King&#8217;s work is on the brink. Despite initial enthusiasm and support (including hard cash from industry giant Manwin), interest in the project has waned considerably. In an update to adult industry platform GFY, King announced today that StopFileLockers has run out of money and resources and will shut down this week.</p>
<p>&#8220;Unfortunately at the end of September we finally ran out of funds and the resources just don&#8217;t exist to keep this effort going any longer. In fact, we now face a deficit in the vicinity of $15,000,&#8221; King said.</p>
<p>&#8220;Unless a source of funding is found, all operational aspects of the Stop File Lockers project and Copy Control will cease at midnight on Friday 4th October (AEST). I would like to thank every person, company and organization that has provided support (financial and otherwise) to the project.&#8221;</p>
<p>So what now for AdultKing? More anti-piracy work, or an unlikely change of sides perhaps?</p>
<p>&#8220;Overnight one of the largest remaining file lockers offered me $XXX,XXX a year to come on board as a consultant and help them become compliant and get their PayPal account back,&#8221; King revealed in September.</p>
<p>&#8220;I told them to get fucked.&#8221;</p>
<p>In the absence of any figures to show success or failure it is very difficult to assess the real-world achievements of the campaign, at least as far as it may or may not have boosted sales of official content. However, King&#8217;s legacy may lie in a more significant area &#8211; adding momentum to the shifting of payment processor attitudes towards the file-sharing space.</p>
<p>&#8220;We have recast the way in which file lockers are viewed by many organizations,&#8221; King concludes.</p>
<p>Few will argue with that.</p>
<p><strong>Update:</strong></p>
<p>&#8220;More than one file locker operator has offered either incentive or threat to help them, or desist from working to mitigate their business model. There is no price at which a piracy outfit can obtain my services,&#8221; King informs TorrentFreak.</p>
<p>&#8220;At the conclusion of the Stop File Lockers project I shall be concentrating my efforts on my mainstream business interests which are not associated with either anti-piracy or the adult industry.&#8221;</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/stopfilelockers-anti-piracy-outfit-announces-imminent-shutdown-131002/">StopFileLockers Anti-Piracy Outfit Announces Imminent Shutdown</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77518
title: Comcast Terminates Accounts of Persistent Pirates
uri: Comcast-Terminates-Accounts-of-Persistent-Pirates
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/hqnB2Dg93zw/
content:
<p><a href="media/759cf2e9.comcast.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/comcast.jpg"><img src="media/759cf2e9.comcast.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/comcast.jpg" alt="comcast" width="170" height="60" class="alignright size-full wp-image-53356" /></a>As one of the largest Internet providers in the United States, <a href="http://www.comcast.com/">Comcast</a> is alerted to the existence of pirating customers on a daily basis.</p>
<p>When the provider receives <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/riaa-mpaa-copyright-warnings-facts-and-fiction-090328/">DMCA notices</a> it is required to forward them to the customers in question, and if the copyright holder is part of the <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/six-strikes-anti-piracy-scheme-starts-130225/">six-strikes</a> Copyright Alert System the notice results in an official &#8216;strike&#8217;.</p>
<p>The above is nothing new, but the situation gets more complex when it comes to the effects these DMCA notices have on the long term. Although those participating in the six-strikes system have made it very clear that no accounts will be terminated, outside the program it is certainly an option. </p>
<p>TorrentFreak has received information suggesting that Comcast is actively terminating the accounts of repeat infringers under certain circumstances, without a court order. When we asked the ISP about their policy with regard to repeat copyright infringers, this was confirmed.</p>
<p>&#8220;Termination is a requirement of the DMCA and applies to all ISPs, not just Comcast, as a consequence of repeated and egregious copyright infringement,&#8221; a Comcast spokesperson told TorrentFreak.</p>
<p>Comcast is indeed correct in stating that Internet providers have to act against repeat infringers. The DMCA <a href="http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/512">requires</a> ISPs to <em>&#8220;&#8230; adopt and reasonably implement a policy that provides for the termination in appropriate circumstances of subscribers and account holders of the service provider’s system or network who are repeat infringers.&#8221;</em></p>
<p>However, <a href="http://www.mediainstitute.org/IPI/2011/071211.php">legal experts</a> and Internet providers interpret the term &#8220;repeat infringer&#8221; differently. For example, <a href="http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-10208747-93.html">AT&#038;T previously said</a> that it would never terminate accounts of customers without a court order, arguing that only a court can decide what constitutes a repeat infringement. </p>
<p>Comcast, however, informs TorrentFreak that a court order is certainly not required under the DMCA and that the company&#8217;s interpretation of the law is appropriate. </p>
<p>Comcast is not the only company to take this stance. Verizon&#8217;s <a href="http://www.verizon.net/policies/vzcom/tos_popup.asp">terms of service</a> also suggest that account termination is an option, without due process. Similar policies are also applied by other service providers, such as YouTube for example. Needless to say, terminating an Internet connection will have more impact than shutting down a YouTube account. </p>
<p>While the DMCA has been in place for more than a decade, the launch of the Copyright Alert System puts the repeat infringer issue in a new light. Previously, ISPs were not obliged to keep logs of copyright infringement notices for a set period of time, but under the new system they are. </p>
<p>In addition, as part of the alert system ISPs are required to track the number of notices &#8220;repeat infringers&#8221; receive. This means that providers are keeping a database of the most persistent pirates, which outside of the CAS can lead to terminations in Comcast&#8217;s case. </p>
<p>Comcast assured TorrentFreak that &#8220;termination of a customer’s Internet service is not part of the Copyright Alert System,&#8221; but didn&#8217;t deny that these notices can eventually lead to account terminations under the ISP&#8217;s <a href="http://www.comcast.com/Corporate/Customers/Policies/HighSpeedInternetAUP.html">acceptable use policy</a>. </p>
<p>Under what circumstances this would take place, and how Comcast defines &#8220;repeated and egregious&#8221; copyright infringement, remains unknown for now. </p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/comcast-terminates-accounts-of-persistent-pirates-131002/">Comcast Terminates Accounts of Persistent Pirates</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77554
title: Jail For File-Sharers Does Nothing to Increase Music Sales
uri: Jail-For-File-Sharers-Does-Nothing-to-Increase-Music-Sales
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/DOYCxjNXYl4/
content:
<p><img src="media/64198147.japan.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/japan.png" width="200" height="134" class="alignright" />There can be little doubt that given the chance the entertainment industries would like to see super-tough copyright legislation introduced worldwide. The idea is that with harsh legislation comes fear of serious repercussions, prompting a decision by the music consumer to purchase rather than pirate.</p>
<p>On October 1 2012, Japan introduced brand new legislation targeting users that not only upload (distribute) music without permission, but also those who merely download. There were no half measures on punishments either, with infringers facing up to <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/anti-downloading-law-hits-japan-up-to-2-years-in-prison-from-today-121001/">two years in jail</a>.</p>
<p>With those using P2P software to obtain music naturally being the most vulnerable to monitoring, the effects on those networks were both immediate and dramatic. According to data gathered by the General Association of Copyright for Computer Software, populations of three key file-sharing networks plummeted as the law was introduced and have since failed to recover.</p>
<p><center><img src="media/131c56c5.p2pdownjp.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/p2pdownjp.png" alt="P2PDownJP" /></center></p>
<p>So what effect did this exodus have on the market for recorded music?</p>
<p>According to figures published by the Recording Industry Association of Japan (RIAJ), after the new law was passed physical sales increased, with CDs enjoying a boost of 5% between October 2012 and June 2013 when compared to the period October 2011 to June 2012.</p>
<p>However, when comparing sales during the first eight months of 2012 before the law was introduced with the first eight months of 2013 with the law in effect, a different picture emerges. Total CD music sales this year are down a full 7% on the same period in 2012.</p>
<p>Given the legal threats against file-sharers in place since October 2012, the overall digital market isn&#8217;t looking great either, despite subscription services enjoying a sales boost in excess of 500%.</p>
<p>Japan&#8217;s <a href="http://www3.nhk.or.jp/news/html/20130929/k10014898651000.html">NHK News</a> reports that digital sales between October 2012 and June 2013 are down 24% on the same period in the previous year. Furthermore, figures published by the RIAJ show that despite digital album sales being up 52% over the same period in 2012, overall digital sales for the first two quarters of 2013 are fairing even worse, down 26% on the same period last year.</p>
<p><center><img src="media/010d9469.riajjanjune2013.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/riajjanjune2013.png" alt="RIAJ Jan to June 2013" /></center></p>
<p>Another shift in the market has been witnessed in the CD album rental market, a popular method of listening to music in Japan. According to the RIAJ, since the introduction of the new legislation rentals have increased by 50%. However, no such boost has been seen in those making purchases.</p>
<p>“The new law has been effective in increasing the amount of CD rentals, but seems unconnected to the number of people who are actually buying music,” RIAJ chief Kenji Takasugi told NHK.</p>
<p>Was that a confession that harsh legislation online doesn&#8217;t affect the numbers of people actually buying music? Could be, and consider this. While album rentals go through the roof another interesting thing took place in the first half of 2013 &#8211; sales of digital singles dropped 34%. Perhaps those rented albums aren&#8217;t simply being listened to and returned?</p>
<p>Nevertheless, Japan is doing rather well overall and is set to become the world&#8217;s <a href="http://www.digitalmusicnews.com/permalink/2013/20130616japan">largest music market</a>, bucking the trend by embracing physical formats while lagging behind on digital. What seems fairly certain for now is that threatening to send people to jail for downloading hasn&#8217;t helped much at all.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/jail-for-file-sharers-does-nothing-to-increase-music-sales-131003/">Jail For File-Sharers Does Nothing to Increase Music Sales</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77539
title: Piracy Isn’t Killing The Entertainment Industry, Scholars Show
uri: Piracy-Isn-t-Killing-The-Entertainment-Industry-Scholars-Show
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/O88VUHUjI1c/
content:
<p><img src="media/3bd7a91d.lbe.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/lbe.png" alt="lbe" width="222" height="108" class="alignright size-full wp-image-77542" />Over the past years there have been ample research reports showing that file-sharing can have positive effects on the entertainment industries. </p>
<p>Industry lobbyists are often quick to dismiss these findings as incidents or weak research, and counter them with expensive studies they have commissioned themselves. </p>
<p>The London School of Economics and Political Science (<a href="http://www.lse.ac.uk/home.aspx">LSE</a>) jumps into the discussion this week with a media policy brief urging the UK Government to look beyond the reports lobbyists hand to them. <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/172985274/LSE-MPP-Policy-Brief-9-Copyright-and-Creation">Their report</a> concludes that the entertainment industry isn&#8217;t devastated by piracy, and that sharing of culture has several benefits. </p>
<p>“Contrary to the industry claims, the music industry is not in terminal decline, but still holding ground and showing healthy profits. Revenues from digital sales, subscription services, streaming and live performances compensate for the decline in revenues from the sale of CDs or records,” says Bart Cammaerts, LSE Senior Lecturer and one of the report’s authors.</p>
<p>The report shows that the entertainment industries are actually doing quite well. The digital gaming industry is thriving, the publishing sector is stable, and the U.S. film industry is breaking record after record.</p>
<p>&#8220;Despite the Motion Picture Association of America’s (MPAA) claim that online piracy is devastating the movie industry, Hollywood achieved record-breaking global box office revenues of $35 billion in 2012, a 6% increase over 2011,&#8221; the report reads.</p>
<p>Even the music industry is doing relatively well. Revenue from concerts, publishing and digital sales has increased significantly since the early 2000s and while recorded music revenues show a decline, there is little evidence that piracy is the lead cause. </p>
<p>&#8220;The music industry may be stagnating, but the drastic decline in revenues warned of by the lobby associations of record labels is not in evidence,&#8221; the report concludes. </p>
<p><center><br />
<h5>Music industry revenue</h5>
<p><img src="media/10d1ac40.musicgraph.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/musicgraph.png" alt="musicgraph" width="565" height="348" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77543" /></center></p>
<p>The authors further argue that file-sharing can actually benefit the creative industries in various ways. </p>
<p>The report mentions the success of the SoundCloud service where artists can share their work for free through Creative Commons licenses, the promotional effect of YouTube where copyrighted songs are shared to promote sales, and the fact that research shows that file-sharers actually <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/uk-movie-pirates-spend-way-more-at-the-box-office-121122/">spend more money</a> on entertainment than those who don&#8217;t share.  </p>
<p>&#8220;Within the creative industries there is a variety of views on the best way to benefit from online sharing practices, and how to innovate to generate revenue streams in ways that do not fit within the existing copyright enforcement regime,&#8221; the authors write. </p>
<p>Finally, the report shows that punitive enforcement strategies such as the three strikes law in France are not as effective as the entertainment industries claim. </p>
<p>The researchers hope that the U.K. Government will review the Digital Economy Act in this light, and make sure that it will take into account the interests of both the public and copyright holders.</p>
<p>This means expanding fair use and private copying exceptions for citizens, while targeting enforcement on businesses rather than individuals.  </p>
<p>&#8220;We recommend a review of the DEA and related legislation that strikes a healthy balance among the interests of a range of stakeholders including those in the creative industries, Internet Service Providers and internet users.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;When both [the creative industries and citizens] can exploit the full potential of the internet, this will maximize innovative content creation for the benefit of all stakeholders,&#8221; the authors write. </p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/piracy-isnt-hurting-the-entertainment-industry-121003/">Piracy Isn&#8217;t Killing The Entertainment Industry, Scholars Show</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77566
title: Samsung Exposed as Top Advertiser on Pirate Sites
uri: Samsung-Exposed-as-Top-Advertiser-on-Pirate-Sites
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/GAgpueOIKBA/
content:
<p><a href="http://legalcontentua.com/en/"></a><a href="http://www.ustr.gov/about-us/press-office/press-releases/2013/may/ustr-releases-annual-special-301-report"></a><img src="media/047c6c75.samsing-pirate.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/samsing-pirate.jpg" alt="samsing-pirate" width="200" height="175" class="alignright size-full wp-image-77569" />When it comes to online piracy Ukraine has built up a bad reputation over the years. </p>
<p>The Eastern European country has been branded by the U.S. as one of the top piracy havens in the world and was placed on the USTR&#8217;s priority watchlist. </p>
<p>To counter this image a group of Ukrainian media outlets has started the &#8220;<a href="http://legalcontentua.com/en/">Clear Sky</a>&#8221; initiative. The coalition&#8217;s goal is to find solutions to online piracy. However, with one of their first campaigns they appear to put the ball back in the court of international companies. </p>
<p>The group commissioned the research outfit <a href="http://www.inmind.com.ua/en/about/">InMind</a> to take a closer look at the advertising revenues of two of the country&#8217;s major file-sharing websites, Ex.ua and FS.ua. Both sites have millions of visitors per week and generate a healthy revenue stream through their ads, some of which are paid by global companies.</p>
<p>According to the report about 10% of all ads on the two file-sharing sites are financed by well-known international brands. Nearly half of all those ads (4.2% of the total) come from Samsung as the bar chart below reveals. </p>
<p><center><img src="media/e81b9294.20top.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/20top.jpg" alt="20top" width="599" height="447" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77570" /></center></p>
<p>A big chunk of Samsung&#8217;s advertising budget in Ukraine goes to the two file-sharing sites according to the report. &#8220;The research reveals that 15% of all Samsung`s ads in Ukraine are placed on the pirate websites Ex.ua and Fs.ua,&#8221; Clear Sky informed TorrentFreak.</p>
<p>Samsung is not the only international brand that advertises on pirate sites, the top 20 also lists other familiar names including Nokia, Canon, Carlsberg and Coca Cola. </p>
<p>Other international brands are better at avoiding these sites. For example, Kraft and Procter and Gamble advertize more on Ukrainian Internet than any other the other brands listed above, yet they are not listed among the top 20 advertisers on Ex.ua and FS.ua.</p>
<p>Clear Sky informed TorrentFreak that they have demanded an urgent audit of the global online advertising practices of several of the world’s largest brands in order to support its domestic anti-piracy efforts.</p>
<p>&#8220;Clear Sky believes that malpractice within global online advertising and the ambiguity surrounding the wider digital environment, are key factors currently enabling piracy to flourish while damaging anti-piracy initiatives,&#8221; the group added.</p>
<p>According to the research 40% of Ukrainian population is exposed to ads from these global brands on file-sharing sites, which gives the impression that these sites are legitimate entertainment portals.  </p>
<p>Pavel Mykolyuk, director of the law firm <a href="http://www.vindex.com.ua/">Vindex</a> and a key member of  the Clear Sky coalition, calls on international partners to help address this issue. </p>
<p>“Clear Sky is calling for international collaboration to ensure anti-piracy efforts are optimized by changing the status quo, a situation that sees brands &#8211; sometimes unwittingly &#8211; fueling the illicit revenue of these sites and consequently exacerbating the global problem,” Mykolyuk explains. </p>
<p>How much these international brands indirectly pay to file-sharing sites remains unclear. Some experts estimate that Ex.ua and FS.ua alone already generate millions of dollars in revenue.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/samsung-exposed-as-top-advertiser-on-pirate-sites-131004/">Samsung Exposed as Top Advertiser on Pirate Sites</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77576
title: Anonymous Members Indicted for DDoSing Pirate Bay Enemies
uri: Anonymous-Members-Indicted-for-DDoSing-Pirate-Bay-Enemies
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/7QGdJEsGbis/
content:
<p><a href="media/fa918d71.anonymous.gif" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/anonymous.gif"><img src="media/fa918d71.anonymous.gif" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/anonymous.gif" alt="anonymous" width="200" height="216" class="alignright size-full wp-image-27985" /></a>In early September 2010, a little known anti-piracy company admitted that in the course of their work they sometimes go the extra mile to end copyright infringement.</p>
<p>India-based AiPlex Software <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/anti-piracy-outfit-threatens-to-dos-uncooperative-torrent-sites-100905/">said</a> that when faced with uncooperative torrent sites they &#8220;flood the website with requests, which results in database error.&#8221; The admission, that the company engaged in what amounts to a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack, started off a momentous chain of events.</p>
<p>The confession irked the masses on the chat board 4Chan and many of its members, known as Anons (collectively &#8216;Anonymous&#8217;), plotted their revenge. Firing up their <a href="http://sourceforge.net/projects/loic/">LOICs</a>, they DDoS&#8217;d AiPlex in return, taking the site offline.</p>
<p>But despite letting off steam the rage did not subside and soon the MPAA and RIAA were being <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/4chan-ddos-takes-down-mpaa-and-anti-piracy-websites-100918/">overwhelmed</a> with traffic, along with the Bank of America, Visa and Mastercard who had cut off payments to Wikileaks. Operation Payback was underway and it would spread around the world.</p>
<p>In the three years that have since passed, authorities in various countries have rounded up some of those who coordinated and participated in the attacks. A few hours ago came the news that United States authorities have scheduled some payback of their own for more than a dozen Operation Payback participants.</p>
<p>A federal grand jury has indicted 13 alleged members of Anonymous on claims that they &#8220;did knowingly cause the transmission of a program, information, code, and command, and, as a result of such conduct, intentionally cause damage, and attempt to cause damage, without authorization, to a protected computer,&#8221; including those operated by the Motion Picture Association of America, the Recording Industry Association of America, and the U.S. Copyright Office.</p>
<p><center><img src="media/e6ca87bd.ipo-payback.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/ipo-payback.jpg" alt="Payback" /></center></p>
<p>The indictment states that 13 men coordinated attacks by collectively deciding on targets and publishing their names and IP addresses along with proposed times and dates for the attacks. Via online postings and fliers, plus through the IRC channels #saveTPB, #savethepiratebay, and #operationpayback, the men allegedly recruited more individuals to the collective.</p>
<p>Interestingly, the indictment makes no specific mention of AiPlex&#8217;s illegal DDoS attacks on torrent sites, merely stating that Anonymous launched Operation Payback to retaliate &#8220;against the discontinuation of &#8216;The Pirate Bay&#8217;.&#8221;</p>
<p>In addition to United States-based targets including Warner Bros., the indictment lists attacks on the IFPI, BPI, ACS:Law, Davenport Lyons and Ministry of Sounds websites in the UK, against anti-piracy group BREIN in the Netherlands, one launched in Australia targeting the Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft (AFACT), and another against French anti-piracy outfit Trident Media Guard.</p>
<p>Overall the indictment tries to paint a very bleak picture of the defendants engaging in a deliberate campaign of destruction during the course of Operation Payback. It often cites comments made by each individual as they allegedly went about arranging and motivating others to carry out attacks against high-profile targets.</p>
<p>&#8220;We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us,&#8221; is the Anonymous battle cry. United States authorities appear to operate with a similar philosophy.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/anonymous-members-indicted-for-ddosing-pirate-bay-enemies-131004/">Anonymous Members Indicted for DDoSing Pirate Bay Enemies</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77619
title: Google Now Taking Down Eight ‘Pirate’ Links Every Single Second
uri: Google-Now-Taking-Down-Eight-Pirate-Links-Every-Single-Second
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/vfkqWgLxDXg/
content:
<p><a href="media/3a6fa524.google-bay.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/google-bay.jpg"><img src="media/3a6fa524.google-bay.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/google-bay.jpg" alt="google-bay" width="200" height="177" class="alignright size-full wp-image-21875" /></a>While it&#8217;s impossible to report with any accuracy how many DMCA-style notices are sent by all rightsholders Internet-wide in a typical week, thanks to Google&#8217;s relative openness we do have a reasonable idea of the size of the problem.</p>
<p>After a fairly steady climb in the early part the year, between July and October 2012 copyright holders stepped on the gas, sending around 1.8 million URL notices in a single week, more than ten times the amount being sent in a typical seven day period at the start of the year.</p>
<p>Mid November 2012 saw the sharpest increase to date, with 2.8 million URL notices sent in a week, a record beaten in mid December when 3.5 million were delivered to Google.</p>
<p>Then following a deceptive lull at the start of 2013, things picked up again in February. In a single week 3.8 million takedowns landed on Google&#8217;s desk, a record beaten again at the end of March when 4.47 million were received.</p>
<p>Since then it&#8217;s been rare for more than 4.6 million URLs to be processed by the world&#8217;s largest search engine in a single week but the latest figures published by Google reveal that during the final days of last month yet another record was smashed.</p>
<p>Between September 23 and September 29 Google received DMCA notices from 5,407 copyright owners and reporting organizations requesting the removal of 5,310,080 URLs spanning a total of 37,413 domains.</p>
<p><center><img src="media/86b7eea1.GoogleDMCAsept.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/GoogleDMCAsept.png" alt="GoogleDMCASept" /></center> </p>
<p>That&#8217;s up 561,950 URLs on the previous record set two weeks earlier and a 4008% increase over the first batch of notices listed by Google in July 2011, meaning that Google is now taking down just under nine URLs every single second of every single day. </p>
<p>As usual the major labels of the recording industry are leading the way. During the week in question the BPI asked for the removal of 1,294,641 URLs (2 per second) and the RIAA 751,739 (1.2 per second).</p>
<p>From the figures for the whole of September we can see that file-hosting site ZippyShare was the number one target with more than 830 copyright holders asking for the removal of 922,946 URLs. Two music linking sites, Dilandau and BeeMP3, took second and third places with 918,008 and 698,985 URLs respectively. File-hosting search engine FilesTube (585,338 URLs) and file-hoster Rapidgator (569,580 URLs) made up the top five.</p>
<p>But despite Google&#8217;s herculean response to the demands of nearly 5,500 entertainment and anti-piracy outfits, according to some the search engine still isn&#8217;t doing enough. Both Hollywood and the recording labels say that Google needs to step up its game but it&#8217;s difficult to see how much more it can do, unless it doesn&#8217;t even index &#8216;pirate&#8217; URLs in the first place&#8230;.</p>
<p>&#8230;and, of course, there you have it&#8230;&#8230;the Holy Grail &#8211; for now at least.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/google-now-taking-down-eight-pirate-links-every-single-second-131005/">Google Now Taking Down Eight &#8216;Pirate&#8217; Links Every Single Second</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77440
title: YIFY: Hollywood Nemesis Becomes Iconic Piracy Brand
uri: YIFY-Hollywood-Nemesis-Becomes-Iconic-Piracy-Brand
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/MSY-4-6eFFo/
content:
<p><img src="media/a9295419.yify.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/yify.png" alt="yify" width="237" height="102" class="alignright size-full wp-image-77492" />Every month hundreds of million of people flock to various torrent sites to download the latest Hollywood blockbusters. </p>
<p>Traditionally these pirated released were leaked from &#8220;the Scene,&#8221; but in recent years the landscape has evolved bringing many new groups to the forefront. </p>
<p>These P2P groups release their own pirated versions and often beat the Scene to it. The primary motivation, however, is the competition element of being the first to get a movie out there in top quality. </p>
<p>YIFY doesn&#8217;t fit into either of these categories. Unlike most other groups they are not motivated by the competition and the credits that come with it, but by serving their &#8216;audience&#8217; the best way they can. </p>
<p>This approach appears to work, as millions of people are now following the group&#8217;s releases. Their own website <a href="http://yify-torrents.com/">YIFY-torrents</a> is now among the top ten most-visited torrent sites on the Internet, and on sites such as KickassTorrents the term YIFY constantly appears as one of the top searches.</p>
<p><center><br />
<h5>YIFY searches on KAT</h5>
<p><a href="media/510d164c.yify-kat.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/yify-kat.png"><img src="media/510d164c.yify-kat.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/yify-kat.png" alt="yify-kat" width="491" height="173" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77499" /></a></center></p>
<p>To find out how it all came to be and what makes this group tick, TorrentFreak caught up with its founder. Using the handle YIFY, he tells us that one of the main goals is to make films accessible in all parts of the world, combining relatively small file-sizes with good quality. </p>
<p>&#8220;We aim to bring Hollywood films to the masses at smaller file-size. Our primary goal is to enable users from all parts of the world, who have bandwidth or hard drive limitations, to download and enjoy this content,&#8221; YIFY says. </p>
<p>YIFY started three years ago by releasing movies on various torrent sites and quickly added its own website a year later.   </p>
<p>&#8220;It all started in 2010 when x264 started to gain significant popularity. I saw the potential application of using this codec to spread films at a smaller size. By August 2011, YIFY releases had gained enough popularity to launch our own website, serving as a platform for our releases.&#8221;</p>
<p>The steady release of popular titles in an easily digestible size and format piqued the interest of many movie pirates. Around this time last year the number of visitors to YIFY&#8217;s own site had grown to 200,000 a day, and over the past year this exploded to 700,000. </p>
<p>Together with the hundreds of thousands of followers on other sites, it is safe to say that YIFY caters to the demands of millions of people. </p>
<p><center><br />
<h5>YIFY site growth</h5>
<p><img src="media/3a494918.yify-graph.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/yify-graph.png" alt="yify-graph" width="490" height="180" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77504" /></center></p>
<p>YIFY currently uploads its releases to its own site and five other public indexes: PublicHD, KickassTorrents, 1337x, The Pirate Bay, and ExtraTorrent. The group posts dozens of new and older films every month, a schedule that appears to appeal to a wide audience. </p>
<p>The high volume of searches for YIFY shows that more people actually search for the group tag than for specific movie titles, so in a way the group is guiding people&#8217;s viewing habits.</p>
<p>&#8220;I personally think that many people are following and downloading YIFY encodes due to the consistency we offer in our releasing. Everything from the consistent film cover art, to the information layout, and ultimately to the file-size of our encodes,&#8221; YIFY says. </p>
<p>&#8220;I believe this is important because people like stability and assurance with what they are downloading. By adding consistency to a reasonable file-size, we have filled a spot in the community, which seemingly has a lot of demand.&#8221;</p>
<p>Behind the scenes there&#8217;s a lot going on before a release is published on the Internet. YIFY doesn&#8217;t reveal specific sources but says it mostly relies on &#8220;leaked Blu-ray disks from friends.&#8221; A set of automated scripts then handles the encoding and subsequent uploading. </p>
<p>In many ways the popularity of YIFY is reminiscent <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/tag/axxo/">of aXXo</a>, the uploader that gathered an immense popularity during the latter half of the last decade. YIFY is flattered by this comparison, but personally he believes that&#8217;s too much credit.</p>
<p>&#8220;aXXo revolutionized the file-sharing community with highly accessible releases, while we are just a popular name; we have not actually introduced anything new to the community,&#8221; YIFY says.</p>
<p>Of course there&#8217;s also a darker side to YIFY&#8217;s newly gained fame. The group is clearly in the cross-hairs of Hollywood since the UK anti-piracy group FACT has already asked the court to <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/uk-isps-asked-to-block-eztv-and-yify-torrents-130619/">block the site in the UK</a>. At the same time, more radical legal steps can certainly not be excluded. </p>
<p>YIFY notes that their legal issues are limited to DMCA requests for now, which they comply with as other torrent sites do. Their biggest challenge at the moment is keeping the site online, which is easier said than done with the rapid increase in visitors.</p>
<p>&#8220;One year ago we were getting around 250,000 visitors daily on the website, presently we get around 700,000. Setting up our system to handle this growth in traffic has been the main challenge thus far,&#8221; YIFY says.</p>
<p>As for Hollywood, YIFY points out that the movie industry would be wise to move away from expensive per item sales, and focus more on free access models such as Hulu and Netflix-style subscription models in countries where these are not yet available. </p>
<p>&#8220;I do not think that Hollywood needs to learn anything specifically from our success. Rather, I think that our success is just a symptom of a much wider, and fast growing, worldwide phenomenon. I think that this demonstrates that people all around the world are no longer willing to pay a premium for their digital media,&#8221; YIFY concludes.   </p>
<p>For the time being, YIFY is happily filling this gap. </p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/yify-hollywood-nemesis-becomes-iconic-piracy-brand-131005/">YIFY: Hollywood Nemesis Becomes Iconic Piracy Brand</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77656
title: Pirate Bay Founder Asks Danish Authorities to Drop Hacking Case
uri: Pirate-Bay-Founder-Asks-Danish-Authorities-to-Drop-Hacking-Case
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/Rsf90YLZMgI/
content:
<p><img alt="anakata" src="media/7557a16b.anakata1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/anakata1.jpg" align="right" />Two weeks ago Pirate Bay founder Gottfrid Svartholm had his hacking sentence reduced from two to <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bay-founder-hacking-sentence-slashed-in-half-on-appeal-130925/">one year in prison</a>.</p>
<p>The Court of Appeal upheld the guilty verdict in the hacking of IT company Logica, but overturned the guilty verdict handed down in respect of the breach at the Nordea bank.</p>
<p>Following the new verdict Gottfrid will be a free man in just four months. However, soon after the appeal court decision authorities in Denmark announced that they would move forward with the Pirate Bay founder&#8217;s extradition for a separate hacking case.</p>
<p>In Denmark, Gottfrid is accused of downloading a large number of files, including police records, from the mainframe of IT company CSC. The Danes <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bay-founder-will-be-extradited-to-denmark-130618/">successfully requested</a> Gottfrid&#8217;s extradition earlier this year when they described the CSC hack as similar to the Nordea one in Sweden.</p>
<p>Despite the similarities and Gottfrid&#8217;s acquittal on the Nordea hack, Denmark is continuing its case against the Pirate Bay founder, much to the surprise of his mother Kristina Svartholm.</p>
<p>&#8220;It would be remarkable if the Danes bring Gottfrid to court in spite of the Swedish judgment. It would mean, in principle, that one country after another could do this to him despite the acquittal,&#8221; Kristina informs TorrentFreak.</p>
<p>The decision to extradite Gottfrid was based on an treaty between the two Nordic countries, in which Sweden trusts the Danish legal system and vice versa. However, in an open letter to the Danish Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Interior, Gottfrid doubts that this is still the case. </p>
<p>In the letter he further apologizes that his computer was used for the CSC hack, but stresses that this was not his wrongdoing. </p>
<p>&#8220;It was positioned as a ‘lab computer’/server available to other people, both physically and through the Internet. This has been confirmed by the Swedish Svea Court of Appeal in the judgment delivered on 25 September,&#8221; Gottfrid writes.</p>
<p>&#8220;The Court of Appeal also notes that the computer&#8217;s firewall has been configured in such a way that the computer&#8217;s integrity could no longer be guaranteed and the remote control could be done in a number of ways,&#8221; he adds. </p>
<p>Gottfrid says that he can&#8217;t be held responsible for what the police found on his computer. To avoid wasting time and resources, he believes that the Danish prosecution should drop the case.</p>
<p>&#8220;I wish to emphasize my view that there must be a huge waste of resources &#8211; both monetary and human &#8211; to continue to pursue the case against me in Denmark after this judgment. It seems as if the Danish police and the Danish prosecution service does not trust the Swedish courts,&#8221; Gottfrid writes. </p>
<p>Thus far there is no sign that the Swedish appeal verdict will change the position of the Danish prosecution, and whether Gottfrid&#8217;s plea will have any effect remains to be seen. A full copy of the open letter is available below.</p>
<p>&#8212;</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">Dear Morten Bødskov / Margarethe Vestager,</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">I am sincerely sorry that my computer has been used in a way that caused injury in Denmark. Of course, this has not been the intention of it. It was positioned as a ‘lab computer’/server available to other people , both physically and through the Internet.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">This has been confirmed by the Swedish Svea Court of Appeal in the judgment delivered on 25 September. The Court of Appeal also notes that computer&#8217;s firewall has been configured in such a way that the computer&#8217;s integrity could no longer be guaranteed and the remote control could be done in a number of ways. Hereby, I can not be held responsible for what has have been found on the computer.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">I want to emphasize that I have no connection whatsoever to Denmark. Previously, Danish police in interrogation with me claimed that the Danish CSC-hack was similar to the Nordea infringement that I was charged of. With the ruling by the Svea Court of Appeals, I am completely cleared of suspicions of the Nordea intrusion.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">Finally, I wish to emphasize my view that there must be a huge waste of resources &#8211; both monetary and human &#8211; to continue to pursue the case against me in Denmark after this judgment. It seems as if the Danish police and the Danish prosecution service does not trust the Swedish courts. I would be grateful if the Minister could point this out to those affected and would once again regret that my computer was misused in this way.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">Sincerely<br />
Gottfrid Svartholm Warg</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bay-founder-asks-danish-authorities-to-drop-hacking-case-131006/">Pirate Bay Founder Asks Danish Authorities to Drop Hacking Case</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77587
title: VPNs: Is it OK to Monitor ‘Bad’ Users on Ethical Grounds?
uri: VPNs-Is-it-OK-to-Monitor-Bad-Users-on-Ethical-Grounds
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/k9movWLyf7s/
content:
<p><img src="media/3f37a159.proxyshlogo.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/proxyshlogo.jpg" width="180" height="95" class="alignright" />When signing up to a VPN provider many users hope that they can use those services in complete privacy, free from the prying eyes of their ISP, aggressive governments and commercially motivated corporations.</p>
<p>There are many different VPN providers to choose from and endless configuration, pricing and location issues to consider. Those aside, current attitudes suggest that going with one that claims a zero logging policy, where it&#8217;s impossible to link any activity with a particular user, is a good starting point for a selection.</p>
<p>Proxy.sh is one such provider, but last weekend the company openly announced that it would install the Wireshark network monitoring tool on one of its servers in order to identify an individual who had been accused of harassing someone&#8217;s daughter. Surprised that the company would do so without a court order, on Monday TorrentFreak <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/proxy-sh-vpn-provider-monitored-traffic-to-catch-hacker-130930/">published an article</a> on the topic.</p>
<p>We contacted Proxy.sh for comment and it soon become clear that they were unhappy with our general position that monitoring a user without a court order isn&#8217;t something that a VPN service should engage in. After discussing the matter with them all week we&#8217;d like to present our findings.</p>
<p>It&#8217;s an interesting situation in which legalities are important but the company&#8217;s ethical policy holds the real power. Interestingly and despite placing restrictions where other VPNs do not, Proxy.sh maintains that their policy makes users more secure, not less. The issues could be extremely important for users of all VPNs, no matter which provider they choose.</p>
<h2>Brief background to last Saturday&#8217;s decision to monitor a user</h2>
<p>Proxy.sh received a complaint &#8220;from a desperate family, with support of its lawyer and a third party IT expert&#8221; that a user of Proxy.sh was allegedly using Proxy.sh&#8217;s Illinois server 1 to &#8220;harass&#8221; a female.</p>
<p>&#8220;We were given backup of a rootkit-infected Android mobile with logs about one of our network&#8217;s node. Information retrieved via the rootkit-infected mobile was then utilized to harass the minor,&#8221; Proxy.sh told TorrentFreak.</p>
<h2>The decision to monitor</h2>
<p>In response to the complaint, Proxy.sh activated its &#8220;ethical policy&#8221; which forbids, among other things, racist, drug-related and pornographic activity, pedophilia and politically and/or religiously sensitive conduct. Proxy.sh say that in order to qualify as a breach the activity in question must be physically or morally harmful to an individual, not a company or corporation.</p>
<p>In Proxy.sh&#8217;s view the alleged activity against the female amounted to an ethical policy breach and without any court order it began monitoring a US-based server to identify the alleged perpetrator. In a matter of hours the alleged hacker apologized and Proxy.sh shutdown their monitoring.</p>
<h2>The Ethical Policy and where the line is drawn</h2>
<p><a href="media/57e976f8.ethics.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/ethics.jpg"><img src="media/57e976f8.ethics.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/ethics.jpg" alt="ethics" width="180" height="121" class="alignright size-full wp-image-77642" /></a>Given that Proxy.sh is setting standards by which users need to abide or risk being monitored in the event of a complaint, we dug a little bit deeper. Is porn banned if someone is &#8216;harmed&#8217; by it? What defines harm? Are objectionable religious or political views a risky prospect? Where is the line drawn and how are users expected to know?</p>
<p>It turns out that porn is acceptable and what Proxy.sh meant to say is that they ban videos depicting &#8220;the death of a person, or snuff movie.&#8221; It&#8217;s not clear, gore fans, whether torrenting <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faces_of_death">Faces of Death</a> is out of the question.</p>
<p>On the religious front we posed a situation that affected TorrentFreak earlier this year when we <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/priests-watch-dvd-screeners-while-pirates-download-filth-in-the-vatican-130407/">reported</a> on porn downloads taking place in the Vatican, a piece which apparently offended some residents of Northern Ireland. Is that outlawed too?</p>
<p>&#8220;With your story on the Vatican, we would be against your activity if you quoted the name of the guy who downloaded porn, and subsequently suggested action should be taken against him. As long as you have kept it general and with respect for all individuals, this is no problem for us,&#8221; Proxy.sh explained.</p>
<p>So we get the general idea &#8211; Proxy.sh isn&#8217;t going to sit around and do nothing if customers of their service hurt individuals. But the question is this &#8211; as a service provider and carrier of information, should they be getting involved at all and are they doing so based on the mere allegations of third parties?</p>
<h2>How easy is it to have a user monitored?</h2>
<p><a href="media/f408e481.cameraspy.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/cameraspy.jpg"><img src="media/b07a2380.cameraspy-150x150.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/cameraspy-150x150.jpg" alt="cameraspy" width="150" height="150" class="alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-49625" /></a>&#8220;First of all, you need to get in touch with a lawyer to characterize the crime in a legal context. Then, you need to get in touch with a forensic IT expert who can gather evidences of your misfortune (in computer meaning). Then you all three need to get in touch with us to report a complaint,&#8221; the company explains.</p>
<p>Based on the above it&#8217;s far from clear how someone can carry out a religious or politically damaging &#8216;crime&#8217;, much less gather and present proof of it, but it seems that at the least there is some overlap in Proxy.sh&#8217;s ethical policy and the law, although in what country&#8217;s legal system (possibly ProxyLand&#8217;s) remains a blur.</p>
<p>However, with these gray areas identified we asked the company this &#8211; does its ethical policy create uncertainty as to what is acceptable behavior when compared to a provider that doesn&#8217;t try to govern use of their services other than in accordance with a specified country&#8217;s law?</p>
<p>&#8220;Of course. There has always been some uncertainty in policies and terms. We do not think we are an exception here and we are happy that you take the time with us to define them more in depth. All the people who have got in touch with us with questions about our terms or policy know that we have always answered transparently and as openly as possible to make them even more understanding on case-by-case basis. It is actually good policy before you turn to any VPN provider, to come and ask it precise questions you need answers for.&#8221;</p>
<p>In any event, if a third party complaint passes muster the company is openly prepared to monitor the alleged perpetrator&#8217;s VPN connection. That said, Proxy.sh says it will transparently announce that event on its website, something other providers do not.</p>
<h2>Is transparency on monitoring better than complete silence?</h2>
<p>&#8220;Of course. We are sons of anarcho-capitalism. We believe in the sovereignty and self-consciousness of individuals, not of those of States or other entities such as agencies or corporations. We also especially value transparency. We believe this is what terribly lacks in today&#8217;s world,&#8221; Proxy.sh says.</p>
<p>&#8220;Here at Proxy.sh we offer users the full choice of both knowing and deciding to opt out (or simply switching to another node part of our network) when an intervention needs to take place. We do not believe this choice should be left only to governments and VPN suppliers themselves, but rather to the entire customer-base; in other words, to everyone involved.&#8221;</p>
<h2>Just because you can, does it follow that you should?</h2>
<p><a href="media/4de57c4e.threemonkeys.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/threemonkeys.jpg"><img src="media/9410a4d1.threemonkeys-150x150.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/threemonkeys-150x150.jpg" alt="threemonkeys" width="150" height="150" class="alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-77640" /></a>In addition to all the wonderful people online there are obviously some hateful individuals too. But is it a service provider&#8217;s job to appoint itself judge and jury over their behavior, no matter how objectionable? How does Proxy.sh respond to people who say that as a privacy service provider they should simply keep out of their customers&#8217; business?</p>
<p>&#8220;This is a very good question and actually the onus behind our move. To us, a service provider that acts in a jurisdiction where law enforcement is of quality should not feel responsible for interfering with any ethical or legal matter, as the jurisdiction in which it operates is supposed to provide all the necessities. I am thinking here of the United States of course who can through subpoenas directly access the infrastructures of the businesses incorporated in its economy,&#8221; the company says.</p>
<p>&#8220;On the other side, a service provider that acts in a jurisdiction where law enforcement may unfortunately not be of quality (for various reasons and by various aspects), should in turn feel responsible for interfering with some ethical or legal matters, to prevent the loophole it uses to avoid legislation it finds unacceptable (e.g. DMCA) from being turned into one that avoids pretty much any sort of legislation.&#8221;</p>
<h2>Conclusions</h2>
<p>Aside from setting up your own VPN service, Proxy.sh says that realistically VPN users have a couple of choices.</p>
<p>&#8220;You now face two options: choose a provider that tells you when it will intervene on its network (even though you can&#8217;t be 100% sure it will actually tell you all the time), or choose one that actually never tells you anything.</p>
<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t know about you, but for me I actually prefer one that at least keeps me updated about some, especially when one states that he does keep me updated about all of them,&#8221; Proxy.sh concludes.</p>
<p>The big question is this &#8211; what are customers happy with?</p>
<p>A VPN provider who states clearly no logs and no monitoring/logging but may or may not be forced behind the scenes to do so anyway? Or one that claims no logs, some monitoring/logging based on ethics, but promises to keep people informed?</p>
<p>Would customers prefer it if their VPN provider took the stance of a mere carrier and kept out of their business completely, or would subscribers be more happy knowing that their provider is taking an ethical responsibility for the data flowing through their networks in order to reduce harm?</p>
<p>The decision, is yours&#8230;.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/vpns-is-it-ok-to-monitor-bad-users-on-ethical-grounds-131006/">VPNs: Is it OK to Monitor &#8216;Bad&#8217; Users on Ethical Grounds?</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77700
title: Spotify: Labels Thought We Were No Better Than The Pirate Bay
uri: Spotify-Labels-Thought-We-Were-No-Better-Than-The-Pirate-Bay
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/iDfjydnlf7Y/
content:
<p><a href="media/46b7618f.spotify.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/spotify.jpg"><img src="media/46b7618f.spotify.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/spotify.jpg" alt="spotify" width="200" height="125" class="alignright size-full wp-image-36278" /></a>In a world where all kinds of entertainment media is available for free download with a couple of clicks, we have been led to believe that competing with such a reality is not just hard, but virtually impossible.</p>
<p>So who could have imagined then that after its birth five years ago today (during the glory years of The Pirate Bay no less) Spotify would develop into a hugely successful consumer product that has not only proven popular with music lovers around the world, but with pirates past and present.</p>
<p>Against the odds, Spotify has gone beyond turning many dedicated file-sharers into revenue-generating customers, it has made them happy ones too.</p>
<p>Earlier this year Spotify revealed it had signed up 24 million users worldwide, 18 million to the ad-supported service and 6 million to a paid subscription. But as revealed by company founder Daniel Ek, even greater goals are being eyed.</p>
<p>“My goal is to not just convert the 24 million into buying a subscription,” Ek <a href="http://articles.latimes.com/2013/mar/13/entertainment/la-et-ms-spotify-deadmau5-sxsw-2013-20130312">said</a>. “My goal is to get 1 billion using streaming services rather than a piracy service.&#8221;</p>
<p>But during the early days in Spotify&#8217;s Swedish homeland, a problem persisted. By failing to respond to customer needs a content availability vacuum had formed, and it came as no surprise to Spotify&#8217;s Scandinavia CEO Jonathan Forster that sites like The Pirate Bay were thriving.</p>
<p>&#8220;It is a society that loves music and when the internet exploded it was no surprise that it took place in Sweden. In the absence of a legal service, people used whatever was available,&#8221; Forster <a href="http://www.metro.se/nyheter/femaringen-som-blev-skivbranschens-raddare/EVHmjf!L57JTxOTzbs/">told</a> Metro today.</p>
<p>But despite a huge customer base in waiting and a dream of luring people away from unauthorized sources en masse, Spotify faced problems with the labels.</p>
<p>&#8220;When I started at Spotify and realized that we really had not even talked to any of the majors, I felt that this would be difficult,&#8221; Forster <a href="http://www.svd.se/naringsliv/kaxig-femaring-pa-vag-att-fa-ratt_8588256.svd">explains</a>.</p>
<p>So Spotify embarked on a mission to convince the record companies that making their catalogs available on an ad-supported basis would be the way to go. However &#8211; and perhaps unsurprisingly given the track records of some of their countrymen before them &#8211; they were instead treated as if they were creating a piracy service of their own.</p>
<p>&#8220;[The labels] were very polite, but utterly amazed at what we wanted to do,&#8221; Forster recalls. &#8220;In their eyes we were just a bunch of Swedes who wanted to take their music and give it away for free. We were no different than the people behind the Pirate Bay for them.&#8221;</p>
<p>But Spotify refused to give in and two years later the company netted its first license agreements and is now promoted heavily by the labels. According to Rasmus Fleischer, former Piratbyran member and author of award-wining thesis &#8220;The music&#8217;s political economy,&#8221; some of Spotify&#8217;s success in Sweden can be attributed to the entertainment companies&#8217; legal victories against The Pirate Bay and the streaming service&#8217;s reputation for stirring things up.</p>
<p>&#8220;On a symbolic level, it was incredibly significant,&#8221; Fleischer <a href="http://www.metro.se/nyheter/femaringen-som-blev-skivbranschens-raddare/EVHmjf!L57JTxOTzbs/">says</a>. &#8220;The history of Spotify has been built in the Swedish press and media as a rebel company that has rebelled against an outdated recording industry.&#8221;</p>
<p>The art of rebellion against the entertainment industries was perfected by The Pirate Bay during the last decade and as a result the site made itself some dangerous rivals. But interestingly while the most powerful forces in the world have failed to take it down, it&#8217;s companies like Spotify that could end up becoming its most serious adversary yet.</p>
<p>That, however, will rely on the company maintaining its rebellious streak, positive image and excellent product at a fair price. It will be interesting to see if it can keep that up.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/spotify-labels-thought-we-were-no-better-than-the-pirate-bay-131007/">Spotify: Labels Thought We Were No Better Than The Pirate Bay</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77616
title: Copyright Groups Demand Pirate Bay Blockade in Iceland
uri: Copyright-Groups-Demand-Pirate-Bay-Blockade-in-Iceland
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/2KSrxUT8rT4/
content:
<p><a href="media/4e243e8b.tpb-logo.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/tpb-logo.jpg"><img src="media/4e243e8b.tpb-logo.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/tpb-logo.jpg" alt="tpb-logo" width="222" height="198" class="alignright size-full wp-image-67837" /></a>The efforts to cut access to The Pirate Bay in Europe continues, with yet another country looking to block the defiant torrent site. </p>
<p>A group of copyright groups including the local equivalent of the RIAA (STEF) and MPAA (SMAIS) filed a complaint with the local head of police last week. </p>
<p>The groups request an injunction to force local ISPs to block their users&#8217; access to The Pirate Bay, following the examples of the UK, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark and other European countries.</p>
<p>In addition, the groups also want the providers to block access to Deildu.net, the largest private BitTorrent tracker in Iceland. Both sites are quite popular with locals, with The Pirate Bay currently the 53rd most visited website in Iceland and Deildu.net ranked 142nd. </p>
<p>In a <a href="http://www.stef.is/Frettir/nr/240">press release</a> the copyright holders state that they saw no other option than to go down the blocking route. They previously reported the operators of the websites to the police, but without much success. In addition they launched a public awareness campaign to promote legal alternatives, but online piracy continues to thrive. </p>
<p>Blocking Internet users&#8217; access to The Pirate Bay will be much more effective, they argue.</p>
<p>&#8220;Blocking access to websites that offer a wide range of entertainment without permission of the copyright holders has been proven effective in neighboring countries, and has a strong fundament in EU legislation,&#8221; the groups note. </p>
<p>&#8220;This action doesn&#8217;t go against freedom of expression as it aims to prevent copyright infringement and protect the rights and income of authors, artists and producers,&#8221; they add.</p>
<p>Hrafn Gunnarsson, a member of Iceland&#8217;s Parliament for the Pirate Party, doubts that a blockade will be very effective. He notes that there are thousands of other sites just like The Pirate Bay, so a blockade will simply result in a failure, or turn into a police state Internet.   </p>
<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s comparable to the police holding the Department of Transportation responsible for fleeing criminals, simply because they took advantage of the road to get away,&#8221; <a href="http://www.visir.is/bann-a-the-pirate-bay-og-deildu.net-neydarurraedi/article/2013131009755">Gunnarsson notes</a>.</p>
<p>Commenting to TorrentFreak, the secretary of the executive board of The Pirate Party Bjartur Thorlacius says that a blockade would place copyright above freedom of expression, which goes against the party&#8217;s ideals.</p>
<p>&#8220;The blocking request is based on copyright grounds, and since copyright is not a civil right the Pirate Party oppose the request. It is wrong to sacrifice a strong right for a weaker one, whether in principle or in practice.&#8221; </p>
<p>The copyright groups&#8217; complaint is not supported by all artists. Snæbjörn Ragnarsson, the bass player of the popular Icelandic viking heavy metal band Skálmöld, says that he&#8217;s well aware of people&#8217;s downloading habits but that they are still doing pretty well. </p>
<p>&#8220;It does not change the fact that we are selling well both at home and abroad. It simply can not be true that the majority of people get their music illegally, and if they do then the law is most likely broken,&#8221; Ragnarsson says.</p>
<p>The Pirate Bay is unlikely to be bothered by yet another country where copyright holders want to take their site off the Internet. In August the Pirate Bay team launched the <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-browser-hits-500000-downloads-130830/">Pirate Browser</a> to circumvent these types of censorship. In addition, they are working on a truly P2P-based website that will be impossible to block or take offline. </p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/copyright-groups-demand-pirate-bay-blockade-in-iceland-131007/">Copyright Groups Demand Pirate Bay Blockade in Iceland</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77673
title: Top 10 Most Pirated Movies of The Week
uri: 2013-10-07-Top-10-Most-Pirated-Movies-of-The-Week
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/ygirNe4M9S4/
content:
<p><a href="media/19607b0b.pacific-rim.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/pacific-rim.jpg"><img src="media/19607b0b.pacific-rim.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/pacific-rim.jpg" alt="pacific-rim" width="300" height="143" class="alignright size-full wp-image-77678" /></a>This week we have six newcomers in our chart. </p>
<p>The Internship is the most downloaded movie. </p>
<p>The data for our weekly download chart is collected by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only. All the movies in the list are BD/DVDrips unless stated otherwise.</p>
<p><a href="http://TorrentFreak.com/category/dvdrip/feed/"><strong>RSS feed</strong></a> for the weekly movie download chart.</p>
<table class="css hover" summary="Most downloaded movies on BitTorrent">
<caption>Week ending Oktober 06, 2013</caption>
<thead>
<tr>
<th width="12%"><strong>Ranking</strong></th>
<th width="15%"><strong>(<a href="https://torrentfreak.com/top-10-most-pirated-movies-of-the-week-130930/">last week</a>)</strong></th>
<th><strong>Movie</strong></th>
<th width="18%"><strong>IMDb Rating / Trailer</strong></th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tfoot>
<tr>
<td colspan="4">torrentfreak.com</td>
</tr>
</tfoot>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td><strong>1</strong></td>
<td>(&#8230;)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/pacific_rim_2013/">Pacific Rim</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1663662/">7.4</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5guMumPFBag">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>2</strong></td>
<td>(&#8230;)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_internship_2013/">The Internship</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2234155/">6.3</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdnoqCViqUo">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>3</strong></td>
<td>(&#8230;)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_lone_ranger/">The Lone Ranger</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1210819/">6.6</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjFsNSoDZK8">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>4</strong></td>
<td>(&#8230;)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/elysium_2013/">Elysium</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1535108/">7.0</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QILNSgou5BY">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>5</strong></td>
<td>(1)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/after_earth/">After Earth</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1815862/">4.9</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUcNyzu4IdM">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>6</strong></td>
<td>(5)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/this_is_the_end/">This Is The End</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1245492/">7.6</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yma-g4gTwlE">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>7</strong></td>
<td>(&#8230;)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/2_guns/">2 Guns</a> (TS)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1272878/">7.0</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVNe3RK2fgI">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>8</strong></td>
<td>(&#8230;)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/embrace_of_the_vampire/">Embrace Of The Vampire</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3148890/">?.?</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFw5fZGrl5Q">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>9</strong></td>
<td>(4)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/white_house_down/">White house Down</a> (Webrip)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2334879/">6.4</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wonLfgO5p8">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>10</strong></td>
<td>(2)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/bounty_killer_2013/">Bounty Killer</a> (Webrip)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2369396/">4.7</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ciGAjiPlvYk">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/top-10-most-pirated-movies-of-the-week-131007/">Top 10 Most Pirated Movies of The Week</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77774
title: BitTorrent Mastermind Controversial NSA Billboard Campaign
uri: BitTorrent-Mastermind-Behind-Controversial-NSA-Billboard-Campaign
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/NcEOdD2LmdA/
content:
<p><a href="media/ab851df2.regul.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/regul.jpg"><img src="media/ab851df2.regul.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/regul.jpg" alt="regul" width="222" height="143" class="alignright size-full wp-image-77787" /></a>BitTorrent Inc, the company behind the successful uTorrent and BitTorrent file-sharing clients, has been making huge efforts in recent times to shed the false image that it is synonymous with mass online piracy.</p>
<p>The company&#8217;s tools can of course be put to illegal uses, but so can those of a thousand other companies in thousands of cities worldwide. The company has been relentless in its quest to get this message to the masses, but it&#8217;s also taking another approach to boosting its image with its tech-savvy customer base.</p>
<p>Anyone who monitors the company&#8217;s Twitter feed will see that it regularly retweets items that relate to privacy and freedom, such as the recent NSA whistle-blower scandal for example. </p>
<p>Like many technology companies BitTorrent Inc. has an interest in keeping the Internet both free and open so the news today that the San Francisco-based company is behind a controversial advertising campaign doesn&#8217;t come as too much of a shock.</p>
<p>Last week billboards appeared in three major cities &#8211; New York, San Francisco and Los Angeles &#8211; each with a statement designed to be offensive to anyone who values freedom, privacy and a right to choose.</p>
<p><center><br />
<h5>Your Data Should Belong To The NSA</h5>
<p><a href="media/77ecb8ee.datansa1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/datansa1.jpg"><img src="media/77ecb8ee.datansa1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/datansa1.jpg" alt="datansa1" width="550" height="297" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77782" /></a></center></p>
<p><center><br />
<h5>Artists Need To Play By The Rules</h5>
<p><a href="media/de775e37.playbytherules.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/playbytherules.jpg"><img src="media/de775e37.playbytherules.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/playbytherules.jpg" alt="playbytherules" width="550" height="290" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77784" /></a></center></p>
<p><center><br />
<h5>The Internet Should Be Regulated (<a href="http://www.animalnewyork.com/2013/shadowy-midtown-billboard-wants-to-regulate-your-internet/">via</a>)</h5>
<p><a href="media/a1610533.regulated1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/regulated1.jpg"><img src="media/a1610533.regulated1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/regulated1.jpg" alt="regulated1" width="550" height="309" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77785" /></a></center></p>
<p>&#8220;These statements represent an assault on freedom. They also, for the most part, represent attitudes Internet culture has accepted. Chips we’ve traded for convenience. Part of the allegiance we’ve sworn to the web’s big platforms and server farms. That’s what you get for going online,&#8221; BitTorrent Inc. says of the campaign&#8217;s messages.</p>
<p>The company goes on to bemoan general society&#8217;s apparent eagerness to accept data centralization and along with it the distribution of personal information to powerful companies and governments who choose to exploit it.</p>
<p>&#8220;We’ve chosen to accept surveillance culture: the right of security agencies to violate the Fourth Amendment; to see and store data as they see fit,&#8221; the company says.</p>
<p>Interestingly, BitTorrent Inc. also takes a shot at entertainment companies who put content behind paywalls and suggests that all-you-can-eat outlets like Spotify, for example, fail to adequately compensate the artists.</p>
<p>&#8220;We’ve chosen to accept walled gardens of creativity: a lifetime of work (our life’s work) locked into digital stores that take 30% of the revenue and streaming services that pay pennies in royalties,&#8221; BitTorrent says.</p>
<p>Of course, the campaign isn&#8217;t simply a me-too retaliation at the revelations of the past few months and years. BitTorrent Inc. has a business model and several products that really do put the power back in the hands of the individual, from its BitTorrent Bundles through to its DIY decentralized Dropbox alternative, <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/bittorrents-secure-dropbox-alternative-ios-130827/">BitTorrent Sync</a> and its &#8220;NSA-proof&#8221; <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/bittorrent-launches-nsa-proof-messenger-app-130930/">messenger app</a>.</p>
<p>With these tools and last week&#8217;s billboard campaign the San Francisco-based company hopes to capture the imaginations of Internet users who have become weary of entrusting their data to big companies and artists who want to leave the industry machine behind and take their futures into their own hands, as the updated billboards suggest.</p>
<p><center><a href="media/4e9b6a6d.datansareveal.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/datansareveal.jpg"><img src="media/4e9b6a6d.datansareveal.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/datansareveal.jpg" alt="datansareveal" width="550" height="323" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77789" /></a></center></p>
<p>&#8220;This is the generation that will decide whether the Internet is a tool for control, or a platform for innovation and freedom. We have an incredible opportunity. We can shape the next one and one hundred years of human connection. A free, open Internet is a force for change, creativity; the backbone of a society where citizens are stakeholders, not data sets.</p>
<p>&#8220;BitTorrent is built to preserve that Internet,&#8221; the company concludes.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/bittorrent-mastermind-controversial-nsa-billboard-campaign-131008/">BitTorrent Mastermind Controversial NSA Billboard Campaign</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77739
title: Hollywood Attacks Scholars Who Deny The Evils of Piracy
uri: Hollywood-Attacks-Scholars-Who-Deny-The-Evils-of-Piracy
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/znRVyVTrjKc/
content:
<p><a href="media/12bdbb91.running.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/running.jpg"><img src="media/12bdbb91.running.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/running.jpg" alt="running" width="200" height="133" class="alignright size-full wp-image-52725" /></a>In recent months the MPAA has made a habit of <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/mpaa-criticizes-piracy-study-because-it-doesnt-like-the-results-130901/">attacking</a> every paper which suggests that piracy may not actually be that big of a problem after all. </p>
<p>While the movie industry group often raises valid points, the critique is also one-sided. Much like the critique often voiced by pro-sharing opponents, it&#8217;s merely reinforcing their existing beliefs. </p>
<p>Yesterday the MPAA &#8220;<a href="http://blog.mpaa.org/BlogOS/post/2013/10/07/Debunking-some-major-flaws-in-the-LSE-media-brief-on-the-impact-of-piracy.aspx">debunked</a>&#8221; the findings of a policy brief the London School of Economics and Political Science <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/piracy-isnt-hurting-the-entertainment-industry-121003/">published last week</a>. </p>
<p>In their report the scholars noted that there is ample evidence that file-sharing is helping, rather than hurting the creative industries. The scholars therefore called on the Government to look at more objective data when deciding on future copyright enforcement policies.</p>
<p>The MPAA, however, is quick to point out that the researchers are wrong. For example, they refute the argument that piracy may do little harm because revenues are still booming. Describing the analysis as &#8220;unsophisticated and misleading,&#8221; the Hollywood group notes that they could have made even more money if piracy was properly dealt with.</p>
<p>The MPAA points out that there is plenty of academic research that affirms how piracy leads to a loss in revenue. To strengthen their argument they highlight a <a href="http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2132153">literature review study</a> published last summer, which ironically displays the following footnote on the first page.</p>
<p>&#8220;We thank the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) for providing generous funding to support this study.&#8221;</p>
<p>The MPAA&#8217;s debunking effort also refers to music industry analyst Matt Mulligan, <a href="http://musicindustryblog.wordpress.com/2013/10/04/why-the-lses-piracy-arguments-just-dont-hold-water/">whose critique</a> of the LSE brief has also been retweeted by the RIAA and IFPI. Again, while some of Mulligan&#8217;s arguments make sense, many are rather one-sided. </p>
<p>For example, LSE noted that the music industry is holding ground as revenues from live performances compensate for the decline in revenues from the sale of CDs or records. Mulligan&#8217;s reply to this is that revenues from live gigs are over-reported because they include reseller revenue, which doesn&#8217;t go anywhere near the artists. </p>
<p>However, this appears to be a skewed logic, because the same can be said for recorded music where traditionally only a tiny fraction of the retail value goes to the musician, probably much less than for live performances. And the same can be said for streaming services and digital download platforms where a lot of money sticks in the distribution chain.</p>
<p>It&#8217;s not our intention to debunk all comments from the MPAA and Mulligan, but their responses are an illustration of the problem LSE tried to highlight. TorrentFreak spoke with Dr. Bart Cammaert, one of the authors of LSE&#8217;s policy brief, who believes that the industry critique completely misses the point. </p>
<p>&#8220;The main problem here is that the copyright and file sharing debate is waged in a highly ideological fashion. In other words, the industry is itself guilty of the allegations it fields at us. A closer reading of what we actually say in the reports shows furthermore that the industry has misread what we actually say.&#8221; </p>
<p>&#8220;In addition to this, we would argue that in this debate we only really hear the self-interested arguments and skewed figures of the lobby organizations calling for repression. We almost never hear the many counter-arguments to their positions,&#8221; Cammaert tells TorrentFreak.</p>
<p>LSE&#8217;s intention was not to write a definitive piece arguing that piracy doesn&#8217;t have any negative effects. Instead, they wanted to highlight certain points where the industry is misrepresenting what&#8217;s actually happening. </p>
<p>&#8220;Hence, one of the main aims of our policy briefs is to rebalance this and list, document, outline the counter-arguments to this repressive logic and to the same old tune that the internet is killing the video stars. From this perspective, the entertainment industry refuting and taking issue with our findings and conclusions is hardly surprising and as far as we’re concerned totally logical,&#8221; Cammaert adds.</p>
<p>The industry response to LSE&#8217;s brief is perhaps the best reinforcement of the main point the scholars tried to make. That is, review existing copyright law based on objective and independent analysis that strikes a healthy balance among the interests of a range of stakeholders, including copyright holders, Internet Providers and internet users.</p>
<p>The above clearly illustrates that this advice is perhaps more relevant than ever before.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/hollywood-attacks-scholars-who-deny-the-evils-of-piracy-131008/">Hollywood Attacks Scholars Who Deny The Evils of Piracy</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77721
title: MPAA Private Investigators Bust ‘Gravity’ Pirates
uri: MPAA-Private-Investigators-Bust-Gravity-Pirates
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/R8ajD4-91yo/
content:
<p><a href="media/94cae5ce.rsz_gravity-movie-poster.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/rsz_gravity-movie-poster.jpg"><img src="media/94cae5ce.rsz_gravity-movie-poster.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/rsz_gravity-movie-poster.jpg" alt="rsz_gravity-movie-poster" width="165" height="244" class="alignright size-full wp-image-77736" /></a>As Internet speeds and available bandwidth have increased along with a thirst for high quality video on super-large screens, thirst for &#8216;cammed&#8217; copies of movies has died down somewhat. Nevertheless, there are still those who are prepared to take risks to capture the latest blockbuster.</p>
<p>Opening weekends, where demand for big titles is greatest, has always been a popular time for pirates to try and grab a copy. But for the men recording the Sandra Bullock and George Clooney movie &#8216;Gravity&#8217; in a Michigan theater last Sunday, things went pretty badly.</p>
<p>Unknown to the men, both from Detroit and aged 48 and 49, they were sharing the theater with private investigators hired by the MPAA. The P.I.s watched the men set up their camera and start recording after using a baseball cap and a towel to cover the device.</p>
<p>As can be seen from the image below, the camera was fitted with a clamp so that it could be attached to an arm rest or possibly the back of a seat.</p>
<p><center><br />
<h1>Camcorder with clamp used by pirates (image: <a href="http://www.wxyz.com/dpp/news/bootleggers-caught-filming-movies-in-clinton-township">ABC</a>)</h1>
<p><img src="media/7a36dd72.rsz_cam.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/rsz_cam.jpg" alt="CAM" /></center></p>
<p>So was it pure chance that the investigators were on site? According to John Coghlan, an MPAA investigator from New York in charge of the investigation, the pair were already under surveillance. Thanks to their previous activity and watermarks present in the copies, the MPAA were able to trace them to the exact theater.</p>
<p>“They did several movies before,” Coghlan <a href="http://www.macombdaily.com/general-news/20131007/movie-bootleggers-caught-at-amc-star-gratiot-in-clinton-township">said</a>.</p>
<p>The men are currently out on bail and may well be coming to the conclusion that going back to the same theater time and again wasn&#8217;t the best strategy, especially on opening weekends.</p>
<p>During the last decade recording movies in theaters became a pretty big deal. Hundreds of big movies were recorded and uploaded to the Internet, creating an online feast for movie pirates.</p>
<p>However, after the introduction of the Family Entertainment and Copyright Act in 2005, &#8216;camming&#8217; became an extremely risky act in the United States, with first time offenders facing up to three years in jail and six years for those who don&#8217;t get the message first time round.</p>
<p>Of course, United States legislation has little bearing on pirates determined to record movies in other countries and in respect of Gravity this is appears to have happened this past weekend.</p>
<p>Copies are now surfacing online which have Russian and Spanish audio, so all that remains is for someone to record the English audio (much easier than capturing the video) and splice it to the foreign video. That will happen very soon indeed.</p>
<p><center><br />
<h1>Screenshot of Russian pirate Gravity &#8211; honest</h1>
<p><img src="media/451f3cbd.gravityss.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/gravityss.jpg" alt="Gravityss" /></center></p>
<p>That said, why anyone would do so is open to question. A stunning 2013 movie like Gravity really deserves to be seen as the makers intended, not on some terrible cam copy that takes us back 50 years.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/mpaa-private-investigators-bust-gravity-pirates-131008/">MPAA Private Investigators Bust &#8216;Gravity&#8217; Pirates</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77824
title: Police Dramatize ‘$445 Million’ Pirate Movie Site Raid
uri: Police-Dramatize-445-Million-Pirate-Movie-Site-Raid
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/FkC-rQzlyTk/
content:
<p><img src="media/3df2fe22.guardia.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/guardia.jpg" width="225" height="150" class="alignright" />Following the raids on Megaupload in January 2012, some pretty big figures were thrown around in respect of the alleged damages the site had caused copyright holders.</p>
<p>The general consensus of those rallying against the site was that Megaupload, a site that accounted for around 4% of all Internet traffic and dominated the online storage space, cost Hollywood around $500 million during its many years of operation.</p>
<p>This was the big one, the U.S. Government said, the world&#8217;s most notorious file-hosting site. But unknown to them in the depths of Europe a formidable new online piracy force was waiting to be unleashed.</p>
<p>According to the Guardia di Finanza (GdF), a department under Italy’s Ministry of Economy and Finance tasked with dealing with financial crime, the damage caused to the movie industry since the portal&#8217;s launch in 2012 has been enormous.</p>
<p>By offering Hollywood blockbusters and first-run movies illegally, in just over 12 months the operation netted more than 240 million visits resulting in 80 million unauthorized movie viewings. According to Italy&#8217;s leading copyright protection group <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_Society_of_Authors_and_Publishers">SIAE</a>, the losses were incredible.</p>
<p>&#8220;The damage, attributable to the non-collection for the film sector, according to estimates by the SIAE, amounted to about 330 million euros [$445m], with negative consequences on employment, huge losses for the treasury and inevitable repercussions on the country&#8217;s health,&#8221; the Guardia di Finanza said.</p>
<p>Yesterday, the GdF ran out of patience and raided the &#8220;operational headquarters&#8221; of the organization behind this piracy behemoth, taking their cameras along for the ride. Upon viewing the footage it doesn&#8217;t take long for the gloss to come off both the headlines and the wild claims of losses.</p>
<p>While the video (complete with flashing lights while the supposed pirate kingpin appears to be spirited back to GdF headquarters) is particularly poor, the claims of seizures of substantial quantities of &#8220;new generation computer equipment&#8221; aren&#8217;t backed up by the content either. </p>
<p>But always of most concern is when sites apparently as large as these are raided but not named by the authorities. We did some digging around and armed with the information that the site&#8217;s domains were ordered to be seized, we spoke with Marco d’Itri who runs <a href="http://censura.bofh.it/elenchi.html">Osservatorio Censura</a>, a site dedicated to reporting on Italian web censorship, to try and find out some names.</p>
<p>&#8220;It has to be Casacinemas.com,&#8221; d&#8217;Itri told TorrentFreak.</p>
<p>Casacinemas is indeed a movie streaming portal and the pieces all fitted together. The operation against the site (which was indeed founded in 2012) took place in Verona and the only domain seizure order coming out of Verona is for Casacinemas. GdF revealed that the site&#8217;s admin was from Moldova, and that&#8217;s where Casacinemas was hosted.</p>
<p>So now to the wild claims of losses &#8211; do they hold water? Frankly &#8211; no.</p>
<p>Casacinemas was fairly popular in Italy, currently ranked 574th most popular site in the region by Alexa, but no way was it pulling in the claimed number of visits. Making the figures even more ridiculous is that around 86% of the site&#8217;s visitors were from Italy. This means that if the police figures are to be believed, every man, woman and child in Italy separately watched at least one movie on the site in the last 12 months.</p>
<p>Finally, another reason for not naming the site. Despite apparently getting their man and seizing Casacinemas.com, the site remains up at Casacinemas.in, ready to cost another half a billion dollars by this time next year.</p>
<p>&#8220;Investigations are continuing and, at the moment, we can not rule out further developments,&#8221; GdF conclude.</p>
<p>Enjoy the video.</p>
<p><center><iframe width="500" height="281" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/WuRWH2RL1qE" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></center></p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/police-dramatize-445-million-pirate-movie-site-raid-131009/">Police Dramatize &#8216;$445 Million&#8217; Pirate Movie Site Raid</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77800
title: UK Police Orders Registrars to Suspend Domains of Major Torrent Sites
uri: UK-Police-Orders-Registrars-to-Suspend-Domains-of-Major-Torrent-Sites
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/ykTQ15JabHA/
content:
<p><img src="media/31176dbb.cityoflondonpolice.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/cityoflondonpolice.jpg" align="right" alt="city of london police" />Earlier this year UK police began working with rightsholders on a campaign <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/uk-police-launch-campaign-to-shut-down-torrent-sites-130604/">to shut down file-sharing sites</a>. Many site operators received warnings that their activities were breaching copyright law as well as the UK’s Serious Crime Act. </p>
<p>The actions yielded some success as a few smaller sites closed their doors. However, the major targets were unfazed by the police demands and continued business as usual. </p>
<p>This week the <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/uk-government-announces-new-intellectual-property-crime-unit-130628/">newly founded</a> Intellectual Property Crime Unit (PIPCU) of the City of London Police stepped up its efforts and instead of targeting the site owners, they contacted their domain registrars. In a carefully worded <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/174692661/police-letter-to-registrar">letter</a> the police warn that the sites in question may be copyright-infringing. </p>
<p>&#8220;The  owners  of  the  aforementioned  domains  are  suspected  to  be  involved  in  the  criminal distribution of copyrighted material either directly or indirectly and are liable to prosecution under UK law for the following offences: Conspiracy to Defraud, Offences under the Fraud Act 2006, Copyright, Design &#038; Patents Act 1988,&#8221; the letter states.</p>
<p>&#8220;Should a conviction be brought  for the above offences,  UK courts may impose sentences of imprisonment and/or fines. PIPCU has criminal and civil powers in UK law to seize money, belongings and any property in connection with these offences.&#8221;</p>
<p><center><a href="media/663a66ca.grounds.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/grounds.png"><img src="media/663a66ca.grounds.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/grounds.png" alt="grounds" width="578" height="340" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77805" /></a></center></p>
<p>There is no reference to an active court order that requires the registrar to take action, but the police unit instead points at the obligations the registrars have. Among other things, the letter lists a possible breach of ICANN policy and a violation of the registrars&#8217; own Terms of Services as a validation for the suspension.</p>
<p>The letters were sent to the registrars of dozens of domain names and the fallout is already visible. TorrentFreak spoke to the owner of SumoTorrent.com who confirmed that his domain was suspended yesterday. The site quickly moved to <a href="http://www.SumoTorrent.sx">SumoTorrent.sx</a>, but lost a lot of traffic in the process. </p>
<p>MisterTorrent.me was also suspended after the registrar received the police letter, and ExtraTorrent&#8217;s .com domain presumably suffered that same fate. </p>
<p>With millions of visitors a day ExtraTorrent is the biggest casualty so far. TorrentFreak talked to the operator who couldn&#8217;t yet confirm that City of London Police are behind the suspension, but this seems very likely. For now the site has moved to ExtraTorrent.cc which is still operational.</p>
<p>Not all domain name registrars are blindly complying with the demands of the Intellectual Property Crime Unit. Canada-based <a href="http://easydns.com">easyDNS</a> is refusing to suspend TorrentPond&#8217;s domain, describing the police request as overbroad and unfounded as there is no hint of due process.</p>
<p>&#8220;Who decides what is illegal? What makes somebody a criminal?  Given that the subtext of the request contains a threat to refer the matter to ICANN if we don&#8217;t play along, this is a non-trivial question,&#8221; easyDNS&#8217; CEO Mark <a href="http://blog.easydns.org/2013/10/08/whatever-happened-to-due-process/">Jeftovic responds</a>.</p>
<p>&#8220;Correct me if I&#8217;m wrong, but I always thought it was something that gets decided in a court of law, as opposed to &#8216;some guy on the internet&#8217; sending emails. While that&#8217;s plenty reason enough for some registrars to take down domain names, it doesn&#8217;t fly here,&#8221; he adds.</p>
<p>It&#8217;s unclear how many sites were targeted by the police letter but it&#8217;s not unlikely that more registrars will take action during the hours to come. The police letter recommends the registrars to act within 48 hours and asks the companies to &#8220;consider their liability.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;Suspension of the domain(s) is intended to prevent further crime. Where possible we request that domain suspension(s) are made within 48 hours of receipt of this Alert. In respect of the information provided by us, we respectfully ask you to consider your liability and the wider public interest should those services be allowed to continue,&#8221; the letter states. </p>
<p>In addition, the registrars are being asked to effectively send the traffic of the torrent sites to a landing page with the City of London Police logo, as well as the logos of their entertainment industry partners. Again, all without citing a court order or specific legal mandate.</p>
<p>&#8220;We request that the aforementioned domain(s) are redirected to the PIPCU Warning Page located at IP address: 83.138.166.114,&#8221; the letter notes.</p>
<p>TorrentFreak asked the City of London Police for the comment on their latest actions but we have not heard back from them. It&#8217;s clear, however, that the cooperation between the entertainment industry and UK law enforcement is serious. </p>
<p>Whether the impact will be lasting has yet to be seen. </p>
<p><strong>Update:</strong> The emails were sent to registrars of other &#8220;pirate&#8221; sites as well, including emp3world.com, full-albums.net and maxalbums.com. We will update this article when more information comes in. </p>
<p><strong>Update:</strong> ExtraTorrent confirms that their domain troubles are related to the same issue.  </p>
<p>&#8220;Our registrar and with no court order or due process got scared of the London Police email and did suspend the domain. We are communicating with the registrar to find a logical solution to this chaos,&#8221; TorrentFreak was told. </p>
<p><center><a href="media/0ab803c9.city-police.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/city-police.jpg"><img src="media/0ab803c9.city-police.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/city-police.jpg" alt="city-police" width="550" height="617" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77801" /></a></center></p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/uk-police-orders-registrars-to-suspend-domains-of-major-torrent-sites-131009/">UK Police Orders Registrars to Suspend Domains of Major Torrent Sites</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77722
title: MPAA Screws Up Torrent Evidence in isoHunt Trial
uri: MPAA-Screws-Up-Torrent-Evidence-in-isoHunt-Trial
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/cvJazcipt9k/
content:
<p><a href="media/affdc09e.evidence1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/evidence1.jpg"><img src="media/affdc09e.evidence1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/evidence1.jpg" alt="evidence" width="200" height="198" class="alignright size-full wp-image-58268" /></a>For more than seven years isoHunt and the MPAA have been battling it out in court.</p>
<p>After the District Court ruling against the torrent site <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/isohunt-loses-appeal-against-the-mpaa-keyword-filter-remains-130321/">was affirmed</a> in March, the case is now moving towards a trial next month from which the movie industry hopes to win <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/mpaa-wants-up-to-750-million-in-damages-from-isohunt-130729/">hundreds of millions</a> in statutory damages.</p>
<p>To secure this amount the MPAA has to prove direct infringement and show that United States users either uploaded or downloaded copyrighted works. In addition, they have to show that they are the rightful owners of the files in question. The movie studios want to settle these issues before trial and recently submitted a <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/175112417/mpaa-mot">motion for summary judgment</a> as well as supporting evidence. </p>
<p>However, isoHunt&#8217;s legal team is now pointing out that the evidence is not only far from conclusive but in some accounts completely inaccurate.</p>
<p>The MPAA initially listed 3,947 files, all movies and TV-shows, which means that the total damages isoHunt faces is as high as $592,050,000. To prove that isoHunt was offering these copyrighted files the MPAA hired Bruce Ward, owner of the consulting firm IP Intelligence. Ward <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/175112829/ward">identified the &#8220;infringing&#8221; torrents</a> by searching through a copy of the isoHunt database from 2007. He then loaded the torrents into a BitTorrent client and transferred the downloaded files onto a hard drive. </p>
<p>The hard drive was subsequently sent to the movie studios to confirm that the downloaded files were indeed the infringing files listed as evidence. While this sounds like a solid process, something went seriously wrong somewhere down the line. </p>
<p>After all the files were identified the MPAA sent the hard drive with the infringing content to isoHunt&#8217;s legal team. On the drive were the torrent files and related videos categorized in folders, each with a unique id number (BT_ID) associated with the movie IDs on the list of titles isoHunt is accused of infringing.  </p>
<p>However, when isoHunt&#8217;s legal team inspected the contents of the drive it turned out to be quite a mess, as the torrent files were not all linked to the right files. </p>
<p>&#8220;Plaintiffs’ BT_ID List identifies dot-torrent file 2224 as corresponding to Plaintiffs’ work &#8216;Legends of the Fall.&#8217; Plaintiffs produced a copy of a dot-torrent file named &#8217;2224.torrent&#8217; on September 19, 2013. But opening the dot-torrent file &#8217;2224.torrent&#8217; in a BitTorrent client causes it to begin attempting to download a copy of a work entitled &#8216;Buddha Bar – Vol 4&#8242;,&#8221; isoHunt&#8217;s legal team <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/175113089/Evid">explains</a> to the court.</p>
<p>The mismatch between the titles provided by the MPAA and what the torrent files link to is not an isolated incident. isoHunt&#8217;s legal team has found several other examples, even though they only looked at a small selection of the files that were provided. They were unable to download all of the files in question, so they couldn&#8217;t check the actual videos.</p>
<p>In one case isoHunt&#8217;s team was able to download a torrent, but instead of the movie “Lords of Dogtown” it was linked to an MP3 album. </p>
<p>&#8220;On September 28, 2013, I launched the dot-torrent file &#8217;16170.torrent&#8217; using the BitTorrent client uTorrent, which downloaded eighteen files from the Internet. I reviewed each of the files and determined that none of them is the movie &#8216;Lords of Dogtown&#8217;,&#8221; isoHunt&#8217;s attorney writes. </p>
<p>&#8220;Indeed, none of the files is a video file. Rather, the downloaded files comprise sixteen mp3 audio files, an m3u file, a .sfv file, and a .nfo file that contains textual information about the audio files. Launching the 16170.torrent file using a BitTorrent client results in a download of audio files identical to the content files Plaintiffs actually produced on their hard drive on September 19, 2013.&#8221;</p>
<p>The attorney doesn&#8217;t mention the name of the album in question, but it seems plausible that the MPAA confused the &#8220;Lords of Dogtown&#8221; film with the soundtrack. In any case, isoHunt&#8217;s team argues that it is far from clear that the provided evidence is sufficient to prove that all torrents link to the movies and TV-shows the MPAA lists as evidence. </p>
<p>isoHunt&#8217;s legal team further notes that MPAA&#8217;s method to determine the location of isoHunt downloaders contains a pretty significant flaw. In his report, the MPAA&#8217;s expert notes that he used a geolocation tool to lookup the redacted IP-addresses of downloaders from isoHunt&#8217;s 2007 log. </p>
<p>The report concludes that at least one U.S. IP-address is linked to each of the downloads, but apparently the investigator used a recent IP-location database to determine that. This would be a problem, since an IP-address that was previously in use by a U.S. Internet provider might be used by an ISP in a different country today. </p>
<p>&#8220;Plaintiffs’ analysis of direct infringements also relies on geo-location data that does not cover the time periods at issue, such that their conclusions about the locations of purported downloaders are unreliable,&#8221; isoHunt&#8217;s legal team points out.  </p>
<p>Based on the above and several other arguments isoHunt is now asking the court to reject the MPAA&#8217;s motion for summary judgment and reserve these issues for the upcoming trial. It&#8217;s now up to the judge to decide whether the MPAA&#8217;s evidence is good enough, or whether it requires a review during the trial. </p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/mpaa-screws-up-torrent-evidence-in-isohunt-trial-131010/">MPAA Screws Up Torrent Evidence in isoHunt Trial</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77848
title: ExtraTorrent Threatens Legal Action Over Police-Ordered Domain Seizure
uri: ExtraTorrent-Threatens-Legal-Action-Over-Police-Ordered-Domain-Seizure
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/va3PH782j8M/
content:
<p><img src="media/31176dbb.cityoflondonpolice.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/cityoflondonpolice.jpg" width="200" height="82" class="alignright" />Yesterday it became apparent that the newly-founded <a href="http://www.cityoflondon.police.uk/CityPolice/Departments/ECD/PIPCU/">Intellectual Property Crime Unit</a> of the City of London Police had deepened its campaign against some of the world&#8217;s largest torrent sites.</p>
<p>The unit has been in operation for some time, but until this week the only immediate signs of its existence were the <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/uk-police-launch-campaign-to-shut-down-torrent-sites-130604/">threatening letters</a> sent out to sites a few months ago. Now the unit is sending letters to domain registrars asking them to suspend the domains of sites that the police &#8211; and their Hollywood and music industry partners &#8211; say are copyright-infringing criminal organizations.</p>
<p>&#8220;Say&#8221; is the key word here. There appears to be no court orders and no due process, something that was condemned yesterday by EasyDNS, a registrar approached by the police to suspend the domain of meta-search engine TorrentPond. The Canada-based company refused to do so and <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/uk-police-orders-registrars-to-suspend-domains-of-major-torrent-sites-131009/">published the letter</a> from the police instead.</p>
<p>For half a dozen sites it was already too late. ExtraTorrent, SumoTorrent, MisterTorrent and MP3 sites emp3world.com, full-albums.net and maxalbums.com, all had action taken against their domains this week. However, at least one will be fighting back.</p>
<p>At the start of 2013 ExtraTorrent was the <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/top-10-most-popular-torrent-sites-of-2013-130106/">5th largest</a> torrent site in the world so the fact that the police decided to target the site is significant. Its owners are annoyed to say the least, particularly with <a href="http://www.publicdomainregistry.com/">PDR Ltd</a> (Public Domain Registry), the registrar that suspended ExtraTorrent&#8217;s .com domain and also those belonging to the previously mentioned MP3 sites.</p>
<p><a href="media/30b6392a.extratorrent.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/extratorrent.jpg"><img src="media/30b6392a.extratorrent.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/extratorrent.jpg" alt="extratorrent" width="180" height="110" class="alignright size-full wp-image-77858" /></a>&#8220;After contacting PDR [after the suspension] they kept giving us funny replies but finally gave us a copy of the PDF file sent by the London Police,&#8221; ExtraTorrent told TorrentFreak.</p>
<p>&#8220;This was even more funny than the rest of the communications we had with PDR Ltd because it turned out that the suspension was solely and willfully under the discretion of the registrar and with no legal basis.&#8221;</p>
<p>ExtraTorrent says that they view the police correspondence, which suggested ways in which a website could be in breach of the registrar&#8217;s own ToS, as &#8220;guidance&#8221; to PDR Ltd on how to suspend a website domain in the absence of any due process.</p>
<p>&#8220;PDR Ltd didn&#8217;t even think of spending more time on understanding the content of the email sent by London Police. Basically they just got scared and did what was asked of them even with no legal implications indicated by the sender. The police were dictating to registrars what to do and how to do it their way,&#8221; ExtraTorrent explains.</p>
<p>ExtraTorrent remains operational at ExtraTorrent.cc but the site believes that it should fight back in order to regain control over its .com domain.</p>
<p>&#8220;We are going to fight this action legally if needed,&#8221; the site concludes.</p>
<p>After the news of the suspensions spread yesterday much of the criticism transcended the issues of copyright infringement or whether or not any of the sites had committed any offenses as claimed by the police. The general consensus among critics is that if sites are indeed guilty of a crime then it should be a court&#8217;s responsibility to order action to be taken.</p>
<p>TorrentFreak spoke with City of London Police yesterday and asked if it was normal to take this kind of action without court orders. We were informed that more information would be made available in the coming weeks. </p>
<p>It goes without saying that domain names and domain name servers are a crucial part of what makes the Internet tick. Little surprise then that there are concerns when copyright holders with police backing decide to meddle with them without the expected formalities.</p>
<p>As <a href="http://blog.easydns.org/2010/11/27/first-they-came-for-the-file-sharing-domains/">pointed out</a> by EasyDNS, first they came for the file-sharing websites&#8230;.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/extratorrent-threatens-legal-action-over-police-ordered-domain-seizure-131010/">ExtraTorrent Threatens Legal Action Over Police-Ordered Domain Seizure</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77898
title: Canada Wants VPNs to Log and Warn Pirating Customers
uri: Canada-Wants-VPNs-to-Log-and-Warn-Pirating-Customers
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/u7NVMseNWQk/
content:
<p><img src="media/f408e481.cameraspy.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/cameraspy.jpg" alt="cameraspy" width="170" height="164" class="alignright size-full wp-image-49625" />Late last year the first provisions of Canada&#8217;s long awaited Copyright Modernization Act were implemented. </p>
<p>While the <a href="http://www.parl.gc.ca/About/Parliament/LegislativeSummaries/bills_ls.asp?ls=c11&#038;Parl=41&#038;Ses=1">new law</a> introduces <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/canadians-better-protected-from-copywrath-starting-today-121107/">great improvements</a> in terms of fair use and non-commercial file-sharing, the &#8220;notice-and-notice&#8221; provisions are more problematic, especially for VPN providers and their customers. </p>
<p>Under the new law Internet providers and <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/vpn-services-that-take-your-anonymity-seriously-2013-edition-130302/">VPN services</a> <a href="http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/6967/125/">are required to forward</a> copyright notices they receive from rightsholders to their customers. To be able to do so, the companies have to retain access logs for a minimum of six months so the pirating customers can be identified. Providers who do not comply face damages up to $10,000.</p>
<p>Specifically, the law requires providers to &#8220;[...] <em>retain records that will allow the identity of the person to whom the electronic location belongs to be determined, and do so for six months</em> [...].&#8221; Failing to forward a notice may result in &#8220;[...] <em>statutory damages in an amount that the court considers just, but not less than $5,000 and not more than $10,000</em> [...].&#8221;</p>
<p>The new logging requirements in combination with a notice policy and fines are a disaster for VPN providers, and that&#8217;s not an overstatement. </p>
<p>The mandatory data retention is expected to lead to a customer exodus as it makes it impossible for providers to guarantee people&#8217;s anonymity, <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/vpn-services-that-take-your-anonymity-seriously-2013-edition-130302/">a key feature of any VPN service</a>.</p>
<p>In addition, it will require VPN providers to implement an extensive logging and notice policy to deal with takedown notices. This will prove to be quite costly or simply impossible, especially for smaller companies that are sometimes run by individuals. </p>
<p>For example, many VPN providers assign shared IP-addresses to their customers, so even if they wanted to there is no option to accurately identify a copyright infringer. For these companies the only option will be to shut down, or move the company outside of Canada. </p>
<p>TorrentFreak contacted University of Ottawa professor Michael Geist, who signals two main issues for VPN providers. On the one hand there are the resources that come with the implementation of the new provisions, and on the other there is the privacy issue for VPN users.</p>
<p>&#8220;First, are the resources needed to comply with a notice-and-notice system. These can be significant and it is disappointing that the government has decided not to consult on potential fees for notices. The law gives them the right to establish a fee, but it seems as if they will not do so, at the last for the time being,&#8221; Geist tells TorrentFreak. </p>
<p>&#8220;Second, on the privacy issue, notice-and-notice does not require disclosure of the identity of the subscriber. The additional logging of user information does create a new privacy issue, however.  This is particularly sensitive given the recent Snowden disclosures and the growing interest among Internet users to safeguard their privacy.&#8221;</p>
<p>In a blog post Geist further <a href="http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/6967/125/">highlights</a> that the Government&#8217;s tone on the notice-and-takedown provisions recently shifted. Initially it was meant to be balanced and functional for both copyright owners and internet intermediaries, but the scale has slowly tipped towards the interest of copyright holders.</p>
<p>&#8220;It is our goal that a system be in place that is both balanced and functional; but, most importantly, it must endeavour to deter infringement,&#8221; the latest version reads.  </p>
<p>The Canadian Government currently invites stakeholders to voice their opinions through the <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/175287948/Consultation-Letter-Lettre-de-Consultation">public consultation</a>, and it might be wise for VPN providers and users to voice their concerns. There is currently no date set for the implementation of the notice-and-notice provisions.   </p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/canada-wants-vpns-to-log-and-warn-pirating-customers-131011/">Canada Wants VPNs to Log and Warn Pirating Customers</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77885
title: Seized Torrent Domains Must Be Released Says Domain Registrar
uri: Seized-Torrent-Domains-Must-Be-Released-Says-Domain-Registrar
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/k09e6G3RyBE/
content:
<p><img src="media/31176dbb.cityoflondonpolice.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/cityoflondonpolice.jpg" width="200" height="82" class="alignright" />Earlier this week it became apparent that City of London Police had approached certain domain registrars with demands that they should suspend the domains of various torrent and other file-sharing sites. Among them were ExtraTorrent and SumoTorrent, some of the largest indexes on the web today.</p>
<p>There appeared to be no legal basis for the requests, something which <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/uk-police-orders-registrars-to-suspend-domains-of-major-torrent-sites-131009/">outraged</a> Canada-based EasyDNS who refused to comply with a suspension request for meta-search engine TorrentPond.com</p>
<p>To get the lowdown on the latest developments and in order to be absolutely sure that there is no formal legal process underway, TorrentFreak spoke with City of London Police. They told us that in the summer they began a campaign to target websites &#8220;that attract visitors by providing unauthorised access to copyrighted content for criminal gain&#8221; and that the project is now in new hands.</p>
<p>&#8220;In September the project was taken on by the City of London Police&#8217;s new Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit [PIPCU], which has been set up to target serious and organized intellectual property crime affecting physical and digital goods, with a specific focus on offences committed online,&#8221; a spokesman confirmed.</p>
<p>&#8220;The latest stage of Operation Creative, as it is now known, involves contacting registrars whose website domains have been identified as involved in facilitating criminal copyright infringement under UK law and as result are potentially breaching the terms and conditions of the registrars. PIPCU are then requesting the registrars adhere to their terms and conditions and take consideration to suspending the supplied domain.&#8221;</p>
<p>So, while the police are stating that the domain registrars are involved in facilitating a crime, there is no formal legal process which establishes either that or whether the torrent and other file-sharing sites involved are actually illegal under UK law.</p>
<p>Given the status of The Pirate Bay and sites like KickassTorrents in the UK it&#8217;s certainly possible they are, but none of the sites are based in the UK.</p>
<p>Legal certainty would of course be of some comfort to registrars trying to decide the best course of action in these cases. However, for PDR Ltd, the company we yesterday <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/extratorrent-threatens-legal-action-over-police-ordered-domain-seizure-131010/">revealed</a> as suspending the domains of ExtraTorrent and three other MP3 sites, no such reassurance was needed.</p>
<p>So far PDR Ltd have failed to respond to our requests for comment, but according to <a href="http://blog.easydns.org/2013/10/10/registrars-that-complied-with-shakedown-requests-may-now-be-in-violation-of-icann-transfers-policy/">Mark Jeftovic</a> of EasyDNS, they may now need to think again.</p>
<p>&#8220;Any of those registrars that actually complied with the UK requests to bring down the torrent domains *must* allow those domains to simply transfer out, or they themselves will be in violation of the ICANN transfers policy,&#8221; Jeftovic told TorrentFreak this morning.</p>
<p>The problem is that the suspended domains are effectively seized and out of the control of their owners. This, Jeftovic notes, leaves the registrar exposed to the wrath of <a href="http://www.icann.org/en/about/welcome">ICANN</a>. </p>
<p>&#8220;Since there were no charges against any of the domains and no court orders, it may be at the registrars&#8217; discretion to play ball with these ridiculous demands. However – what they clearly cannot do now, is prevent any of those domain holders from simply transferring out their names to more clueful, less wimpy registrars,&#8221; Jeftovic explains.</p>
<p>&#8220;If any of those registrars denied the ability to do that, then they would be in clear violation of the ICANN Inter-Registrars Transfer Policy.&#8221;</p>
<p>According to that policy, registrars can only take a domain when it was paid for fraudulently or is the subject of a &#8220;court order by a court of competent jurisdiction.&#8221; As already established, one of those doesn&#8217;t exist.</p>
<p>This means that domain owners who refuse a transferral of a domain to a new registrar will open themselves up to further action under ICANN&#8217;s Transfer Dispute Resolution Policy, a battle Jeftovic predicts they will lose.</p>
<p>&#8220;This is why it is never a good idea to just react to pressure in the face of obnoxious bluster – in the very act of trying to diffuse any perceived culpability you end up opening yourself to real liability,&#8221; the EasyDNS CEO concludes. </p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/seized-torrent-domains-must-be-released-says-domain-registrar-131011/">Seized Torrent Domains Must Be Released Says Domain Registrar</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77723
title: 20th Century Fox Sues “Rogue” Movie Theater in Oregon
uri: 20th-Century-Fox-Sues-Rogue-Movie-Theater-in-Oregon
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/2zGmNwx6F64/
content:
<p><a href="media/a5a3df11.rogue-theater.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/rogue-theater.jpg"><img src="media/a5a3df11.rogue-theater.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/rogue-theater.jpg" alt="rogue-theater" width="180" height="271" class="alignright size-full wp-image-77753" /></a>Generally speaking movie theaters are the oil of the movie industry, generating billions of dollars in revenue each year. </p>
<p>However, it appears that not all theaters are playing along with Hollywood&#8217;s rules. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.roguetheatre.com/index.html">Rogue Theatre</a> in Oregon is not a classic movie theater but describes itself as a regional non-profit performing arts center. As such it hosts cultural events, including theater, concerts and film screenings. </p>
<p>One of its events is the yearly screening of the cult movie &#8216;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rocky_Horror_Picture_Show">The Rocky Horror Picture Show</a>&#8216; around Halloween. Although the film is nearly 40 years old it still has a dedicated fan-base, many of whom dress up in costume <a href="http://www.rockyhorror.com/participation/virgins.php">to participate live</a>. </p>
<p>The Halloween screenings have been quite successful, but according to 20th Century Fox there is one problem. Apparently, The Rogue Theatre never bothered to license its screenings and is therefore infringing on the copyrights of the movie studio.</p>
<p>This week Fox <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/174453345">filed a complaint</a> at a federal court in Oregon demanding compensation for Rogue&#8217;s defiant acts. According to the complaint, the movie studio first warned the theater three years ago. Despite multiple warnings, the screenings haven&#8217;t stopped.  </p>
<p>&#8220;Fox first learned of Rogue’s infringing conduct in or around October 2010, and promptly notified Rogue in writing that its exhibition of the Film infringed Fox’s copyright in the Film. Rogue did not respond, and, on information and belief, proceeded with its scheduled exhibition.&#8221; </p>
<p>&#8220;Since 2010, Fox has repeatedly warned Rogue that any further exhibitions could subject Rogue to copyright liability. Despite these warnings, Rogue has refused to cease its infringing conduct&#8221;</p>
<p>The Rogue Theatre is currently promoting yet another screening of the Rocky Horror Picture Show on October 25 and 26. When Fox found out last month it sent letters to the theater’s president, directors, and secretary, ordering them to cease and desist from their planned unauthorized screening. There was no response.</p>
<p>The movie studio subsequently felt it had no other option than to ask the court to stop the screenings and award $150,000 in statutory damages plus all loss in profits. </p>
<p>&#8220;[Fox demands] damages in an amount sufficient to fairly compensate it for the injury it has sustained, plus all the profits attributable to Rogue’s infringement of the copyright in the Film, and further that the amount of the monetary award granted herein be increased by $150,000 in view of the willful and deliberate nature of Rogue’s unlawful conduct.&#8221;</p>
<p>For Fox the Rocky Horror Picture Show is certainly an asset worth protecting. With a budget of $1.4 million the movie generated $175 million in box office revenue, even without the sums generated from Rogue&#8217;s unauthorized screenings. </p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/20th-century-fox-sues-rogue-movie-theater-in-oregon-131012/">20th Century Fox Sues &#8220;Rogue&#8221; Movie Theater in Oregon</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77928
title: Minister: Government Will Censor All 160 Russian ‘Pirate’ Sites
uri: Minister-Government-Will-Censor-All-160-Russian-Pirate-Sites
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/ZwNuu-PpE-k/
content:
<p><a href="media/83799112.russsopa.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/russsopa.jpg"><img src="media/83799112.russsopa.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/russsopa.jpg" alt="russsopa" width="180" height="212" class="alignright size-full wp-image-72488" /></a>Just over two months ago Russia made some of its strongest steps yet against online piracy by introducing a formal system for rightsholders to have unauthorized content, or links to content, taken offline.</p>
<p>The system, dubbed Russia&#8217;s SOPA, forces sites to comply with copyright complaints in a swift manner or face their domains being added to a national blacklist. Being added to that register is a serious business, since all local ISPs are expected to blacklist corresponding IP addresses so that local Internet users cannot gain access.</p>
<p><a href="http://torrentfreak.com/russia-to-punish-isps-search-engines-users-over-content-blocking-130904/">Proposals</a> put forward last month upped the ante again, with any service provider or search engine not blocking sites on the blacklist potentially facing fines of around $30,000.</p>
<p>But according to comments coming out of the Government yesterday, Russia appears to be taking its anti-piracy initiative to the next level and beyond, fully living up to its &#8216;SOPA&#8217; billing.</p>
<p>Ministry of Communications deputy head Alexei Volin said that Russia now intends to compartmentalize sites that are dedicated to piracy. They will be treated completely differently from other sites, such as YouTube etc, who may have an infringement problem but respond to copyright holders positively.</p>
<p>&#8220;There are a conscientious and diligent owners of websites, to which some people upload illegal or dangerous content. When it comes to this sort of thing, we order blocks of URLs and individual pages,&#8221; Volin <a href="http://www.19rus.info/news/114903.html">said</a>.</p>
<p>&#8220;However, there are some specialized and entirely pornographic sites that are entirely blocked by IP address. The same principle will be observed in respect of torrents and sites engaged in outright piracy,&#8221; the minister added.</p>
<p>&#8220;We will not block them for some particular things, we&#8217;ll close them entirely by IP address,&#8221; Volin said.</p>
<p>According to the minister there are around 160 local sites, ten of them very popular, that are causing serious concerns for the entertainment industries. Dealing with these, he says, can be a positive for the economy.</p>
<p>&#8220;There are [around 8 million] people who pay money for the legal content that they get on the Internet. These are the users who are one of the growth drivers of the Internet economy,&#8221; Volin said, adding that even pirates will spend when the circumstances are right.</p>
<p>&#8220;People on the Internet are willing to pay, especially when the content is useful, available and at a fair price,&#8221; he concludes.</p>
<p>Right at this moment it is unclear how the system will be implemented and on what basis. Presumably some kind of &#8216;pirate&#8217; list already exists but whether sites will be blocked without further discussion or will have to fall foul of future complaints is not known. </p>
<p>Whatever the outcome, sites like RuTracker.org will probably be a priority target, despite claims from the site&#8217;s operators that they comply with takedown requests.</p>
<p>The site has around 13.4 million registered users, 3.5 million of them active in the past year. It hosts close to 1.5 million torrent files and is currently the 14th most-popular site in Russia. It&#8217;s proven resilient so far and last month celebrated its 9th birthday, but only time will tell what the future holds.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/minister-government-will-censor-all-160-russian-pirate-sites-131012/">Minister: Government Will Censor All 160 Russian &#8216;Pirate&#8217; Sites</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77917
title: BitTorrent Inc. Doesn’t Care About Your Privacy, Not Always
uri: BitTorrent-Inc-Doesn-t-Care-About-Your-Privacy-Not-Always
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/msA0Hhrq0Po/
content:
<p><a href="media/b7ca5e79.bittorrent-nsa.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/bittorrent-nsa.jpg"><img src="media/b7ca5e79.bittorrent-nsa.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/bittorrent-nsa.jpg" alt="bittorrent-nsa" width="250" height="181" class="alignright size-full wp-image-77920" /></a>This week BitTorrent Inc. surprised friend and foe with a brilliant marketing campaign. </p>
<p>The company, known for the popular file-sharing applications uTorrent and BitTorrent, <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/bittorrent-mastermind-controversial-nsa-billboard-campaign-131008/">put up shocking billboards</a> in three major metropolitan areas. </p>
<p>One of the slogans displayed the spooky message &#8220;Your Data Should Belong To The NSA.&#8221; After a few days this billboard was updated, striking <strike>The NSA</strike> while adding You. </p>
<p>In a blog post BitTorrent&#8217;s marketing president Matt Mason <a href="http://blog.bittorrent.com/2013/10/08/maybe-you-saw-the-signs/">later explained</a> that the company wanted to wake the public up, alerting them to the fact that they have the power to do something about the gross rights violations that were all over the news lately. </p>
<p>&#8220;We’ve chosen to accept surveillance culture: the right of security agencies to violate the Fourth Amendment; to see and store data as they see fit. But these things are just that. They’re choices. And these choices belong to us,&#8221; Mason wrote. </p>
<p>According to Mason privacy is one of the core values of BitTorrent and a means to get away from nasty government surveillance.</p>
<p>&#8220;We’re a company founded on a few simple core values. Uphold user privacy, and user control,&#8221; he writes, adding that &#8220;BitTorrent is a secure, distributed response to the challenge of data surveillance.&#8221;</p>
<p>While these words are music to the ears of many Internet users, they certainly don&#8217;t apply to all BitTorrent products. </p>
<p>In fact, regular BitTorrent transfers through uTorrent or other clients lack any form of privacy. People who share files in public, including BitTorrent&#8217;s artist bundles, display their IP-addresses to the rest of the world and are tracked by dozens of monitoring outfits. </p>
<p>This was also picked up by David Lowery, a well-known musician and respected anti-piracy advocate in the music industry. Lowery was quick to highlight the privacy aspect in an article on the <a href="http://thetrichordist.com/2013/10/10/luddite-artists-point-out-that-bittorrent-doesnt-know-shit-about-their-own-technology/">Trichordist </a>where he slammed BitTorrent for not understanding their own technology. </p>
<p>&#8220;It seems to me that BitTorrent is suggesting that by using their product you are somehow safe from snooping by the NSA. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Nope you aren’t even safe from a so-called luddite musician,&#8221; Lowery writes.</p>
<p>Backing up his argument, Lowery goes on to list the IP-addresses of a few dozens downloaders who were sharing his work via BitTorrent, many using the software provided by the San Francisco company. </p>
<p>&#8220;Apparently BitTorrent doesn’t even understand how it’s own product works. Luddites,&#8221; Lowery notes.</p>
<p>BitTorrent does know its own technology of course, but we have to agree that the company&#8217;s messaging is confusing to say the least. Yes, BitTorrent released a great Sync application earlier this year, which allows people to run a private and secure backup service. But the general public associates BitTorrent with something entirely different &#8211; public downloads.</p>
<p>The billboard campaign and media commentary the company put out this week made no mention of this distinction. This is unfortunate, and perhaps a bit misleading. Not least because more than a <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/hurt-locker-makers-return-to-sue-2514-bittorrent-users-120423/">quarter million torrent users</a> have been sued in the U.S. alone because it&#8217;s so easy to monitor downloaders. </p>
<p>It becomes even more painful when we bring in the fact that BitTorrent refused to accept advertisements from a company that wanted to offer BitTorrent users a bit more privacy. </p>
<p>Earlier this year the company <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/utorrent-and-bittorrent-reject-high-risk-vpn-ads-130506/">refused to run ads</a> for TorGuard, because the VPN-service was considered to be &#8220;high risk&#8221;. The <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/vpn-services-that-take-your-anonymity-seriously-2013-edition-130302/">VPN service</a> would only be welcome when it changed its name, logo, and removed all references to “BitTorrent,” “torrent” and uTorrent from its website.</p>
<p>For a business that claims to have privacy as one of its core values, this is a rather odd stance. But perhaps the privacy principle is only applied selectively, whenever it fits the company&#8217;s business interests.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/bittorrent-doesnt-care-about-your-privacy-not-always-131013/">BitTorrent Inc. Doesn&#8217;t Care About Your Privacy, Not Always</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77968
title: Movie Outfit Asks Google to Censor Its Own Trailer, IMDb and Reviews
uri: Movie-Outfit-Asks-Google-to-Censor-Its-Own-Trailer-IMDb-and-Reviews
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/ySi0A6Jgqwg/
content:
<p><a href="media/0bf08826.face-palm.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/face-palm.jpg"><img src="media/0bf08826.face-palm.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/face-palm.jpg" alt="face-palm" width="200" height="133" class="alignright size-full wp-image-61200" /></a>In an effort to make piracy less visible, copyright holders are sending dozens of millions of takedown notices to Google every month.</p>
<p>Unfortunately not all of these requests are accurate. Because of the high number of often automated notices and the fact that copyright holders don’t check the validity of all requests, this results in questionable takedowns.</p>
<p>This week we stumbled upon a prime example in which Magnolia Pictures asked Google to remove a variety of URLs that are certainly not infringing. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.chillingeffects.org/notice.cgi?sID=1193383">DMCA takedown request</a> lists both a trailer and the IMDb listing of &#8220;Évocateur: The Morton Downey Jr. Movie,&#8221; as well as news articles in The Week and Salon. The same notice also lists the Rotten Tomatoes pages of the movies &#8220;I Give It a Year&#8221; and &#8220;Mr. Nobody,&#8221; as well as a trailer of the movie &#8220;Prince Avalanche.&#8221;</p>
<p><center><br />
<h5>Magnolia Takedown</h5>
<p><a href="media/1249b34e.magnolia-whoops.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/magnolia-whoops.png"><img src="media/1249b34e.magnolia-whoops.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/magnolia-whoops.png" alt="magnolia-whoops" width="556" height="145" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-77972" /></a></center></p>
<p>Unfortunately this notice is not an isolated incident. In another DMCA notice Magnolia Pictures <a href="http://www.chillingeffects.org/notice.cgi?sID=1133304">asked Google</a> to remove a Hollywood Reporter article and several other clearly non-infringing pages.</p>
<p>The good news is that Google appears to have white-listed a few domains, as most of the sites mentioned in the DMCA notice above were not censored. However, less prominent sites may not be so lucky.</p>
<p>As we have mentioned before, the DMCA avalanche is becoming a bigger problem day after day, with Google now removing <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/google-now-taking-down-eight-pirate-links-every-single-second-131005/">more than eight links per second</a>. Since Google and other websites can’t possibly verify every DMCA claim, the problem will only increase as more takedown notices are sent each week.</p>
<p>Right now rightsholders and the anti-piracy outfits they employ have absolutely no incentive to improve the accuracy of their automated takedown systems, so perhaps it’s time for them to be held accountable?</p>
<p>Two weeks ago Microsoft set a great example by <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/microsoft-ditches-anti-piracy-partner-after-embarrassing-dmca-takedowns-130927/">ditching its DMCA partner LeakID</a> after it sent yet another embarrassing takedown request. Perhaps more will follow in the future.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/movie-outfit-asks-google-to-censor-its-own-trailer-imdb-and-reviews-131013/">Movie Outfit Asks Google to Censor Its Own Trailer, IMDb and Reviews</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77986
title: The Copyright Monopoly Can Only Be Enforced With Mass Wiretapping, And Must Therefore Be Torpedoed
uri: The-Copyright-Monopoly-Can-Only-Be-Enforced-With-Mass-Wiretapping-And
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/iGhXDkTkL8g/
content:
<p><a href="media/f408e481.cameraspy.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/cameraspy.jpg"><img src="media/f408e481.cameraspy.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/cameraspy.jpg" alt="cameraspy" width="170" height="164" class="alignright size-full wp-image-49625" /></a>The copyright monopoly debate started with an assertion from the monopolists that &#8220;no artist can make money without having a complete monopoly on every form of distribution&#8221;. </p>
<p>This is obviously false, most easily observed by looking at the millions of works under Creative Commons licenses, where artists have renounced their already-awarded copyright monopoly rights.</p>
<p>When this is pointed out to copyright monopoly fundamentalists, who begrudgingly have to admit the existence of Creative Commons, they frequently shift stances and say it should be up to every individual creator what distribution they would allow of their book, painting, or guitar piece. They argue that the &#8220;distribution control of the author&#8221; is some kind of right that has no side effects at all.</p>
<p>Few things could be more deranged and out of touch with reality.</p>
<p><strong>Today, noncommercial distribution of works under the copyright monopoly take place in our private communications, intermixed with our most private data that leave and arrive at our devices. You can&#8217;t tell one type of data from the other without looking at all of it, so the only way to discover copyright monopoly violations is by mass wiretapping and mass surveillance.</strong></p>
<p>This means that enforcement of the copyright monopoly has become mutually exclusive with private communications as a concept, which is why the copyright monopoly must take a rather large step back into brain-undamaged territory.</p>
<p>This means that allowing every author to control distribution of their book &#8211; including me and my swarm leadership book <a href="http://falkvinge.net/books/">Swarmwise</a> &#8211; would give each and every one of those authors the right to wiretap and censor every individual on the planet. That&#8217;s the very real, and very insane, consequence.</p>
<p>Let&#8217;s take that again, because it is key to the whole copyright monopoly debate today: it was never about the money, it was about the fact that you can&#8217;t enforce the copyright monopoly without mass wiretapping, censorship, and intrusive mass surveillance. This is also why you see the copyright industry relentlessly pushing for just that &#8211; for example, when they sued Eircom for the right to install the copyright industry&#8217;s wiretapping and censorship equipment in the deepest of the Irish internet hubs. The audacity, it burns!</p>
<p>You cannot say that freedom of speech and the secrecy of private correspondence applies to some types of data (mail, surfing, communications) but not to other types (transmissions of works under copyright monopoly), because the only way to tell which is which is to break the secret of correspondence in the first place. You can&#8217;t tell if the contents of a letter is legal or illegal without opening it, reading it, and sorting it based on your findings. This monopoly enforcement breaks centuries of civil liberties.</p>
<p>This is also why the common and dismissive counter-argument from copyright monopolists along the lines of &#8220;you&#8217;re just spoiled brats who don&#8217;t want to pay&#8221; is such an enraging insult. In Sweden, there&#8217;s a saying that &#8220;the mouth speaks of what fills the mind&#8221;. Monopolists may only care about money, but I don&#8217;t care about that and I never did &#8211; the copyright monopoly conflict was always a deep civil liberties issue, where the monopoly has become incompatible with fundamental civil liberties for the entire online generation.</p>
<p>Therefore, the copyright monopoly needs to give way.</p>
<p><strong>The copyright monopoly needs to be permanently and irrevocably scaled back in legislation. Until it is, it is everybody&#8217;s duty to undermine it in favor of the communications secret and freedom of speech that have always covered private communications.</strong></p>
<p>In the words of the Freenet philosophy: &#8220;You cannot have both copyright monopoly enforcement and freedom of speech. Therefore, any technology designed to promote and protect freedom of speech must by necessity prevent copyright monopoly enforcement.&#8221;</p>
<div style="border:2px solid #3F3F3F;width:521px;padding:15px;padding-top:8px;padding-bottom:4px;margin-top:20px;margin-bottom:10px;border-radius:10px">
<h3 style="margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:10px">
<div style="float:right;height:130px;width:39px;margin-left:20px;margin-right:10px"><img src="media/98818a80.Rick_Falkvinge_39x130.jpg" data-original-source="http://falkvinge.net/wp-content/themes/WpNewspaper/images/falkvinge/Rick_Falkvinge_39x130.jpg" style="border:none;-moz-box-shadow:none;-webkit-box-shadow:none" class="quimby_search_image"></div>
<p><span style="color:#3F3F3F;font-size:125%">About The</span> <span style="color:#FF3C78;font-size:125%">Author</span></p>
</h3>
<p style="font-family:PTSansRegular,Arial,Sans-Serif;font-weight:400;line-height:150%;margin-bottom:14px"><small>Rick Falkvinge is a regular columnist on TorrentFreak, sharing his thoughts every other week. He is the founder of the Swedish and first Pirate Party, a whisky aficionado, and a low-altitude motorcycle pilot. His blog at <a href="http://falkvinge.net">falkvinge.net</a> focuses on information policy.</small></p>
<div style="float:right;position:relative;top:-12px">
<p><small>Book Falkvinge <a href="http://falkvinge.net/keynotes/">as speaker</a>?</small></p>
</div>
<p><a href="http://twitter.com/Falkvinge" class="twitter-follow-button">Follow @Falkvinge</a></p>
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<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/copyright-monopoly-must-be-torpedoed-131013/">The Copyright Monopoly Can Only Be Enforced With Mass Wiretapping, And Must Therefore Be Torpedoed</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78021
title: Google-Backed File-Sharing Service Spreads Malware
uri: Google-Backed-File-Sharing-Service-Spreads-Malware
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/47wcMd9JwfY/
content:
<p><a href="media/130515eb.xunlei1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/xunlei1.jpg"><img src="media/130515eb.xunlei1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/xunlei1.jpg" alt="xunlei" width="209" height="183" class="alignright size-full wp-image-78022" /></a>To the Western public the name Xunlei might not ring any immediate bells, but in China its software is used by hundreds of millions of people every month.</p>
<p>Previously the company&#8217;s BitTorrent client was crowned the <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/thunder-blasts-utorrents-market-share-away-091204/">most used BitTorrent software in the world</a>, beating uTorrent and several other popular clients. </p>
<p>Xunlei&#8217;s website offers a searchable index of billions of media files which users can download with the proprietary Xunlei software. The company is partly owned by Google and in recent years has evolved into the leading player in the online file-sharing space.</p>
<p>Recently, however, the company ran into trouble when people spotted suspicious software on their systems signed with a Xunlei security certificate. A thorough investigation from <a href="http://www.welivesecurity.com/2013/10/11/win32kankan-chinese-drama/">ESET now reveals</a> that Xunlei the company has been spreading malware to Windows and Android users. </p>
<p>While it&#8217;s unclear how the application is distributed, the windows installer &#8220;INPEnhSetup.exe&#8221; that spreads the suspicious files is directly connected to the Chinese file-sharing giant. Besides the security certificate, the application also calls home to the Xunlei-owned domain kankan.com</p>
<p>Once the &#8220;dropper&#8221; is installed it loads an Office plugin which among other things downloads an Android application. This application is then installed on all Android devices that are connected to the computer, which subsequently installs several other seemingly harmless applications. </p>
<p>ESET looked at all the technical details of the software distributed by Xunlei and has categorized the application as a malicious program under the name Win32/Kankan.</p>
<p>&#8220;The use of a fake Office plugin to gain persistence, the ability to silently install Android applications, and the backdoor functionalities, confirm the validity of the concerns of Chinese users and explains why ESET detects this program as malicious, under the name Win32/Kankan,&#8221; ESET&#8217;s Joan Calvet writes.</p>
<p>&#8220;There are still some open questions, like the original infection vector and the exact reason the Android applications were installed,&#8221; he adds.</p>
<p>While it remains unclear whether Xunlei&#8217;s popular BitTorrent client was used to spread the malware, the company has admitted that its employees were responsible for the development and distribution of the suspicious software. </p>
<p>During a press conference Xunlei apologized for their mistakes. The company said that the personnel responsible were acting without permission and have since been fired.</p>
<p>For affected users Xunlei has released an uninstaller and according to ESET the number of infections has dropped significantly since its release, as can be seen in the graph below.</p>
<p><center><a href="media/b1435772.detections.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/detections.png"><img src="media/b1435772.detections.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/detections.png" alt="detections" width="599" height="370" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-78025" /></a></center> </p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/google-backed-file-sharing-spreads-malware-131014/">Google-Backed File-Sharing Service Spreads Malware</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77991
title: FACT Releases Video of File-Sharing Site Home Visit and Domain Grab
uri: FACT-Releases-Video-of-File-Sharing-Site-Home-Visit-and-Domain-Grab
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/Qlb0HyavgKk/
content:
<p><a href="media/0920354e.factbanner1.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/factbanner1.png"><img src="media/13ed1dd4.factbanner1-150x150.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/factbanner1-150x150.png" alt="factbanner1" width="150" height="150" class="alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-61581" /></a>Over in the United States and indeed many other countries around the world, operators of file-sharing sites are treated harshly when they are identified by studios, record labels and police. However, in the UK there has been a new trend developing to deal with smaller sites that aren&#8217;t generally up for a fight. </p>
<p>The approach, in place for a couple of years now, has been pioneered by the Federation Against Copyright Theft. The group, commonly known has FACT, has masterminded aggressive operations in the past, but is currently identifying the admins and owners of file-sharing focused sites and going to their homes in person for a &#8216;chat&#8217;.</p>
<p>Once they have the direct attention of the person involved their transgression is pointed out, usually the act of running a torrent or Usenet site that indexes copyrighted content. After the scare tactics the site owner is given a choice &#8211; shut down the site and hand over its domain to FACT or face the possibility of being dragged through the courts.</p>
<p>We&#8217;ve <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/search/federation+against+copyright">documented the process</a> many times but never had the chance to see it first hand. However, a new video released by the BBC shows FACT turning up at the home of Tom, the owner of FindNZBs.info, a site that was shut down earlier this month following a FACT visit.</p>
<p>Early on it shows two FACT operatives, a man and a woman, knocking at Tom&#8217;s door. While Tom is in clear view, both FACT operatives have their faces blurred out. They present identity cards and gain access to what looks like Tom&#8217;s lounge.</p>
<p><center><br />
<h1>FACT operatives turn up at the home of a file-sharing admin</h1>
<p><img src="media/d238388a.FACT1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/FACT1.jpg" alt="FACT1" /></center></p>
<p>The male FACT officer asks Tom if he is the site operator which he admits right away, denying the suggestion that anyone else is involved. FACT state that the Usenet indexer is facilitating the distribution of infringing content.</p>
<p>&#8220;When you say it&#8217;s infringing content, it&#8217;s just automated indexing. What&#8217;s the infringement? Tom asks.</p>
<p>&#8220;Your site deals predominantly, well only in NZBs,&#8221; the woman states.</p>
<p>&#8220;Well NZBs aren&#8217;t illegal,&#8221; Tom fires back.</p>
<p><center><br />
<h1>Faces obscured, FACT make themselves at home</h1>
<p><img src="media/84b7ee37.FACT2.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/FACT2.jpg" alt="FACT2" /></center></p>
<p>The woman then explains that the studios haven&#8217;t authorized the distribution of their content via NZBs. &#8220;So all NZBs are illegal?&#8221; Tom asks. &#8220;Yes,&#8221; she responds.</p>
<p>Of course, all NZBs are not illegal, only in some circumstances when they point deliberately to infringing content. What follows is a nuts and bolts argument over how indexers and Usenet works. None of it amounts to much within the scope of FACT&#8217;s intentions for the visit &#8211; the seizure of the site&#8217;s domain.</p>
<p>Tom is served with a notice as the male FACT operative explains that Tom will be expected to unlock the FindNZBs.info domain so that it can be transferred to the anti-piracy group.</p>
<p><center><br />
<h1>Documents in hand, Tom signs over his website to FACT</h1>
<p><img src="media/4ad9f4fa.FACT4.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/FACT4.jpg" alt="FACT 4" /></center></p>
<p>&#8220;What this will do is that it will stop us from taking any further action in relation to this website,&#8221; FACT conclude. Tom signs the document and the website is immediately shutdown.</p>
<p>Checking the domain&#8217;s WHOIS records reveals that FACT is now its registered owner.</p>
<p>A follow up interview with Tom reveals his thoughts for the site and how it merely indexed material that is already present online.</p>
<p>&#8220;It could be a DRM-free ebook, it could be a Linux distro, but potentially it could be a film as well, hence the visit,&#8221; he told the BBC while still maintaining that he wasn&#8217;t breaking the law.</p>
<p>The video and subsequent interview, which at times gets a little awkward, <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/24449861">can be viewed here</a>.</p>
<p>Taking people to court in an effort to close their sites is an expensive process, even if settled fairly quickly. It seems that identifying a site operator &#8211; often from an unprotected domain WHOIS entry &#8211; and then calling round is a much cheaper way to go. Expect to see more of it in future.</p>
<p><strong>Update:</strong> The admin of FindNZBs contacted TorrentFreak and explained how he was woken by FACT and the BBC at 07:45. He&#8217;s written up his experiences and a few other thoughts <a href="http://www.tiag.me/what-is-an-nzb-indexer/">here</a>.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/fact-releases-video-of-file-sharing-site-home-visit-and-domain-grab-131014/">FACT Releases Video of File-Sharing Site Home Visit and Domain Grab</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77983
title: Top 10 Most Pirated Movies of The Week
uri: 2013-10-14-Top-10-Most-Pirated-Movies-of-The-Week
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/FZD_ndUYst8/
content:
<p><a href="media/19607b0b.pacific-rim.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/pacific-rim.jpg"><img src="media/19607b0b.pacific-rim.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/pacific-rim.jpg" alt="pacific-rim" width="300" height="143" class="alignright size-full wp-image-77678" /></a>This week we have two newcomers in our chart. </p>
<p>The Internship is the most downloaded movie for the second week in a row. </p>
<p>The data for our weekly download chart is collected by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only. All the movies in the list are BD/DVDrips unless stated otherwise.</p>
<p><a href="http://TorrentFreak.com/category/dvdrip/feed/"><strong>RSS feed</strong></a> for the weekly movie download chart.</p>
<table class="css hover" summary="Most downloaded movies on BitTorrent">
<caption>Week ending Oktober 13, 2013</caption>
<thead>
<tr>
<th width="12%"><strong>Ranking</strong></th>
<th width="15%"><strong>(<a href="https://torrentfreak.com/top-10-most-pirated-movies-of-the-week-131007/">last week</a>)</strong></th>
<th><strong>Movie</strong></th>
<th width="18%"><strong>IMDb Rating / Trailer</strong></th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tfoot>
<tr>
<td colspan="4">torrentfreak.com</td>
</tr>
</tfoot>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td><strong>1</strong></td>
<td>(1)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/pacific_rim_2013/">Pacific Rim</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1663662/">7.4</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5guMumPFBag">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>2</strong></td>
<td>(9)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/white_house_down/">White house Down</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2334879/">6.4</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wonLfgO5p8">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>3</strong></td>
<td>(4)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/elysium_2013/">Elysium</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1535108/">7.0</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QILNSgou5BY">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>4</strong></td>
<td>(2)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_internship_2013/">The Internship</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2234155/">6.3</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdnoqCViqUo">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>5</strong></td>
<td>(3)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_lone_ranger/">The Lone Ranger</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1210819/">6.6</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjFsNSoDZK8">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>6</strong></td>
<td>(&#8230;)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/monsters_university/">Monsters University</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1453405/">7.5</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xBzPioph8CI">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>7</strong></td>
<td>(&#8230;)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_mortal_instruments_city_of_bones/">The Mortal Instruments City of Bones </a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1538403/">6.4</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHlwRsl2uFk">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>8</strong></td>
<td>(7)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/2_guns/">2 Guns</a> (TS)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1272878/">7.0</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVNe3RK2fgI">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>9</strong></td>
<td>(5)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/after_earth/">After Earth</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1815862/">4.9</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUcNyzu4IdM">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>10</strong></td>
<td>(6)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/this_is_the_end/">This Is The End</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1245492/">7.6</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yma-g4gTwlE">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/top-10-most-pirated-movies-of-the-week-131014/">Top 10 Most Pirated Movies of The Week</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78034
title: Pirates Jump on “The Walking Dead” Despite Legal Options
uri: Pirates-Jump-on-The-Walking-Dead-Despite-Legal-Options
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/Y1FYZtz7VMM/
content:
<p><a href="media/6d222739.walkingdead.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/walkingdead.jpg"><img src="media/6d222739.walkingdead.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/walkingdead.jpg" alt="walkingdead" width="278" height="182" class="alignright size-full wp-image-78036" /></a>For years international TV-fans have complained about long release delays. </p>
<p>In some cases people had to wait up to a year to view their favorite show after the U.S. release, which is unacceptable for most die-hard fans. </p>
<p>Responding to this criticism the TV industry has systematically improved traditional release windows. The recent premiere of The Walking Dead&#8217;s fourth season is a prime example of how the industry is adapting to the signals pirates have been sending for years.</p>
<p>To remove one of the incentives for people to grab an unauthorized copy of the show, Fox International Channels premiered the show in 125 countries a day after it first aired on US television.</p>
<p>&#8220;We want to prevent the spoilers for sure, we also want to make sure [international viewers] get the best version of the show — not some pirated version,” Liz Dolan, Fox International Channel’s chief marketing officer <a href="http://www.thewrap.com/walking-dead-overseas-premiere">told The Wrap</a>. </p>
<p>Unfortunately for Fox, however, pirated versions are available in better quality than most legal streaming options. Also, the download numbers have not declined, quite the opposite. </p>
<p>Data gathered by TorrentFreak shows that 16 hours after the first episode appeared online more than half a million people had grabbed a copy through one of many torrent sites. This is more than last year&#8217;s season premiere, despite the legal viewing options.</p>
<p>Interestingly, most downloaders come from the U.S. where there is no release lag at all.</p>
<p>Based on a sample of more than 30,000 people who shared the show via a BitTorrent client, we see that the United States is in the lead with 15.5 percent of the total. This means that even though people can <a href="http://www.amctv.com/full-episodes/the-walking-dead/2742230910001/30-days-without-an-accident">stream the episode for free</a>, many still preferred to download it through a torrent site.</p>
<p>In the U.K and Australia there was a slight delay but even legal availability couldn’t prevent people from pirating the season opening. With 11.7 and 10.1 percent these countries are second and third respectively. The Philippines and Canada complete the top five with 8.8 and 6.8 percent of the total.</p>
<table class="css hover" summary="Walking Dead Downloads">
<caption>sample N=33,918</caption>
<thead>
<tr>
<th width="10%"><strong>#</strong></th>
<th width="22%"><strong>Country</strong></th>
<th width="22%"><strong>%</strong></th>
<th width="22%"><strong>City</strong></th>
<th width="22%"><strong>%</strong></th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tfoot>
<tr>
<td colspan="5">torrentfreak.com</td>
</tr>
</tfoot>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td><strong>1</strong></td>
<td>United States</td>
<td>15.5%</td>
<td>London</td>
<td>3.8%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>2</strong></td>
<td>United Kingdom</td>
<td>11.7%</td>
<td>Melbourne</td>
<td>2.8%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>3</strong></td>
<td>Australia</td>
<td>10.1%</td>
<td>Manila</td>
<td>2.3%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>4</strong></td>
<td>Philippines</td>
<td>8.8%</td>
<td>Sydney</td>
<td>1.8%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>5</strong></td>
<td>Canada</td>
<td>6.8%</td>
<td>Stockholm</td>
<td>1.7%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>6</strong></td>
<td>Brazil</td>
<td>3.3%</td>
<td>Lisbon</td>
<td>1.4%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>7</strong></td>
<td>The Netherlands</td>
<td>2.7%</td>
<td>Athens</td>
<td>1.3%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>8</strong></td>
<td>Sweden</td>
<td>2.5%</td>
<td>Brisbane</td>
<td>1.2%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>9</strong></td>
<td>France</td>
<td>2.3%</td>
<td>Helsinki</td>
<td>1.1%</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>10</strong></td>
<td>Poland</td>
<td>2.2%</td>
<td>Amsterdam</td>
<td>1.1%</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>Fox has to be applauded for making the show available quickly in so many territories, something that was unthinkable half a decade ago. It&#8217;s safe to say that the download numbers would have been much higher without these efforts, although at the moment piracy is far from defeated.</p>
<p>In part this might be because some prefer the unauthorized download option simply out of habit. This is especially true for U.S. file-sharers. As we reported earlier this year, many people who pay for a Netflix subscription <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/arrested-development-pirates-skip-netflix-out-of-habit-130529/">downloaded</a> Netflix&#8217;s exclusive Arrested Development release, preferring the download experience over online streaming.</p>
<p>There is also another group, one that simply doesn&#8217;t want to pay for a subscription, which is required in Australia for example. It&#8217;s also possible that they are just unhappy with the viewing options currently on offer. In many countries viewers still have to tune in at a fixed time slot while many prefer to program their own viewing schedule.</p>
<p>The challenge for the entertainment industry is to take away these leftover incentives, and make sure that the legal options become the default. For some people it may be too late to be converted, but for most there&#8217;s still hope.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/pirates-jump-on-the-walking-dead-despite-legal-options-131014/">Pirates Jump on &#8220;The Walking Dead&#8221; Despite Legal Options</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78064
title: Are Hollywood’s Artificial Release Delays Driving Piracy?
uri: Are-Hollywood-s-Artificial-Release-Delays-Driving-Piracy
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/u_q7yBpL1rU/
content:
<p><a href="media/74b6a200.hollywood-pirates.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/hollywood-pirates.jpg"><img src="media/74b6a200.hollywood-pirates.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/hollywood-pirates.jpg" alt="hollywood-pirates" width="220" height="142" class="alignright size-full wp-image-50241" /></a>Every day millions of people download the latest Hollywood blockbusters though unauthorized sources. </p>
<p>The movie industry is not happy with the ever-increasing piracy rates and has called out Google and other stakeholders to &#8220;<a href="http://torrentfreak.com/mpaa-accuses-google-of-breeding-pirates-130919/">do more</a>&#8221; to help. At the same time, Hollywood keeps emphasizing the many legal options that are available to the public. </p>
<p>A few months ago the MPAA launched the website <a href="http://wheretowatch.org/">WhereToWatch.org</a> which provides an overview of dozens of legal video outlets that are available in the United States.</p>
<p>“Audiences want seamless access to film and TV shows. Our industry has listened, and we are now delivering more choices than ever before,” MPAA boss Senator Dodd said at the time.  </p>
<p>“There have never been more ways to access movies and television legitimately online, and those platforms continue to grow and develop thanks in large part to a copyright system that encourages innovation, risk and growth,” Dodd added. </p>
<p>While this sounds great, the WhereToWatch site doesn&#8217;t change the fact that many of the newer releases are simply not available online due to artificial release lags. After a movie&#8217;s box office premiere it usually takes months before people can access it online.</p>
<p>This mismatch prompted public policy researchers at George Mason University&#8217;s <a href="http://mercatus.org/">Mercatus Center</a> to take a close look at the online availability of some of the most pirated movies. On the newly launched <a href="http://piracydata.org/">Piracydata.org</a> the researchers use TorrentFreak&#8217;s weekly lists of <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/top-10-most-pirated-movies-of-the-week-131014/">most pirated movies</a> combined with information from <a href="http://www.canistream.it/">CanIStreamIt</a> to come up with an overview of the availability of these titles. </p>
<p>The results from this week are listed below, and it&#8217;s clear that half of the movie titles don&#8217;t have any legal options at all, while none are available for streaming.</p>
<p><center><img src="media/900e32fe.avail.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/avail.png" alt="avail" width="599" height="463" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-78123" /></center></p>
<p>TorrentFreak talked to Jerry Brito, director of Mercatus Center&#8217;s Technology Policy Program and one of the people behind the PiracyData website. Brito tells us that the MPAA and RIAA complaints that Google is placing pirate search results above legal alternatives was one of the motivations to look into the legal availability. </p>
<p>&#8220;We are compiling a dataset to help answer the question: Are the most-pirated movies available legally online? With only three weeks of data, the answer seems to be that very few are available legally. We&#8217;ll get a clearer picture in the months ahead as the dataset grows,&#8221; Brito says.</p>
<p>The lack of legal alternatives they have found so far means that Google sometimes has no other choice than to place pirate sites high in the search results, as there simply are no authorized options available. </p>
<p>&#8220;One implication may be that when movies are unavailable, illegal sources are the most relevant search results, so search engines like Google are just telling it like it is. That is their job, after all,&#8221; Brito says.</p>
<p>While the current dataset is limited to three weeks, it&#8217;s quite telling that of all movies listed none was available for streaming, while only 20% could be rented. </p>
<p><center><img src="media/e202f5ea.piracystats.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/piracystats.png" alt="piracystats" width="557" height="354" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-78089" /></center></p>
<p>Brito notes that the data doesn&#8217;t prove a causal effect between availability and piracy, but that it&#8217;s clear that Hollywood can &#8220;do more&#8221; to increase access to popular movies themselves. </p>
<p>&#8220;While there is no way to draw causality between the fact that these movies are not available legally and that they are the most pirated, it does highlight that while the MPAA is asking Google to take voluntary action to change search results, it may well be within the movie studio&#8217;s power to change those results by taking voluntary action themselves.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;They could make more movies available online and sooner, perhaps by collapsing the theatrical release window. Now, their business model is their prerogative, and it&#8217;s none of my business to tell them how to operate, but by the same token I don&#8217;t see how they can expect search engines and Congress to bend over backwards to protect the business model they choose,&#8221; Brito adds.</p>
<p>Whether Hollywood will take up this suggestion has yet to be seen. Some movie studios have experimented a bit with shorter release delays, but unlike the TV and music industry it is still the core of its business model. </p>
<p><strong>Update:</strong> The PiracyData website included some wrong data initially, the article has been edited to correct this.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/are-hollywoods-artificial-release-delays-driving-piracy-131015/">Are Hollywood&#8217;s Artificial Release Delays Driving Piracy?</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78041
title: Huge Software Piracy Group Calls it Quits After 30,000 Cracked Titles
uri: Huge-Software-Piracy-Group-Calls-it-Quits-After-30-000-Cracked-Titles
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/SgvhP6qycM4/
content:
<p><a href="media/596b3231.Lz0.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/Lz0.png"><img src="media/6ba7e972.Lz0-150x150.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/Lz0-150x150.png" alt="Lz0" width="150" height="150" class="alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-78080" /></a>Before the advent of the Internet, regular computer enthusiasts looking for software had few options other than to buy boxed software from specialist computer stores or paw through magazines looking for mail order outlets. Distribution routes were poor but for those with a like-minded friend &#8211; or a friend of friend &#8211; pirate copies were never too far away.</p>
<p>Of course, when the Internet took off things changed massively. Free software became available to anyone willing to persevere, not just those with access to a private BBS. Applications for just about any purpose were uploaded to the Internet thick and fast and as a result manufacturers had to think even more about their copy protection mechanisms.</p>
<p>But while software houses were applying anti-piracy measures to their products, plenty of groups were at work stripping them out and sharing DRM-free versions with close friends and associates online. Inevitably though, so-called &#8220;cracked&#8221; software leaked out, meaning that pretty much everyone could gain access to zero cost software, often on the day of release &#8211; 0day as it&#8217;s known.</p>
<p>Created way back in 1999, one such group was LineZer0. More commonly known by the characters Lz0, the group has operated for an incredible 14 years and to say they have been prolific would be a  massive understatement.</p>
<p>During that time Lz0 has delivered an incredible 30,000 software and games releases for desktop machines and handhelds (including iPhone and iPad), each designed to be enjoyed only by the reclusive <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/search/warez+scene">&#8216;warez&#8217; scene</a>.</p>
<p><center><br />
<h1>LineZer0 ASCii Art</h1>
<p><img src="media/99c65b35.LZ0.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/LZ0.jpg" alt="LZ0" /></center></p>
<p>&#8220;We do not wish for our releases to be widely spread across web boards, P2P networks and the like. While we do know that occurs we strongly urge people to not share these titles at such places,&#8221; Lz0 stated in their releases. Few took any notice.</p>
<p>Typing the term &#8216;Lz0&#8242; into any search engine or torrent site reveals endless streams of cracked software from hundreds of companies, for anyone to download and enjoy, for free. But for Lz0 and their countless fans, the final curtain came down prematurely yesterday.</p>
<p>Over the weekend someone in the warez scene released information that was obtained as part of a security breach against Lz0 in 2009. While assuring people that much of the data was related to closed sites and individuals who have since left the piracy scene, Lz0 felt it had no option other than to close down the group and retire completely.</p>
<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ve shared a long and fun road, and we&#8217;re sad that this is how it ends,&#8221; Lz0 said in a statement.</p>
<p>The group confirmed that the names Lz0 and Lz0PDA will be put completely to rest &#8211; no one will ever be able to genuinely use those tags again. Additionally, hundreds of software companies will be able to breathe a collective sigh of relief, at least until other groups take up the slack. But annoying companies was never LzO&#8217;s stated aim.</p>
<p>&#8220;Our releases are made to make sure that the end-user is able to fully test a title before going into a purchase as well as give the end-user an opportunity to make backup copies of titles he or she already owns,&#8221; the group said. &#8220;Please do respect our stance on this and make sure that you buy the required licenses upon deciding to buy the product. Respect the software authors that have put time, money and effort into creating the title you now have in your hand.&#8221;</p>
<p>Finally, for some the joy of cracked software was not the tools themselves, but the entertainment value of the additional items groups like Lz0 packaged with their releases. For many &#8211; piracy dramas aside &#8211; the kind of music and graphics illustrated below provided the most intoxicating mix.</p>
<p>Lz0: 1999-2013</p>
<p><center><iframe width="500" height="281" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/4KFUaD1L_cY" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></center></p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/huge-software-piracy-groups-call-it-quits-after-30000-cracked-titles-131015/">Huge Software Piracy Group Calls it Quits After 30,000 Cracked Titles</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78092
title: Piracy is Disgusting! No, it’s Promotion! Artists Disagree as Links Get Removed
uri: Piracy-is-Disgusting-No-it-s-Promotion-Artists-Disagree-as-Links
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/sB85youbooc/
content:
<p><a href="media/e3dd5f16.piracy-progress.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/piracy-progress.jpg"><img src="media/255bb037.piracy-progress-150x150.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/piracy-progress-150x150.jpg" alt="piracy-progress" width="150" height="150" class="alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-67328" /></a>The issue of Internet piracy is certainly a polarizing one, with different camps setting out their stances over whether the practice is generally a good or bad thing.</p>
<p>Just last month a <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/piracy-isnt-hurting-the-entertainment-industry-121003/">report</a> from the London School of Economics reignited the debate after coming to the conclusion that rather than hurting the entertainment industries, piracy is actually helping matters.</p>
<p>Needless to say, the MPAA and IFPI were less than impressed with that conclusion and quickly moved to <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/hollywood-attacks-scholars-who-deny-the-evils-of-piracy-131008/">counter</a> the study. But while scholars and music businessmen fight it out, what about the opinions of those who are supposed to really matter &#8211; the artists.</p>
<p>The BBC has spoken to several British artists to get their views on piracy and their responses are quite a mixed bag.</p>
<p>Pop icon Jessie J didn&#8217;t deviate from the <a href="http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/music/news/a298469/jessie-j-good-fans-shouldnt-steal-music.html">opinions</a> she&#8217;s expressed in the past. Perhaps cleverly addressing the &#8220;nothing was stolen&#8221; response to the piracy-is-theft mantra, the 10 million album selling star said downloading is akin to taking someone&#8217;s time.</p>
<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s like going to the hairdressers, having your hair cut and running out,&#8221; she <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/24524871">said</a>. </p>
<p>&#8220;You can&#8217;t make music for free, you can&#8217;t live for free. If people illegally download your album it&#8217;s very likely that you won&#8217;t make another one.&#8221;</p>
<p><a href="media/a2b6446f.jessiej.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/jessiej.jpg"><img src="media/a2b6446f.jessiej.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/jessiej.jpg" alt="jessiej" width="180" height="186" class="alignright size-full wp-image-78114" /></a>Of course, plenty of people downloaded Jessie J&#8217;s <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Who_You_Are_%28Jessie_J_album%29">first album</a> and she&#8217;s just released <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alive_%28Jessie_J_album%29">another</a>, so her argument doesn&#8217;t quite stand up. However, she was nowhere near as aggressive as singer <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Newman_%28singer%29">John Newman</a>.</p>
<p>&#8220;I think it&#8217;s disgusting. Get some respect for the artist. It&#8217;s not fair at all,&#8221; he said. &#8220;[Downloaders are] ruining the music industry, they really are and it&#8217;s really not fair.&#8221;</p>
<p>Interestingly, Grammy-winning artist Sean Paul sees things quite differently.</p>
<p>&#8220;Before there was the internet, there was people selling mix tapes and CDs with your music on it &#8211; they sell it, they benefit from it,&#8221; he said. &#8220;I get promotion out of it, which is a good thing for me, because people like my song and put on a stage show.&#8221;</p>
<p>Producer Naughty Boy, who has deals with Sony and Virgin EMI, says that there&#8217;s plenty of money to be made, even in the face of piracy. </p>
<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t like the idea of people thinking you&#8217;re never going to get rich from music. You can, even with illegal downloading,&#8221; he told the BBC. &#8220;You&#8217;ve just got to make great music that people want to buy. You&#8217;ve just got to give them more of a reason to buy it than before.&#8221;</p>
<p>Of course, while the artists have their differing opinions, the major labels are singing with one harmonious voice &#8211; piracy is bad and it costs them money. Together they finance the BPI whose anti-piracy department takes down millions of links from file-sharing sites and search engines such as Google. Whether Sean Paul likes it or not, links to his music get taken down too.</p>
<p><center><img src="media/f5cf4528.seanpaul.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/seanpaul.jpg" alt="SeanPaul" /></center></p>
<p>The BBC were invited to the secretive operation where they spoke with John Hodge, the BPI&#8217;s head of internet investigation who suggested that people at home &#8211; the actual downloaders &#8211; aren&#8217;t a BPI target.</p>
<p>&#8220;Our focus is on the people who want to make profit,&#8221; Hodge <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/24524873">said</a>. &#8220;Whether it&#8217;s streaming or downloading, there&#8217;s somebody there facilitating this and making money out of it.&#8221; </p>
<p>Like the FACT operatives who <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/fact-releases-video-of-file-sharing-site-home-visit-and-domain-grab-131014/">visited the home</a> of a file-sharing site admin earlier this month, the remainder of the BPI&#8217;s five man anti-piracy team asked to remain anonymous. Taking down links must be a dangerous game these days.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/piracy-is-disgusting-no-its-promotion-artists-disagree-as-links-get-removed-131015/">Piracy is Disgusting! No, it&#8217;s Promotion! Artists Disagree as Links Get Removed</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78134
title: Policy Research Chief Blasts TorrentFreak Piracy Research, But Why?
uri: Policy-Research-Chief-Blasts-TorrentFreak-Piracy-Research-But-Why
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/TGrgh3fXnOI/
content:
<p><a href="media/6b708215.Giovanetti.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/Giovanetti.jpg"><img src="media/a0bf86ef.Giovanetti-150x150.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/Giovanetti-150x150.jpg" alt="Giovanetti" width="150" height="150" class="alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-78168" /></a>Using TorrentFreak figures as a basis for their analysis, public policy researchers at George Mason University’s Mercatus Center <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/are-hollywoods-artificial-release-delays-driving-piracy-131015/">launched a website</a> yesterday which considers whether Hollywood&#8217;s business model of not making content widely available on day one might be a driving force for piracy.</p>
<p>Some hours later Tom Giovanetti, president of the Institute for Policy Innovation (IPI), a public policy research organization based in Dallas, Texas, expressed his displeasure over just about everything connected to <a href="http://piracydata.org/">the site</a>, from pirates and those who report on them, to the researchers and their findings.</p>
<p>Giovanetti&#8217;s problems seem to be two-fold. First, he thinks that reporting on &#8220;criminal behavior&#8217; is somehow unacceptable and second, the effects of piracy on the legitimate market should be discounted due to the phenomenon being unlawful. After dismissing any connection between piracy and a lack of legal options as &#8220;utterly irrelevant&#8221;, Giovanetti proceeded to shoot the messenger.</p>
<p>&#8220;It IS interesting that TorrentFreak brazenly publishes a list of the most pirated movies. That’s pretty in-your-face behavior, considering that piracy is illegal,&#8221; the IPI president <a href="http://www.ipi.org/policy_blog/detail/missing-the-point-on-piracy-data">wrote</a>.</p>
<p>Not surprisingly that statement raised our collective eyebrows. Just last month an NBC Universal-commissioned study from NetNames titled &#8216;Sizing the Piracy Universe&#8217; generated dozens of news articles. By Giovanetti&#8217;s standards that report must go way beyond brazen, since the amount of illegal activity documented in the study was on a <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/432-million-pirates-share-9567-petabytes-a-month-130917/">staggering scale</a>.</p>
<p>Of course, all the major movie studios hire companies to prepare reports on pirates too, it&#8217;s just that unlike us &#8220;brazen&#8221; folk they don&#8217;t make that data publicly available every week. But despite Giovanetti&#8217;s disapproval, it&#8217;s encouraging to know that even the MPAA finds TorrentFreak data useful when it wants to make a point.</p>
<p><a href="media/6d222739.walkingdead.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/walkingdead.jpg"><img src="media/a53ca851.walkingdead-150x150.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/walkingdead-150x150.jpg" alt="walkingdead" width="150" height="150" class="alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-78036" /></a>A <a href="http://blog.mpaa.org/BlogOS/post/2013/10/15/Despite-Being-Free-Online-The-Walking-Dead-Was-Stolen-by-500000-People.aspx">blog post</a> published yesterday by the MPAA&#8217;s Kate Bedingfield happily cited our recent (in-your-face) Walking Dead <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/pirates-jump-on-the-walking-dead-despite-legal-options-131014/">piracy stats</a>, although we had to summon a wry smile when we saw that the MPAA chose to credit Variety as the source and not us. Perhaps there really is no respect for creators these days.</p>
<p>At this point and since we have a convenient MPAA segue, it&#8217;s probably appropriate to question why Giovanetti is so interested in movie piracy.</p>
<p>The IPI identifies itself as a &#8220;non-profit, non-partisan public policy think tank&#8230;founded in 1987 to research, develop and promote innovative and non-partisan solutions to today&#8217;s public policy problems.&#8221;</p>
<p>While that&#8217;s all very nice, according to the MPAA&#8217;s latest <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/127980909/MPAA-form-990-2011">tax filing</a> the IPI are actually being paid by Hollywood to &#8220;promote the film industry.&#8221;</p>
<p><center><img src="media/bede557e.mpaatax.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/mpaatax.jpg" alt="mpaatax" width="599" height="223" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-78193" /></center></p>
<p>With that established, let&#8217;s have a look at what Giovanetti has to say about the apparently reprehensible notion that piracy might be a market signal.</p>
<p>&#8220;[It] is utterly irrelevant whether or not a pirated movie is available for streaming. That’s because the release schedule and business plan for the movie is entirely the business of whoever owns the movie, and not anyone else. That’s an implication of property rights that libertarians ought to understand. You and your pirate friends do not get to decide what happens to my property,&#8221; he said.</p>
<p>It&#8217;s worth pointing out that earlier in Giovanetti&#8217;s rant he referred to the researchers at George Mason University as the libertarians, so here he deliberately aligns them with those carrying out the illegal downloading, a quite ridiculous notion.</p>
<p>The problem with the latter half of Giovanetti&#8217;s assertion, that &#8216;pirates&#8217; don&#8217;t get to decide what happens to &#8216;his&#8217; property, is plain to see. Of course, sharing content without permission is against copyright law in many countries, so those who feel harmed by the act have a legal right to reply. But that misses the point.</p>
<p><center><img src="media/e1cbeb2d.policyinnovation.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/policyinnovation.jpg" alt="Policy Innovation" /></center></p>
<p>Whether Giovanetti likes it or not, piracy exists and whether people have the right to or not they engage in unauthorized downloading. Stamp your feet and shout about rights all day long, it makes no difference to the reality on the ground. If it did we wouldn&#8217;t be having this discussion.</p>
<p>And finally, just when it couldn&#8217;t get much worse, Giovanetti again turns on the researchers for suggesting that a modification of Hollywood&#8217;s business model might ease the piracy situation.</p>
<p>&#8220;They are implying a change that should happen because of criminal behavior. And those of us who are champions of markets do NOT defend criminal behavior as a market force or creative disruption. Markets take place within the rule of law. We don’t insist that markets adapt to account for criminal behavior. Rule of law is also something libertarians should understand,&#8221; Giovanetti notes.</p>
<p>Sadly, these statements help no one. If &#8220;rule of law&#8221; was a suitable deterrent then already unauthorized downloading wouldn&#8217;t be an issue &#8211; aren&#8217;t $150K in statutory damages for a single infringement already enough to send a message? Apparently not.</p>
<p>What this problem needs is creative thinking and a desire to deal with a real-life situation already underway, not people boo-hooing about how wrong it all is while shooting both the messengers and those looking for solutions.</p>
<p>Especially when they aren&#8217;t up-front about who they&#8217;re doing it for.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/policy-research-chief-blasts-torrentfreak-piracy-research-but-why-131016/">Policy Research Chief Blasts TorrentFreak Piracy Research, But Why?</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78010
title: MPAA Says Piracy Damages Can’t Be Measured
uri: MPAA-Says-Piracy-Damages-Can-t-Be-Measured
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/l5i3IPUfI_Q/
content:
<p><a href="media/394b6768.mpaa-logo1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/mpaa-logo1.jpg"><img class="alignright size-full wp-image-36694" alt="mpaa-logo" src="media/394b6768.mpaa-logo1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/mpaa-logo1.jpg" width="200" height="112" /></a>As the trial date moves closer, the arguments between the MPAA and BitTorrent search engine isoHunt are heating up.</p>
<p>One of the issues the two parties are in disagreement over is whether isoHunt should be able to question the notion that piracy is actually hurting the movie industry.</p>
<p>To argue that piracy might not be as disastrous as it&#8217;s often portrayed, the torrent site has listed researcher and economics professor Koleman Strumpf as one of its witnesses. Strumpf&#8217;s research has previously shown that piracy is not hurting sales at all, and isoHunt is expected to use this in its favor during the trial.</p>
<p>The MPAA, however, prefers not to discuss the topic of actual damages during the trial. They argue that the issue is too complex and that it could mislead the jury. For example, isoHunt may be able to show that movie industry profits are increasing, but that doesn&#8217;t mean that piracy has had no effect. </p>
<p>The movie studios are therefore asking the court to exclude the issue, arguing that actual damages can&#8217;t be measured.  </p>
<p>&#8220;To permit consideration of actual damages under these circumstances would be perverse – and particularly unfair – given that Plaintiffs elected statutory damages precisely because their actual damages are not capable of meaningful measurement,&#8221; the MPAA&#8217;s legal team <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/176517206/mp1">writes</a>.</p>
<p>The MPAA argues that since the court has decided to award statutory damages, it is irrelevant to what extent their revenues are negatively impacted by online piracy. </p>
<p>&#8220;Defendants should not be permitted to exploit the inherent difficulty of proving actual damages in a case such as this as a basis for lowering the statutory damages award, especially when the very purpose of statutory damages was to provide a remedy that is not dependent on proof of actual damages.&#8221;</p>
<p>While the MPAA admits that the effect of online piracy is nearly impossible to measure, the movie studios do have a very clear picture of what&#8217;s needed to bankrupt isoHunt.  The transcript from a recent court meeting reveals that two to five million should exhaust the company. </p>
<p style="padding-left: 15px;"><strong>Court:</strong> What do you estimate to be the resources of [Defendants]? . . . What do you suspect?<br />
<strong>MPAA&#8217;s counsel:</strong> Based on our estimate, Your Honor, we believe a couple to a few million dollars would exhaust Mr. Fung&#8217;s or defendants&#8217; ability to pay…<br />
<strong>MPAA&#8217;s counsel:</strong> A couple to a few million dollars would exhaust defendants&#8217;&#8211;<br />
<strong>Court:</strong> Does that mean, like $2 million<br />
<strong>MPAA’s counsel:</strong> Two million dollars to $4 million, $5 million at the most.</p>
<p>When the court asked the MPAA&#8217;s counsel why it was going for nearly $600 million in damages when a few million would be enough to put the company out of business, the MPAA argued that the high amount is needed to deter others from starting their own torrent search engines. </p>
<p style="padding-left: 15px;"><strong>Court:</strong> So why are you making such a fetish about 2,000 or 3,000 or 10,000 or 100 copyrights?<br />
<strong>MPAA&#8217;s Mr. Fabrizio:</strong> Your Honor, the purpose of statutory damages is not only to seek compensation from the defendants, the extraordinarily important purpose is to create &#8212; send a message to other would-be infringers like defendants, and there are thousands of them…<br />
<strong>Court:</strong> But if you strip him of all his assets &#8212; and you&#8217;re suggesting that a much lesser number of copyright infringements would accomplish that, where is the deterrence by telling the world that you took someone&#8217;s resources away because of illegal conduct entirely or 50 times over?</p>
<p>In a reply to the MPAA&#8217;s opposition, <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/176517223/mp2">isoHunt argues</a> that actual damages are important information for the jury to have, so a more balanced sum can be reached. If there is no proof of piracy hurting the movie industry, a $3 million fine might be more appropriate than $600 million.  </p>
<p>&#8220;Evidence on Plaintiffs’ overall and specific revenues relating to the works at issue will allow the jury to infer that Plaintiffs have not suffered any actual damages, which can be contrasted with the financial condition of Defendants in the jury fashioning an appropriate award,&#8221; isoHunt&#8217;s counsel argues.</p>
<p>&#8220;For example, if Plaintiffs enjoyed uninterrupted profits, and their overall revenues did not decline during the time that isoHunt was launched and Defendants began complying with the Injunction, the jury could conclude that it would be unjust and a windfall to award Plaintiffs anything more than the near $3 million statutory minimum.&#8221;</p>
<p>The court will now have to decide whether the issue of actual damages can be brought up in court. If that&#8217;s the case, then the trial is going to be a numbers game with experts from all sides trying to prove whether or not piracy is hurting Hollywood, and if so to what extent.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/mpaa-says-piracy-damages-cant-be-measured-131016/">MPAA Says Piracy Damages Can&#8217;t Be Measured</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78262
title: isoHunt Shuts Down After $110 Million Settlement With The MPAA
uri: isoHunt-Shuts-Down-After-110-Million-Settlement-With-The-MPAA
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/dxklFnxNnn8/
content:
<p><img src="media/3e145208.isohunt-logo.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/isohunt-logo.jpg" align="right" alt="isohunt" />For more than seven years isoHunt and the MPAA have been battling it out in court but today the case appears to have come to an end, at least for now.</p>
<p>Both parties have submitted a request to conclude the case and isoHunt founder Gary Fung has agreed to pay a <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/176947007/Isohunt-Mpaa-110">$110 million settlement</a> and shut down the site.</p>
<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s sad to see my baby go. But I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, and I have remained faithful. 10.5 years of isoHunt has been a long journey by any business definition, and forever in Internet startup time,&#8221; <a href="http://garyfung.ca/?p=11">Fung notes</a>.</p>
<p>&#8220;I think one worry I want to address is at no time have I compromised privacy of any user on isoHunt, in terms of your IP addresses or emails,&#8221; he added.</p>
<p>At the time of writing isoHunt is still up and running but Fung told TorrentFreak that it will soon close its doors. It&#8217;s a landmark decision &#8211; the site has been <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/top-10-most-popular-torrent-sites-of-2013-130106/">one of the most visited</a> torrent search engines for nearly a decade. </p>
<p>The MPAA is delighted with the outcome and hopes it will deter others from starting similar websites. The Hollywood group explained earlier that while <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/mpaa-says-piracy-damages-cant-be-measured-131016/">two to five million dollars</a> would be enough to bankrupt isoHunt, a higher penalty would scare off others. </p>
<p>“Today’s settlement is a major step forward in realizing the enormous potential of the Internet as a platform for legitimate commerce and innovation,” MPAA boss Chris Dodd, said in a comment. </p>
<p>“It also sends a strong message that those who build businesses around encouraging, enabling, and helping others to commit copyright infringement are themselves infringers, and will be held accountable for their illegal actions.” </p>
<p>The MPAA believes that the closure of isoHunt will help save thousands of jobs and protect many more businesses. </p>
<p>“The successful outcome of this landmark lawsuit will also will help preserve jobs and protect the tens of thousands of businesses in the creative industries, whose hard work and investments are exploited by sites like isoHunt,” Dodd added.</p>
<p>The full terms of the settlement agreement have not been disclosed, but there appears to be more behind it. IsoHunt will be bankrupted by the $110 million settlement, so there is no reason to throw in the towel two weeks before the trial was supposed to start, unless they received something in return.</p>
<p>For the MPAA this is the second big official legal victory against a torrent site. In 2009 the movie industry group won its legal battle <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/torrentspy-one-year-after-the-shutdown-090324/">against TorrentSpy</a>.</p>
<p>While the MPAA has booked a clear victory, the case is not completely over yet. IsoHunt recently filed an application to appeal the case at the Supreme Court, which could mean that both parties are back in court again in the not too distant future.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/isohunt-shuts-down-after-110-million-settlement-with-the-mpaa-131017/">isoHunt Shuts Down After $110 Million Settlement With The MPAA</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78218
title: “Six Strikes”Copyright Alert System Costs Millions
uri: Six-Strikes-Copyright-Alert-System-Costs-Millions
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/GvOwg1KYzX0/
content:
<p><img src="media/12bdbb91.running.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/running.jpg" align="right" alt="copyright alert" />Two years ago the MPAA and RIAA teamed up with five major Internet providers to announce their “six strikes” anti-piracy plan.</p>
<p>The parties founded the Center for Copyright Information (<a href="http://www.copyrightinformation.org/">CCI</a>) which is incorporated as a non-profit company of the same name in Delaware. </p>
<p>While the CCI has been very clear about its goals, information on its finances has been scarce. In the memorandum of understanding the copyright holders and ISPs agreed to split the costs of the company 50/50, but the exact figures remained unknown.</p>
<p>When we previously asked about total operating costs CCI declined to answer. Luckily the IRS was more helpful, so after two years we can now finally lift the financial veil.</p>
<p>TorrentFreak obtained the most recent tax <a href="media/b4692378.45-3366529_990O_201206.pdf" data-original-source="https://bulk.resource.org/irs.gov/eo/2013_06_EO/45-3366529_990O_201206.pdf">filing</a> of the six-strikes outfit which covered the first eight months of the company&#8217;s operations to June 30, 2012. </p>
<p>During this time the ISPs and copyright holders paid a total of $1,377,633 in membership dues, which means that it costs around $2 million per year to keep the company afloat. </p>
<p>The $2 million figure makes sense since the RIAA previously mentioned in its tax filing that it spent $250,000 in CCI membership dues up until March 2012. This would cover half of the $500,000 it would owe per year. </p>
<p>The CCI tax filing further shows that Executive Director Jill Lesser is the only key employee, and that she earned a very modest $43,750 during the first eight months. Looking more closely, we see that Lesser indirectly earns a bit more as $193,750 was paid to her consulting firm JAL Consulting.</p>
<p>The filing further shows that the six-strikes outfit paid $144,093 to their PR firm Glover Park Group, $125,691 for Resource Global&#8217;s consulting services, as well as $102,928 in legal fees.</p>
<p>All in all there aren&#8217;t too many surprises in the tax filing, although it&#8217;s worth knowing how much the six-strikes copyright alert system costs. </p>
<p>It&#8217;s not known whether the $2 million in membership dues for the first year is a fixed amount, so it may fluctuate from year to year. Also, it&#8217;s worth noting that the costs above only apply to the CCI organization. The copyright holders and ISPs incur extra costs when they track down infringers and process the notices.</p>
<p>In other words, copyright holders and ISPs are likely to spend double or triple the previously mentioned $2 million on the entire six-strikes system. </p>
<p>Now that the first accounts are in we encourage the CCI to also share some data on how many people have received a copyright alert to date. But whatever that number is, for now the copyright alerts have <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/six-strikes-fails-to-halt-u-s-pirate-bay-growth-130903/">failed to make a dent</a> in traffic to file-sharing sites. </p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/six-strikescopyright-alert-system-costs-millions-131017/">“Six Strikes”Copyright Alert System Costs Millions</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78209
title: Italian Court Orders ISPs to Block Several Major Torrent Sites
uri: Italian-Court-Orders-ISPs-to-Block-Several-Major-Torrent-Sites
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/QDYEDG-ZaAw/
content:
<p><a href="media/f05b8357.censored.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/censored.jpg"><img src="media/f05b8357.censored.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/censored.jpg" align="right" alt="censored" width="199" height="173" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-35000" /></a>All around Europe rightsholders have been working hard to have Internet providers block torrent and other file-sharing platforms. Courts in the UK, Netherlands, Ireland and Denmark have ordered blockades, but Italy raises its head more regularly than most with additional censorship orders.</p>
<p>In a fresh batch of court orders dated today, Italian ISPs have been ordered to block several of the world&#8217;s leading torrent sites. The orders were granted by the prosecutor from Bergamo who ordered the original blocking of The Pirate Bay back in 2008. Music industry group FIMI say that they were responsible for the complaints.</p>
<p>&#8220;I can confirm that FIMI referred these sites to the criminal prosecutor. We are very happy about the outcome,&#8221; FIMI chief Enzo Mazzo told TorrentFreak.</p>
<p>The first blocking order is against ExtraTorrent, an indexing site ranked <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/top-10-most-popular-torrent-sites-of-2013-130106/">5th in the world</a> during the early part of 2013.</p>
<p>The site suffered a setback earlier this week when police in the UK asked its registrar to suspend its .com domain. However, it now appears that ExtraTorrent managed to transfer the domain away from PDR Ltd to a new company and has since regained control.</p>
<p>The Italian block against the site specifically mentions ExtraTorrent.com (the site has since moved to .CC) but also details the site&#8217;s IP address.</p>
<p>Also ordered to be blocked is 1337x.org, the only site in the batch that operates both indexes and trackers. In January 2013 the site was ranked 6th in the world and it currently lists more than 586,000 torrents in its database.</p>
<p>The third site covered by the blocking orders is the troubled H33T. The site <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/h33t-eu-disappears-from-the-internet-130928/">disappeared</a> from the Internet last month following a complaint from Universal Music. The site&#8217;s admin is currently maintaining radio silence but there are signs that the site is preparing for a revival. The Italian court order lists H33T&#8217;s .eu domain in addition to its IP address, neither of which will be in use for any return.</p>
<p>TorrentHound is the fourth site on the prosecutor&#8217;s list and although not as big as the others has attracted attention from anti-piracy companies in the past, including the RIAA who <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/riaa-starts-going-after-bittorrent-sites-110708/">attempted to identify</a> the site&#8217;s operators in 2011. It currently indexes 6,041,258 torrents linking to 12,755 terabytes of data.</p>
<p>Finally, the prosecutor is revisiting The Pirate Bay. The new order references the site&#8217;s relatively new .sx domain but according to Marco d’Itri who runs <a href="http://censura.bofh.it">Osservatorio Censura</a>, the scope is particularly unusual.</p>
<p>&#8220;I think that this new Pirate Bay order is seriously troubling because it appears to request that the whole network 194.71.107.0/24 should be filtered, which also covers The Pirate Bay&#8217;s mail server,&#8221; d’Itri told TorrentFreak.</p>
<p>D&#8217;Itri is currently investigating the precise details and we hope to post an update here shortly.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/court-orders-isps-to-block-several-major-torrent-sites-131017/">Italian Court Orders ISPs to Block Several Major Torrent Sites</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78282
title: Angry Artists Attack BitTorrent With Spoofed Billboards
uri: Angry-Artists-Attack-BitTorrent-With-Spoofed-Billboards
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/neGMgFjfpoc/
content:
<p><a href="media/b7ca5e79.bittorrent-nsa.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/bittorrent-nsa.jpg"><img src="media/b7ca5e79.bittorrent-nsa.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/bittorrent-nsa.jpg" alt="bittorrent-nsa" width="250" height="181" class="alignright size-full wp-image-77920" /></a>Last week BitTorrent Inc. shocked friend and foe with a clever marketing campaign. </p>
<p>The company, best known for its file-sharing applications uTorrent and BitTorrent, <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/bittorrent-mastermind-controversial-nsa-billboard-campaign-131008/">put up billboards</a> in three major metropolitan areas. </p>
<p>Initially the billboards displayed slogans such as &#8220;Your data should belong to the NSA&#8221; and &#8220;Artists need to play by the rules,&#8221; but they were later updated to signal the reverse. </p>
<p>BitTorrent&#8217;s goal was to raise awareness of issues related to Internet freedom, privacy and artist rights. However, not everyone agreed with the <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/bittorrent-doesnt-care-about-your-privacy-not-always-131013/">somewhat confusing</a> messaging, and some artists were <a href="http://thetrichordist.com/2013/10/10/luddite-artists-point-out-that-bittorrent-doesnt-know-shit-about-their-own-technology/">flat-out offended</a>. </p>
<p>In a direct response to the billboard ads, a group of anonymous artists have launched a banner campaign spoofing BitTorrent&#8217;s slogans, while directing people to <a href="http://www.rightthemusic.org/">a website</a> filled with statements showing various downsides of copyright infringement. </p>
<p>Over the past year BitTorrent Inc. has tried very hard to distance itself from piracy, but the artists in question are having none of that. The banner below <a href="http://adland.tv/node/156152">appeared</a> on the popular music site Rolling Stone earlier this week and suggests that BitTorrent is depriving artists of income. </p>
<p>&#8220;Instead of paying artists, we spent money on banners,&#8221; the banner reads, crediting it to the misspelled &#8220;BitTorent&#8221; alongside a fabricated logo. </p>
<p><center><br />
<h5>Spoof ad running on Rollingstone.com</h5>
<p><img src="media/8f4ac55c.rolling-bittorrent.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/rolling-bittorrent.png" alt="rolling-bittorrent" width="599" height="293" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-78286" /></center></p>
<p>Another banner ad spoofs BitTorrent&#8217;s anti-NSA billboard. Instead of &#8220;Your Data Should Belong To The <strike>NSA</strike> You,&#8221; it reads &#8220;All your content are belong to us.&#8221;</p>
<p>The banners went live earlier this week and have been spotted on  Rollingstone.com, The Drudge Report, Mashable, FileHippo, GrooveShark and MediaFire, among others. All banners were linked to the <a href="http://www.rightthemusic.org/">Right The Music</a> website which is registered by Swedish company <a href="http://www.allabolag.se/8020122464/Mycket_Musik">MycketMusik AB</a>.</p>
<p><center><br />
<h5>All your content are belong to us</h5>
<p><img src="media/8d65b017.belongbittorrent.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/belongbittorrent.png" alt="belongbittorrent" width="599" height="98" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-78287" /></center></p>
<p>Thus far little is known about the mysterious group behind the ads but information received by TorrentFreak suggests that this the first of a series of anti-piracy campaigns the anonymous coalition of artists has planned.</p>
<p>Whether BitTorrent Inc. is the right target for these campaigns is doubtful. While millions of pirates use the company&#8217;s software every day to download copyrighted material, the same can be said about Mozilla&#8217;s Firefox or even Windows. </p>
<p>That, however, may be a little nuanced for the disgruntled artists, who have clearly made up their mind about the company. Luckily for BitTorrent there are also plenty of artists who are supportive of the company, including <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/madonna-to-release-new-film-on-bittorrent-130917/">Madonna</a>, <a href="http://blog.bittorrent.com/2013/10/09/moby-x-bittorrent-unlock-and-remix-innocents/">Moby</a> and <a href="http://blog.bittorrent.com/2013/10/15/plain-white-ts-x-bittorrent-download-the-giving-tree-bundle/">Plain White T&#8217;s</a>, all of whom have collaborated with the company in recent weeks.</p>
<p>To be continued.  </p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/angry-artists-attack-bittorrent-with-spoofed-billboards-131018/">Angry Artists Attack BitTorrent With Spoofed Billboards</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78274
title: Breaking Bad Creator: Illegal Downloading Raised Brand Awareness
uri: Breaking-Bad-Creator-Illegal-Downloading-Raised-Brand-Awareness
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/FQOHgoBfNP0/
content:
<p><img src="media/5ae3f6eb.bb.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/bb.jpg" width="250" height="185" class="alignright" />As one of the most popular shows around, the finale of Breaking Bad was always destined to become a sensation, both off and online.</p>
<p>That eventuality was realized at the end of last month when <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/breaking-bad-finale-clocks-500000-pirated-downloads-130930/">half a million people</a> grabbed a copy of the show from BitTorrent networks within half a day of its United States premiere.</p>
<p>We can now confirm that the latest figures gathered by TorrentFreak point to an amazing three million downloads of the final show. This means that the Breaking Bad finale has already clocked up more downloads so far in 2013 than any episode last year when it placed 5th in the <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/game-of-thrones-most-pirated-tv-show-of-2012-121223/">2012 edition</a> of our Top Downloaded TV Shows chart. </p>
<p>While many will consider this to be a dubious honor, does it necessarily follow that millions of illicit downloads have been bad for the show? Speaking with the <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/24550832">BBC</a>, show creator Vince Gilligan says that while piracy on the Internet is &#8220;ultimately a problem&#8221; there are also positives to consider.</p>
<p>&#8220;I see that there are two sides to this coin. If i&#8217;m being honest I see that the illegal downloading led to a lot of people watching the series, becoming aware of the series who otherwise would not have been,&#8221; he said.</p>
<p>&#8220;I see that in some ways illegal downloading has helped us, certainly in terms of brand awareness, so that&#8217;s a good side.&#8221;</p>
<p>The 46-year-old, who wrote more than two dozen episodes of the X-Files, also acknowledged there are negatives. If all illegal downloads had been legal ones, it would&#8217;ve meant more money in the bank for those involved with Breaking Bad.</p>
<p>&#8220;The downside is that a lot of folks who worked on the show would&#8217;ve made more money, myself included. But you know, like with most things, there&#8217;s two sides to the coin,&#8221; he said.</p>
<p>&#8220;We all need to eat, we all need to get paid, and I get paid very well, I can&#8217;t complain.&#8221;</p>
<p>The confession that unauthorized downloading can be good for TV shows is something that has been accepted more this year than any other.</p>
<p>Game of Thrones director David Petrarca previously <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/piracy-doesnt-hurt-game-of-thrones-director-says-130227/">admitted</a> that piracy generated much-needed &#8220;cultural buzz&#8221; around his show.</p>
<p>Jeff Bewkes, CEO of HBO’s parent company Time Warner, <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/game-of-thrones-piracy-better-than-an-emmy-time-warner-ceo-says-130808/">went even further</a>, stating that piracy resulted in more subscriptions for his company and receiving the title of &#8220;most-pirated&#8221; was &#8220;better than an Emmy.&#8221;</p>
<p>If Breaking Bad follows the Game of Thrones pattern suggested by Bewkes, Vince Gilligan might get that extra money he doesn&#8217;t need sooner than he thinks.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/breaking-bad-creator-illegal-downloading-raised-brand-awareness-131018/">Breaking Bad Creator: Illegal Downloading Raised Brand Awareness</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78197
title: Megaupload Raid ‘Destroyed’ (Way) More Than 10,000,000 Legal Files
uri: Megaupload-Raid-Destroyed-(Way)-More-Than-10-000-000-Legal-Files
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/dx01shbVrfM/
content:
<p><a href="media/5fd37436.megaupload.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/megaupload.jpg"><img src="media/5fd37436.megaupload.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/megaupload.jpg" alt="megaupload" width="180" height="154" class="alignright size-full wp-image-30407" /></a>When the U.S. Government <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/megaupload-shut-down-120119/">took down Megaupload</a> it branded the company as a pirate site with seemingly few legitimate uses. Up until now, however, there has been no research to back up this claim. </p>
<p>In an attempt to fill this gap researchers from Boston&#8217;s Northeastern University, together with colleagues from France and Australia, examined millions of files that were uploaded to five cyberlockers (FileFactory, Easy-share, Filesonic, Wupload and Megaupload) and the reupload service Undeadlink.</p>
<p>To find out whether the files were legitimate or not, the researchers extracted metadata from the site&#8217;s uploads using a link checker. The researchers controlled for several factors including split archives, and then manually determined the legitimacy of the files based on random samples of 1,000 uploads per site.</p>
<p>The results just published in the <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/176860329/Och-Filename-Analysis-Raid2013">article titled</a> &#8220;Holiday Pictures or Blockbuster Movies? Insights into Copyright Infringement in User Uploads to One-Click File Hosters&#8221; provide a unique insight into the proportion of infringing content on these services.</p>
<p>The main results displayed in the figure below reveal that the percentage of infringing files varies heavily between the six services. In addition, it also shows that for the majority of the files the researchers couldn&#8217;t conclusively determine whether a file was infringing or not. </p>
<p>For Megaupload (MU) the researchers found that 31% of all uploads were infringing, while 4.3% of uploads were clearly legitimate. This means that with an estimated 250 million uploads, 10.75 million uploads were non-infringing. For the remaining 65% the copyrighted status was either unknown, or the raters couldn&#8217;t reach consensus. </p>
<p>Using the most conservative estimate the findings show that the Megaupload raid took down at least 10.75 million legitimate files. In addition, the researchers found that FileFactory had a highest percentage of non-infringing uploads (14%).</p>
<p>With 0.1% Wupload and Undeadlink had the fewest uploads that were clearly legitimate, while 79% of all files added to these services were without a doubt infringing. </p>
<p><center><img src="media/d6136d30.mu-files.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/mu-files.jpg" alt="mu-files" width="599" height="315" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-78202" /></center></p>
<p>The research confirms that &#8220;one click&#8221; file-hosting services appear to be predominantly used to upload pirated content. However, there&#8217;s clearly also plenty of non-infringing uses, something the U.S. Government may have overlooked when it took Megaupload offline.</p>
<p>TorrentFreak spoke with Tobias Lauinger, one of the authors of the paper, who told us that the high volume of legitimate files is one of the most interesting aspects of the study. </p>
<p>&#8220;What I find most interesting about our results is that they support what many people were already suspecting before: That Megaupload was partially being used for &#8220;illegal&#8221; file sharing, but that there were also millions of perfectly legitimate files stored on Megaupload.&#8221;</p>
<p>One of the main drawbacks of the findings is that the researchers couldn&#8217;t determine the infringing status of the majority of the files. For two-third of all uploads to Megaupload this remains uncertain. </p>
<p>While unlikely, this means that in the most optimistic scenario 69.3% of the files uploaded to Megaupload could be perfectly legal. This means that the Megaupload raid could in theory have destroyed 172,500,000 million non-infringing files. </p>
<p>TorrentFreak talked to Megaupload&#8217;s Kim Dotcom who says that both the number of files as well as the non-infringing use was much higher in reality. </p>
<p>The researchers, however, found that based on the number of possible file IDs and the hit rate they got by randomly guessing these IDs there were an estimated 250 million files available at the time of the experiment. </p>
<p>Of course, the many users who lost access to their personal files are not helped by this statistics. But perhaps it may serve as a reminder for the District Court to finally make a decision on whether or not to allow former users to <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/u-s-government-is-to-blame-for-megaupload-data-massacre-court-hears-130704/">retrieve their files</a>. It&#8217;s been almost two years after all. </p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/megaupload-raid-destroyed-more-than-10000000-legal-files-131018/">Megaupload Raid &#8216;Destroyed&#8217; (Way) More Than 10,000,000 Legal Files</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78333
title: Pirate Bay’s Anti-Censorship Browser Clocks 1,000,000 Downloads
uri: Pirate-Bay-s-Anti-Censorship-Browser-Clocks-1-000-000-Downloads
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/IN8j2zYEDp4/
content:
<p><img src="media/85793bea.piratebrowser.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/piratebrowser.jpg" align="right" alt="pirate browser" />On the occasion of its 10th anniversary last August, The Pirate Bay presented a gift to its users &#8211; the PirateBrowser.</p>
<p>Blocked by court orders all over the world, The Pirate Bay is arguably the most censored website on the Internet. <a href="http://piratebrowser.com/">The PirateBrowser</a> software allows people to bypass these restrictions, without having to use a proxy site or other circumvention tool. </p>
<p>It appears that the browser idea appeals to a wide audience as the number of downloads have been going through the roof right from the start. </p>
<p>Today, The Pirate Bay team informs TorrentFreak that they just served the 1,000,000th PirateBrowser download from its website. </p>
<p>The million downloads says little about how many people actively use the software, but according to TPB roughly 0.5% of all their visitors now uses the browser. This translates to hundreds of thousands of active users a week, mostly from countries where ISPs are blocking the site.</p>
<p>&#8220;I guess that a lot of people want to see the websites their governments and courts are trying to hide from them,&#8221; Pirate Bay&#8217;s Winston told TorrentFreak commenting on the success.</p>
<p>The browser is based on Firefox 23 bundled with a Tor client and some proxy configurations to speed up page loading. It is meant purely as a tool to circumvent censorship and doesn’t provide any anonymity for its users, as that would slow down the browser.</p>
<p>While the PirateBrowser continues to expand its user base, <a href="http://proxybay.info/">proxies</a> are still the preferred way to circumvent ISP blockades. Currently 7% of all visits to The Pirate Bay go through dedicated proxy sites, some of which receive millions of visitors per week.</p>
<p>The Pirate Bay team informs TorrentFreak that they will continue to develop the browser. An updated edition with several improvements and Mac and Linux versions of the software are also in the works.</p>
<p>The team are also working on a special BitTorrent-powered application, which lets users store and distribute The Pirate Bay and other websites on their own computers, making it impossible for third parties to block them.</p>
<p>This &#8220;p2p browser&#8221; should be able to keep The Pirate Bay operational, even if the site itself is pulled offline. There is currently no estimated release date set for this second project, but it will take a few more months of development at minimum.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bays-anti-censorship-browser-clocks-1-million-downloads-131019/">Pirate Bay&#8217;s Anti-Censorship Browser Clocks 1,000,000 Downloads</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78314
title: Making Money from Movie Streaming Sites, an Insider’s Story
uri: Making-Money-from-Movie-Streaming-Sites-an-Insider-s-Story
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/6ybvSP2aDmg/
content:
<p><a href="media/2efdb268.dollar-money.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/dollar-money.jpg"><img src="media/2efdb268.dollar-money.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/dollar-money.jpg" alt="dollar-money" width="180" height="135" class="alignright size-full wp-image-38877" /></a>There are many ways to obtain unauthorized movies and TV shows online. BitTorrent is almost certainly the most popular, but in the past few years the rise of file-storage and streaming services has been difficult to ignore.</p>
<p>Giants such as PrimeWire.ag and Movie4K.to host links to all of the latest movies to view within a browser, but where does that content come from and how does it get there? What motivates people to contribute?</p>
<p>To find out, TorrentFreak has been speaking to an individual with a wealth of experience in this field. To protect his identity we&#8217;ll have to be vague about where he operates, but suffice to say he&#8217;s one of the most prolific uploaders and linkers online today with a hundreds of thousands of links spread and 30,000 movies and TV shows uploaded. So how did it all start for John?</p>
<p>&#8220;When I was a child, the hottest TV show was Happy Days. Well, it came on Tuesday nights at eight and if I wasn’t around ready to watch, I missed it. That’s right; you used to have to be in front of your television at a specific day and time to watch your favorite TV shows. There was no such thing as VCRs or DVRs and even good ol’ Blockbuster was a decade away from opening its first store,&#8221; John recalls.</p>
<p>The seeds of need had been planted and many, many years later John found file-sharing sites to be the perfect solution to that original problem. But then streaming sites came along with their ultimate convenience, changing things forever.</p>
<p>&#8220;I had just moved to Puerto Vallarta [Mexico] and went to a network’s website to watch a TV Show I had missed and I was blocked because I was outside the US. Grrrrr. Then a friend told me about [<a href="http://torrentfreak.com/k-court-121207/">Richard O'Dwyer</a>'s former site] TVShack and a whole new world opened up to me. The site itself was ugly and clunky but it provided the market with what it needed and me with 100’s of hours of entertainment,&#8221; John explains. </p>
<p>While the site was clearly fulfilling unmet demand, not even TVShack had all the answers. This caused John to start contributing to the piracy ecosystem himself.</p>
<p>&#8220;One day, there was a movie I wanted to watch and there were no links to it. So I did a Google search and found one and added it to TVShack. Yay me! I was part of the community.&#8221;</p>
<p>That event triggered some thoughts. It&#8217;s a time-intensive task adding links, so why were some people spending so much time adding huge quantities of links to sites every night? John did some research and then it hit him in the head &#8220;like a brick.&#8221;</p>
<p>It was all about the money.</p>
<p><a href="media/e88a1d22.affiliate.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/affiliate.jpg"><img src="media/e88a1d22.affiliate.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/affiliate.jpg" alt="affiliate" width="180" height="139" class="alignright size-full wp-image-78325" /></a>&#8220;In order to make money, you have to &#8216;own&#8217; the links. The links come from file hosts. A file host is someone like YouTube or the now defunct MegaVideo. Of course there are hundreds of others out there and many of them have public, and often times private, affiliate programs,&#8221; John says.</p>
<p>The basic mechanism is that users upload hot content to file-hosting sites. The more people who visit that site to view the content the more advertising revenue the file-hoster makes. The file-hoster&#8217;s affiliate scheme then kicks in and part of the ad revenue generated gets sent to the uploader of the content. John says the payout to him is around $1 to $2 per 1,000 views of a movie or TV show.</p>
<p>Of course, putting content on a file-hoster is one thing, driving traffic to that content in order to generate the clicks &#8211; and the revenue &#8211; is another. This is where streaming link sites come in. By uploading hot movies and TV shows to file-hosters and then submitting their links to streaming indexes, more people find the content.</p>
<p>&#8220;Just post your links on one of the popular streaming websites like <a href="http://primewire.ag">PrimeWire.ag</a>, Movie4k.to or even up-and-comers such as <a href="http://theshowdepot.com">TheShowDepot.com</a>, and collect your money. Sounds easy doesn’t it?&#8221;</p>
<p>While John sounds very organized and streamlined now, things weren&#8217;t always that way. The main efficiencies have come in the way that movies and TV shows are obtained and made available on hosters and linking sites. Early on John would only be able to upload around ten TV shows per day and hard drive restrictions were becoming an obstacle to making more money.</p>
<p><a href="media/857e25f9.plzseed.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/plzseed.jpg"><img src="media/fd5e24eb.plzseed-150x150.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/plzseed-150x150.jpg" alt="plzseed" width="150" height="150" class="alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-68571" /></a>&#8220;I made a few bucks, but I knew if I could do more and faster and add to more websites, I could make a nice living. Then I discovered seedboxes and a new way to download massive amounts of TV shows and movies. I even found software that automatically uploads the video files to the file hosts.&#8221;</p>
<p>With things hotting up with a part-automated system, John was soon adding more than a thousand links a day to several streaming websites. He now has 30,000 different movies and TV shows stored online, across 12 different file-hosting sites, each carrying between 10,000 and 30,000 items from John&#8217;s collection.</p>
<p>&#8220;Amongst the different streaming websites I have added over 200,000 links. And yes, I am making a nice living at it,&#8221; John concludes.</p>
<p>To some readers the idea of making money from unauthorized content will be something that&#8217;s unacceptable, yet it&#8217;s a difficult reality to escape online. While the vast majority of file-sharers and stream viewers will have no financial interest in the content being viewed, there will always be a small minority who seek to monetize it.</p>
<p>When reward becomes possible, motivations often increase and with that a proliferation of content online. It&#8217;s impossible to detect the motivations of the person who uploaded the content currently being viewed so the big question is whether the majority of consumers care. To be blunt &#8211; probably not.</p>
<p><em>Next time: How do copyright takedowns affect profits?</em></p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/making-money-from-movie-streaming-sites-an-insiders-story-131019/">Making Money from Movie Streaming Sites, an Insider&#8217;s Story</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78388
title: ArchiveTeam Works Hard to Avert isoHunt Data Massacre
uri: ArchiveTeam-Works-Hard-to-Avert-isoHunt-Data-Massacre
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/4kf8gry7qz4/
content:
<p><img src="media/34e1d7c8.200px-Archiveteam.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/200px-Archiveteam.jpg" alt="200px-Archiveteam" width="200" height="200" class="alignright size-full wp-image-78390" />The Canada-based search engine isoHunt is not just one of the oldest but also one of the largest torrent repositories on the Internet.</p>
<p>At the time of writing isoHunt consists of 13,773,786 torrents linking to 286 million files which are good for a total 17,390.44 terabytes of data. Unfortunately, all of the site&#8217;s metadata may soon disappear.</p>
<p>After a legal battle of nearly eight years isoHunt founder Gary Fung announced the <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/isohunt-shuts-down-after-110-million-settlement-with-the-mpaa-131017/">site&#8217;s closure this week</a>. Fung signed a $110 million settlement with the MPAA and agreed to shut down the torrent site by October 23.</p>
<p>While isoHunt.com will soon be gone, the site&#8217;s torrents and other metadata will be preserved if it&#8217;s up to the <a href="http://www.archiveteam.org/index.php?title=Main_Page">ArchiveTeam</a>. In an attempt to <a href="http://www.archiveteam.org/index.php?title=IsoHunt">save isoHunt&#8217;s</a> extensive collection of torrent files, a group of &#8220;rogue archivists&#8221; has been working around the clock to save all data for future generations.</p>
<p>TorrentFreak talked to several ArchiveTeam members, each determined to prevent one of the largest metadata massacres in history. </p>
<p>&#8220;The settlement took everyone by surprise, and appeared to come out of nowhere. IsoHunt is shutting down in less than three days, and the speedy massacre of such a significant volume of metadata is a tragedy,&#8221; ArchiveTeam&#8217;s &#8216;lysobit&#8217; informs TorrentFreak.</p>
<p>&#8220;This project isn&#8217;t about politics or copyright issues. This is about preserving culture and historical metadata. All data is essential,&#8221; he adds.</p>
<p>The ArchiveTeam gathered fame in 2010 when they released a full backup of all Geocities websites before Yahoo! pulled the plug for good. The archive was released as a <a href="http://thepiratebay.sx/torrent/5923737/Geocities_-_The_Torrent">641 gigabyte torrent</a> and made headlines all over the Internet. </p>
<p>The backup of isoHunt, which is still in progress, is expected to be nearly five times larger. The ArchiveTeam believes that all torrents, comments and other metadata will be around three terabytes when its complete. </p>
<p>At this point it is still uncertain whether they will be able to finish the project in time. IsoHunt is expected to disappear in a few days and the ArchiveTeam is still looking for volunteers to assist in the backup process.  </p>
<p>&#8220;People who are interested in supporting our effort of <a href="http://www.archiveteam.org/index.php?title=IsoHunt">preserving the data</a> contained on isoHunt can do so by following the instructions <a href="https://github.com/joepie91/isohunt-grab">on GitHub</a> for their platform. The script works by downloading metadata in bulks of 50 and uploading a compressed archive of them to a central server <a href="http://tracker.archiveteam.org/isoprey/">via the &#8216;Warrior&#8217;,&#8221;</a> ArchiveTeam&#8217;s &#8216;Fionn&#8217; told us.</p>
<p>According to &#8216;joepie91&#8242;, founder of the isoHunt archiving project, the rescue operation is a prime example of what the ArchiveTeam is for. The people involved in the team&#8217;s projects want to make sure that important data doesn&#8217;t get lost whenever a site shuts down. </p>
<p>&#8220;Many sites shut down over time &#8211; either outside of their own control, or due to an acquisition &#8211; and most of these sites don&#8217;t really care about their users, or the content they host. ArchiveTeam is a loosely organized group of &#8216;rogue archivists&#8217; that keeps track of impending shutdowns, and saves all data that can be saved before it&#8217;s gone forever,&#8221; joepie91 told TorrentFreak.</p>
<p>&#8220;While there is some coherence, and some services are controlled by a smaller group of people, the general idea is to &#8216;just go get it done&#8217;. ArchiveTeam has developed a <a href="https://github.com/ArchiveTeam/seesaw-kit">reusable toolkit</a> for developing archiving scripts compatible with the &#8216;Warrior&#8217;; a system that anyone who runs the script can join to receive automated archiving tasks, making the whole process distributed and quicker,&#8221; he adds.</p>
<p>If the ArchiveTeam is able to get the backup done in time, isoHunt will write history again when the torrent becomes available. As far as we know, a three terabyte isoHunt archive is going to set a record for the largest torrent ever distributed in public. </p>
<p><strong>Update:</strong> isoHunt has taken down its servers to prevent the site from being backed up. We hope to have more information on the current status of the backup later. </p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/archiveteam-works-hard-to-avert-isohunt-data-massacre-131020/">ArchiveTeam Works Hard to Avert isoHunt Data Massacre</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78331
title: TorrentReactor Celebrates 10th Birthday With Cash Prize “Game of Torrents”
uri: TorrentReactor-Celebrates-10th-Birthday-With-Cash-Prize-Game-of-Tor
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/A2Gq6ziwuv8/
content:
<p><img src="media/aea6e5b1.torrentreactor2.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/torrentreactor2.jpg" width="180" height="123" class="alignright" />In recent times two of the world’s largest torrent sites, isoHunt and The Pirate Bay, both celebrated their tenth birthdays. As <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/isohunt-shuts-down-after-110-million-settlement-with-the-mpaa-131017/">revealed</a> this week, only The Pirate Bay has a chance of seeing its eleventh.</p>
<p>But a third site, celebrating its tenth anniversary today, is old-timer TorrentReactor. At the start of the year it was the ninth most-popular torrent site on the Internet but with isoHunt&#8217;s closure and the disappearance of <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/h33t-eu-disappears-from-the-internet-130928/">H33T</a>, it&#8217;s position is likely to improve at the start of 2014.</p>
<p>The site has experienced <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/torrentreactor-ten-years-of-serving-torrents-130914/">many ups and downs</a> over the last decade but is one of the few still in an upbeat mood and having fun. In 2010 the site claimed it had <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/torrentreactor-buys-and-renames-russian-town-100807/">bought a Russian village</a> and the story went viral, something the team never expected for an elaborate joke.</p>
<p>Rejecting the idea of a repeat performance, TorrentReactor have come up with something else to celebrate their birthday &#8211; a browser game called Game of Torrents. The game is still under development but is set to go live next month with plenty of new features. When it does a few lucky torrent users can also pick up some cash prizes.</p>
<p>&#8220;It took us some time to develop some basic mechanics and graphics. We developed tons of ideas along the way and it turned out game development is even greater fun than we expected,&#8221; TorrentReactor told TorrentFreak.</p>
<p>&#8220;The current gameplay is trivial. A player needs to click the big &#8216;Upload torrent&#8217; button and buy automatic uploading units that can do the job for him/her. So the start is pretty easy,&#8221; TR explain.</p>
<p><center><br />
<h1>21 lawyers didn&#8217;t come cheap, but we did upload 2.3 billion torrents&#8230;..<img src="media/9de82698.got.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/got.png" alt="GameofTorrents" /></center></p>
<p>&#8220;The goal of the game at this time is to get all the achievements. This sounds easier than it is. Not only there are trillions of torrents that need to be uploaded but there are some negative events that should be avoided. For example, your virtual computer may break down or your virtual ISP will block your torrenting activity. Just like in real life. These events should be monitored and dealt with during the game. Later we plan to add many interesting upgrades that will make the game even more unpredictable.&#8221;</p>
<p>TorrentReactor are also promising a future multiplayer upgrade but in the meantime will launch the game in single player competition form in a few days time. It&#8217;s not Call of Duty or Grand Theft Auto, but it&#8217;s surprisingly addictive when you get going and the promise of hard cash is something neither of those titles offer.</p>
<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll start the competition on the 1st of November and it will last two weeks. Players that have the greatest amounts of torrents uploaded by that time will win real money. The first three cash prizes will be $300, $200, and $100 respectively. Seven runner-up players will get smaller rewards. There will be a top-players list where anyone can see who the leaders are,&#8221; the site&#8217;s admin concludes.</p>
<p>In the meantime TorrentReactor are making available an early beta version of the game so that people can get used to the kind of thing that will be on offer in a couple of weeks time. We haven&#8217;t played the game for long but aside from a sore finger we can confirm virtual raids on hosting providers, ISP power failures and random copyright infringement issues.</p>
<p>Players who would like to have some features implemented (we&#8217;d like to see seedbox and VPN boosts please) are welcome to mention them in the comments section below.</p>
<p>An early beta of Game of Torrents can be <a href="http://gameoftor.com">played here</a>.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/torrentreactor-celebrates-10th-birthday-with-cash-prize-game-of-torrents-131020/">TorrentReactor Celebrates 10th Birthday With Cash Prize &#8220;Game of Torrents&#8221;</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78356
title: Getting Sampled by Girl Talk Boosts Sales, Research Finds
uri: Getting-Sampled-by-Girl-Talk-Boosts-Sales-Research-Finds
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/VD1C0fWlbqE/
content:
<p><img src="media/2c475b9d.girl-talk-all-day.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/girl-talk-all-day.jpg" alt="girl talk all day" width="222" height="149" class="alignright size-full wp-image-78446" />A lot of music genres wouldn’t exist without samples, but too much sampling can sometimes fray tempers.</p>
<p>Interestingly, new research suggests that this shouldn&#8217;t necessarily be the case as the use of samples may actually boost sales of the original tracks. </p>
<p>These findings come from an <a href="http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2340235">article</a> titled &#8220;Fair Use, Girl Talk, and Digital Sampling: An Empirical Study of Music Sampling&#8217;s Effect on the Market for Copyrighted Works,&#8221; of which a draft version was published a few days ago.</p>
<p>At the center of the study is <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Girl_Talk_(musician)">Girl Talk</a>&#8216;s album All Day. Girl Talk is the stage name of <a href="https://twitter.com/girltalk">Gregg Gillis</a>, who is renowned for sampling the works of hundreds of other artists without obtaining licenses. </p>
<p>As a result, many music platforms refuse to carry Girl Talk&#8217;s music, even though Gillis argues that his sampling is fair use. Whether the fair use argument holds up has yet to be seen, as none of the sampled artists has taken Girl Talk to court. </p>
<p>In the new study, patent attorney Mike Schuster examines the effect Girl Talk&#8217;s sampling has on actual sales. With 374 sampled songs, All Day is an interesting example to assess whether the samples help or hurt sales, and the results are quite clear.</p>
<p>&#8220;This study found that within the bounds of Girl Talk’s All Day, the unlicensed sampling actually benefited sales of the sampled songs,&#8221; Schuster writes.</p>
<p>The findings are valid at a 92.5% degree of statistical significance and appear to be unrelated to factors such as sample length and previous success. While Schuster recognizes that his research is just an initial step, he hopes that it will make courts recognize the positive effects of sampling.  </p>
<p>&#8220;Beyond supporting the premise that digital sampling may constitute fair use, the results of this study raise several notable issues and subjects for future study. One such issue is that courts only address an alleged fair use’s effect on the market for the original as a binary system, wherein the only options are harm to the market (disfavoring fair use) or no harm to the market (favoring fair use).&#8221; </p>
<p>The study notes that in this case both the original artists and Girl Talk would benefit from considering the samples as fair use. This is something the courts should take into account. </p>
<p>&#8220;There is no accepted rule on how to treat a market benefit. The failure to address this issue is questionable because a market benefit actually furthers the utilitarian goal of copyright by incentivizing the creation of new works through economic gain,&#8221; Schuster writes.</p>
<p>Whether the major record labels will agree with this stance has yet to be seen. For now, Girl Talk will continue his trademark use of samples and his <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Girl_Talk_(musician)#Albums">new album</a> is expected to drop soon on <a href="http://illegal-art.net/home/">Illegal Art</a>. </p>
<p><center><br />
<h5>Girl Talk  &#8211; Oh No</h5>
<p><iframe width="550" height="413" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/4bMM7tGV9MI?rel=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></center></p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/getting-sampled-by-girl-talk-boosts-sales-research-finds-131021/">Getting Sampled by Girl Talk Boosts Sales, Research Finds</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78423
title: Game Devs Abuse Copyright to Censor Negative YouTube Review
uri: Game-Devs-Abuse-Copyright-to-Censor-Negative-YouTube-Review
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/zcuzNplznsg/
content:
<p><a href="media/0f383b54.gary1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/gary1.jpg"><img src="media/0f383b54.gary1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/gary1.jpg" alt="gary1" width="200" height="122" class="alignright size-full wp-image-78425" /></a>In recent years YouTube has become a wonderful platform for individuals to create a product and generate revenue from it, often from the comfort of their own homes. Many provide services such as hints, tips and tutorials on anything from baking to flying a plane, but growing in popularity are YouTube-based reviewers.</p>
<p>One guy who has gone down that particular route is <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bain_%28game_commentator%29">John Bain</a>, an Englishman known online as TotalBiscuit. Bain is a great success and has almost 1.3 million subscribers to his PC gaming YouTube channel. However he now finds himself in a copyright takedown controversy sparked by his review of Wild Games Studio&#8217;s first-person survival game <em>Day One: Garry&#8217;s Incident</em>.</p>
<p>There&#8217;s no way to sugar-coat Bain&#8217;s review &#8211; he hated it, and quite rightly so. The 21 minute review ripped apart the graphics, gameplay and presentation of the game and it was quite obvious from Bain&#8217;s tone this wasn&#8217;t going to end well. Aside from the odd element receiving a lukewarm reception, the review concluded that the game is a complete turkey.</p>
<p><center><br />
<h1>The astonishing graphical excesses of Day One: Garry&#8217;s Incident</h1>
<p><img src="media/4e009ad5.gary3.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/gary3.jpg" alt="gary3" /></center></p>
<p>The video review became highly viewed very quickly, topping search results for the game on YouTube. But without warning it suddenly disappeared, only to be replaced by a copyright infringement notice, issued by none other than Wild Games Studio themselves.</p>
<p>At this point it&#8217;s worth pointing out that Bain is no stranger to the studio. They gave him a free key to access a review copy of the game on Steam and asked Bain to place a link in his review to where the game could be bought. It was perhaps appropriate then that the CEO of the studio decided to <a href="http://steamcommunity.com/app/242800/discussions/0/810938810809560203/#p2">justify</a> their takedown actions on the Stream forums themselves.</p>
<p><center><img src="media/a3db1fe8.gary2.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/gary2.jpg" alt="Gary 2" /></center></p>
<p>Well aware of the circumstances behind the review and his protections under copyright law to critique the game if he so chooses, Bain summed up the mess on Twitter.</p>
<p>&#8220;Long story short. Dev sends code, code used to make critique, dev dislikes critique, dev abuses system to censor critique,&#8221; he said.</p>
<p>&#8220;This happened 2 days ago, we contacted [Wild Games] for an explanation and have heard nothing. Giving them til Monday to respond before going nuclear. It should be pointed out that US Fair Use doctrine exists in particular to protect criticism from being censored in such a way.&#8221;</p>
<p>While Bain may have had the intention of not &#8220;goin nuclear&#8221; until today, things are now largely out of his hands. His follow-up video (embedded below) which explains events to date has already received more than 500,000 views and the backlash on Metacritic is something to behold, with the game currently receiving 0.6 out of 10 after 683 votes. It is very clear from the comments that the Metacritic reviewers know what the developer did to Bain.</p>
<p><center><img src="media/29dcafcf.gary4.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/gary4.jpg" alt="gary4" /></center></p>
<p>&#8220;This highlights a wider problem and an issue that must be addressed. Look at how easily a company was able to censor the most-watched and prominent critique of their game by abusing YouTube&#8217;s copyright claim system,&#8221; Bain says. &#8220;Look at how they were able to completely flaunt the notion of networks policing their partners and using a shoot first, ask questions later form, to deny revenue to someone who they didn&#8217;t like.&#8221;</p>
<p>In order to draw attention to the issue, Bain says he will be donating all YouTube revenue generated by the &#8216;incident&#8217; to the EFF.</p>
<p>In the meantime, anyone wanting to see the original review can find it on <a href="http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x15fmac_wtf-is-day-one-garry-s-incident_videogames">here on DailyMotion</a>, ironically now being monetized by someone else.</p>
<p><center><iframe width="500" height="281" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/QfgoDDh4kE0?list=UUy1Ms_5qBTawC-k7PVjHXKQ" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></center></p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/game-devs-abuse-copyright-to-censor-negative-youtube-review-131021/">Game Devs Abuse Copyright to Censor Negative YouTube Review</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78415
title: Top 10 Most Pirated Movies of The Week
uri: 2013-10-21-Top-10-Most-Pirated-Movies-of-The-Week
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/H7pFU8GYl3Q/
content:
<p><a href="media/19607b0b.pacific-rim.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/pacific-rim.jpg"><img src="media/19607b0b.pacific-rim.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/pacific-rim.jpg" alt="pacific-rim" width="300" height="143" class="alignright size-full wp-image-77678" /></a>This week we have three newcomers in our chart. </p>
<p>Man of Steel is the most downloaded movie. </p>
<p>The data for our weekly download chart is collected by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only. All the movies in the list are BD/DVDrips unless stated otherwise.</p>
<p><a href="http://TorrentFreak.com/category/dvdrip/feed/"><strong>RSS feed</strong></a> for the weekly movie download chart.</p>
<table class="css hover" summary="Most downloaded movies on BitTorrent">
<caption>Week ending October 20, 2013</caption>
<thead>
<tr>
<th width="12%"><strong>Ranking</strong></th>
<th width="15%"><strong>(<a href="https://torrentfreak.com/top-10-most-pirated-movies-of-the-week-131014/">last week</a>)</strong></th>
<th><strong>Movie</strong></th>
<th width="18%"><strong>IMDb Rating / Trailer</strong></th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tfoot>
<tr>
<td colspan="4">torrentfreak.com</td>
</tr>
</tfoot>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td><strong>1</strong></td>
<td>(&#8230;)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/superman_man_of_steel/">Man Of Steel</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0770828/">7.5</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6DJcgm3wNY">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>2</strong></td>
<td>(1)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/pacific_rim_2013/">Pacific Rim</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1663662/">7.4</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5guMumPFBag">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>3</strong></td>
<td>(&#8230;)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/despicable_me_2/">Despicable Me 2</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1690953/">7.7</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HwXbtZXjbVE">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>4</strong></td>
<td>(2)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/white_house_down/">White house Down</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2334879/">6.4</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wonLfgO5p8">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>5</strong></td>
<td>(5)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_lone_ranger/">The Lone Ranger</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1210819/">6.6</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjFsNSoDZK8">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>6</strong></td>
<td>(&#8230;)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/kick_ass_2_2013/">Kick-Ass 2</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1650554/">7.0</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qc6tL8cd9KQ">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>7</strong></td>
<td>(3)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/elysium_2013/">Elysium</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1535108/">7.0</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QILNSgou5BY">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>8</strong></td>
<td>(8)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/2_guns/">2 Guns</a> (TS/Webrip)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1272878/">7.0</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVNe3RK2fgI">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>9</strong></td>
<td>(4)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_internship_2013/">The Internship</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2234155/">6.3</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdnoqCViqUo">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><strong>10</strong></td>
<td>(6)</td>
<td><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/monsters_university/">Monsters University</a> </td>
<td><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1453405/">7.5</a> / <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xBzPioph8CI">trailer</a></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/top-10-most-pirated-movies-of-the-week-131021/">Top 10 Most Pirated Movies of The Week</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78467
title: isoHunt Shuts Down Early to Block Backup Plan
uri: isoHunt-Shuts-Down-Early-to-Block-Backup-Plan
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/FveU6n14OCY/
content:
<p><img src="media/3e145208.isohunt-logo.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/isohunt-logo.jpg" alt="isohunt-logo" width="200" height="71" class="alignright size-full wp-image-21815" />After a legal battle of nearly eight years isoHunt founder Gary Fung announced the <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/isohunt-shuts-down-after-110-million-settlement-with-the-mpaa-131017/">site&#8217;s closure last week</a>. </p>
<p>Fung signed a $110 million settlement with the MPAA and planned to shut down the site Tuesday night as stipulated in the agreement with the movie studios.</p>
<p>The unexpected settlement took many of the site&#8217;s users by surprise, and yesterday we reported that a group of &#8220;rogue archivists&#8221; was working <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/archiveteam-works-hard-to-avert-isohunt-data-massacre-131020/">on a full backup</a> to preserve a piece of Internet history. Unfortunately for them, isoHunt&#8217;s founder didn&#8217;t think that this was a very good idea.</p>
<p>A few hours after the news broke, isoHunt took down the server where the torrents were stored. By early Monday morning the entire site had been replaced with a <a href="http://isohunt.com">farewell note to the site&#8217;s visitors</a>. </p>
<p>&#8220;This is it. We are shutting down isoHunt services a little early,&#8221; Fung wrote.  </p>
<p>IsoHunt&#8217;s owner explained that the early exit was a direct response to ArchiveTeam&#8217;s backup attempt, but it&#8217;s unclear if it was his own decision or whether the MPAA&#8217;s lawyers pushed for it.  </p>
<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m told there was this Internet archival team that wants to make historical copy of our .torrent files, I&#8217;m honored that people think our site is worthy of historical preservation, but the truth is about 95% of those .torrent files can be found off Google regardless and mostly have been indexed from other BitTorrent sites in the first place,&#8221; Fung notes.  </p>
<p><center><img src="media/0521dd84.isohunt-destruct.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/isohunt-destruct.png" alt="isohunt-destruction notice" width="534" height="360" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-78469" /></center></p>
<p>Fung is right and of course all isoHunt torrents are also backed up by the torrent cache services <a href="http://torrage.com/">Torrage</a> and <a href="http://zoink.it">Zoink</a>. However, all other metadata and comments appear to be gone for good. The ArchiveTeam managed to grab 242 gigabytes of data, but most is still missing. </p>
<p>ArchiveTeam&#8217;s ‘joepie91′ told TorrentFreak that the main goal of the backup was not to copy the torrents, but all the metadata surrounding it including user comments and file-info. He is nonetheless proud of what the team of volunteers got done in such a short time-span.  </p>
<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m disappointed to see that we didn&#8217;t manage to archive all of isoHunt, of course, but I am quite happy to see how many people helped out, and what kind of a result it has had &#8211; 29 million IDs checked in some two days is still incredible,&#8221; joepie91 says.</p>
<p>This partial backup will be posted on the Internet archive in the near future and announced on the #archiveteam IRC channel. </p>
<p>&#8220;One last but quite important remark I want to make, is that I think Gary might have misunderstood the purpose of the archiving project; he basically states that &#8220;the .torrent files can be found elsewhere too&#8221; &#8211; but this completely misses the point, being the archiving of the metadata *around* those torrents, such as user comments. These cannot be replicated from other sources&#8230;</p>
<p>Fung, meanwhile, used the early shutdown to deliver a &#8220;proper send-off&#8221; to the people who&#8217;ve used his site for many years. </p>
<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s been an adventure in the last 10.5 years working on isoHunt, a privilege working with some of the smartest guys I&#8217;ve worked with, and my life won&#8217;t be the same without it. For what I&#8217;m working on next, please look up <a href="http://garyfung.ca/">my blog</a> on Google and follow me there. </p>
<p>&#8220;Because as the Terminator would say with a German accent, &#8216;I&#8217;ll be backkk&#8217;,&#8221; Fung said, before Rickrolling the already distressed users&#8230;.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/isohunt-shuts-down-early-to-block-backup-plan-131021/">isoHunt Shuts Down Early to Block Backup Plan</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78500
title: Pirate Bay Founder Urges Sweden to Stop His Extradition (Updated)
uri: Pirate-Bay-Founder-Urges-Sweden-to-Stop-His-Extradition-(Updated)
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/kIecjoKPZKg/
content:
<p><img alt="gottfrid" align="right" src="media/7557a16b.anakata1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/anakata1.jpg" />Last month Pirate Bay founder Gottfrid Svartholm had his hacking sentence reduced from two to <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bay-founder-hacking-sentence-slashed-in-half-on-appeal-130925/">one year in prison</a>.</p>
<p>The Court of Appeal upheld the guilty verdict in the hacking of IT company Logica, but overturned the guilty verdict handed down in respect of the breach at the Nordea bank.</p>
<p>Following the new verdict Gottfrid is set to be released early next year. However, since he is wanted in Denmark in a separate hacking case the Swedish authorities are planning to extradite the 29-year old next week.</p>
<p>In Denmark, Gottfrid is accused of hacking into the mainframe of IT company CSC and downloading a large number of files, including police records. The Danes <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bay-founder-will-be-extradited-to-denmark-130618/">successfully requested</a> Gottfrid&#8217;s extradition earlier this year when they described the CSC hack as similar to the Nordea one in Sweden.</p>
<p>Gottfrid <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bay-founder-asks-danish-authorities-to-drop-hacking-case-131006/">previously asked</a> the Danish authorities to drop his case. He apologized that his computer was used for the CSC hack, but stressed that this was not his wrongdoing. Thus far this request has been without result and in a final attempt to stop his pending extradition the Pirate Bay founder has now turned to the Swedish Government. </p>
<p>In an open letter he points out that two crucial issues have to be addressed before the extradition can take place. </p>
<p>Firstly, Gottfrid notes that the arrest warrant he received was incomplete. It didn&#8217;t include a detailed description of the circumstances of the alleged crime, its location or the nature of his involvement. In addition, he didn&#8217;t have the opportunity to read the attachments that were referenced in the warrant, which were in Danish.    </p>
<p>The second issue is the question of whether the Danish case is similar to the one Gottfrid has been tried for in Sweden already. The appeals court previously cleared Gottfrid of the Nordea hacking charges and because of the similarity between the cases he believes this should also apply to the Danish charges.</p>
<p>&#8220;It was found that my computer could have been controlled remotely, and that it had acted as a &#8216;computer lab&#8217;/ server, accessible to a wider audience. I could therefore not be held responsible for what was found on it. Liability was thus tried in Sweden for something that very closely matches what Denmark wants to hold me responsible for,&#8221; Gottfrid writes. </p>
<p>&#8220;It must be investigated whether this act should be considered &#8216;the same offense&#8217; or not,&#8221; he adds.</p>
<p>The Pirate Bay founder urges the Swedish Government to keep him in Sweden until these uncertainties have been resolved. If they proceed with the extradition it would be a violation of international law, he notes.  </p>
<p>&#8220;Overall, I argue that an extradition, if it is executed before [these two issues] have been investigated further, would be contrary to international law and what is to be guaranteed by the European Convention of 4 November 1950 on the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms.&#8221;</p>
<p>Below is a translated copy of the open letter (<a href="http://torrentfreak.com/images/gottfrid-openletter.txt">Swedish original with references</a>). </p>
<p>This Friday the Swedish sentence against Gottfrid will be made final, and if the defense does not appeal, he will be extradited within five days. </p>
<p><strong>Update:</strong> A few minutes after we published this article <a href="http://www.idg.se/2.1085/1.529499/svartholm-warg-vill-till-hogsta-domstolen">the news broke</a> that Gottfrid will appeal his case at the Supreme Court in Sweden. </p>
<p>This means that the extradition is not going through next week. It&#8217;s likely to take months before the Supreme Court will decide on the matter, at which point Gottfrid will have served his sentence.</p>
<p>&#8212;</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">Re.: Possible upcoming Swedish crimes against international law and international agreements</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">I want to make the Swedish government aware that Sweden is about to violate Nordic, European and international agreements in that the Swedish authorities intend to surrender me to Denmark in accordance with a Nordic arrest order, issued in May 2013.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">I would like to state the following :</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">(1) Formal errors were made in terms of the warrant form, of the information I have received on its contents as well as in terms of my rights to have this presented in the Swedish language:</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">I have not received any detailed description of whether the circumstances of the crimes I am suspected of in Denmark , the location of it or what my involvement in it could mean .</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">In the arrest warrant there are references to attachments that I have not had the opportunity to read. In a police interrogation , I could browse through a stack of paper that may possibly have been those attachments, but I do not know. They were also only in the Danish language.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">(2) Before any extradition it must be determined whether an earlier indictment against me for hacking and fraud / attempted fraud against the Danish Nordea is considered as an indictment of the &#8216;same offense&#8217; or not. Here are additional facts emerged since the warrant was issued :</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">I was cleared of suspicion as above by the Court of Appeals (Svea Hovrätt) on 25 September 2013. It was found that my computer could have been controlled remotely, and that it had acted as a &#8216;computer lab&#8217;/ server , accessible to a wider audience. I could therefore not be held responsible for what was found on it.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">Liability was thus tried in Sweden for something that very closely matches what Denmark wants to hold me responsible for. It must be investigated whether this act should be considered &#8216; the same offense&#8217; or not.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">The liability trial that the Court of Appeals has conducted also brings something that the Nordic governments have agreed about: &#8220;The system with a Nordic arrest is based on a high degree of trust between the Nordic States.&#8221; This trust should also apply to evidence trials and verdicts in each country.</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">Overall, I argue that an extradition, if it is executed before (1) and (2) have been investigated further, would be contrary to international law and what is to be guaranteed by the European Convention of 4 November 1950 on the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms .</p>
<p style="padding-left: 10px;">Häktet I Sollentuna<br />
Gottfrid Svartholm Warg</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bay-founder-urges-sweden-to-stop-his-extradition-131022/">Pirate Bay Founder Urges Sweden to Stop His Extradition (Updated)</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78483
title: VPN Provider Shuts Down After Lavabit Case Undermines Security
uri: VPN-Provider-Shuts-Down-After-Lavabit-Case-Undermines-Security
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/aNOWQvWBQek/
content:
<p><a href="media/f408e481.cameraspy.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/cameraspy.jpg"><img src="media/f408e481.cameraspy.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/cameraspy.jpg" alt="cameraspy" width="170" height="164" class="alignright size-full wp-image-49625" /></a>As the revelations of Edward Snowden roll <a href="https://www.google.com/#q=edward+snowden&#038;tbm=nws">on and on</a> the notion that individuals in the United States, or indeed citizens of any country, have any real online privacy is being continually undermined.</p>
<p>As a result, interest in anonymity services such as Tor and <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/vpn-services-that-take-your-anonymity-seriously-2013-edition-130302/">VPNs</a> has increased as even regular Internet users balk at the idea of being monitored.</p>
<p>While there are hundreds of providers to choose from, one particular US-based company has decided that the current environment on home soil makes it impossible to offer an effective consumer-focused service.</p>
<p>&#8220;With immediate effect as of this notice, <a href="https://cryptoseal.com">CryptoSeal Privacy</a>, our consumer VPN service, is terminated.  All cryptographic keys used in the operation of the service have been zerofilled, and while no logs were produced (by design) during operation of the service, all records created incidental to the operation of the service have been deleted to the best of our ability,&#8221; the company said in a statement.</p>
<p>While it&#8217;s not unusual for a provider to leave the marketplace, CryptoSeal says that the ground has recently shifted beneath its feet, meaning that the legal basis on which the company was founded can no longer be relied upon.</p>
<p>&#8220;Essentially, the service was created and operated under a certain understanding of current US law, and that understanding may not currently be valid.  As we are a US company and comply fully with US law, but wish to protect the privacy of our users, it is impossible for us to continue offering the CryptoSeal Privacy consumer VPN product,&#8221; the company says.</p>
<p>The problem, CryptoSeal says, relates back to the recent Lavabit case. The now-shuttered email service used by Edward Snowden closed down in August, with founder Ladar Levison saying that he had been &#8220;forced to make a difficult decision: to become complicit in crimes against the American people or walk away from nearly 10 years of hard work by shutting down Lavabit.”</p>
<p><a href="media/19cffcad.lavabit.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/lavabit.jpg"><img src="media/19cffcad.lavabit.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/lavabit.jpg" alt="lavabit" width="180" height="181" class="alignright size-full wp-image-78495" /></a>Lavabit had been targeted by U.S. authorities but rather than compromise the privacy of his users, Levison decided to close the service down instead. He is currently tied up in a legal battle with U.S. authorities and it&#8217;s a document from this case that has caused CryptoSeal to shut down its consumer service.</p>
<p>&#8220;The Lavabit case, with <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/801182-redacted-pleadings-exhibits-1-23.html">filings</a> released by Kevin Poulsen of Wired.com reveals a Government theory that if a pen register order is made on a provider, and the provider&#8217;s systems do not readily facilitate full monitoring of pen register information and delivery to the Government in realtime, the Government can compel production of cryptographic keys via a warrant to support a government-provided pen trap device,&#8221; CryptoSeal state.</p>
<p>A pen register is a device originally created in the 1800&#8242;s for recording telegraph signals on paper but more recently the term has been used to describe devices that can monitor telephone lines and Internet communications. Since VPN communications are encrypted, CryptoSeal believes that the only way it would be able to comply with a pen register order would be to do the unthinkable &#8211; hand over its encryption keys.</p>
<p>&#8220;Our system does not support recording any of the information commonly requested in a pen register order, and it would be technically infeasible for us to add this in a prompt manner.  The consequence, being forced to turn over cryptographic keys to our entire system on the strength of a pen register order, is unreasonable in our opinion, and likely unconstitutional, but until this matter is settled, we are unable to proceed with our service,&#8221; the company informs.</p>
<p>While encouraging customers to <a href="https://rally.org/lavabit">donate</a> to Lavabit&#8217;s defense fund, CryptoSeal says it is currently investigating whether it will be able to provide a consumer VPN service in the future without compromising user privacy. The company signs off with the following call.</p>
<p>&#8220;For anyone operating a VPN, mail, or other communications provider in the US, we believe it would be prudent to evaluate whether a pen register order could be used to compel you to divulge SSL keys protecting message contents, and if so, to take appropriate action,&#8221; CryptoSeal concludes.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/vpn-provider-shuts-down-after-lavabit-case-undermines-security-131022/">VPN Provider Shuts Down After Lavabit Case Undermines Security</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78524
title: Pirate Bay Downloaders Trolled By Movie Director’s Shaven Balls
uri: Pirate-Bay-Downloaders-Trolled-By-Movie-Director-s-Shaven-Balls
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/3Zaq0r7x3f4/
content:
<p><a href="media/d1d7d87c.pornopung.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/pornopung.jpg"><img src="media/d1d7d87c.pornopung.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/pornopung.jpg" alt="pornopung" width="160" height="214" class="alignright size-full wp-image-78527" /></a>In years gone by downloading material from file-sharing applications could be a risky occupation. Traditional file-sharing networks such as FastTrack (Kazaa) and Gnutella (LimeWire) became dumping grounds for millions of junk files, many incorrectly named, to the point where shutting them down was the only thing that could save them.</p>
<p>These days things are very much different. Although BitTorrent sharing is carried out mainly in software clients, torrent files themselves are generally obtained from indexes, or torrent sites as most people know them. Not only do these sites carry comments from users which can be read in order to avoid downloading trash, many are policed by teams of moderators who remove junk, fake and malicious files.</p>
<p>But despite the superior moderation of today&#8217;s ecosystem, it is still entirely possible to get a file onto a torrent site that isn&#8217;t entirely what it seems. That has just been achieved to hilarious effect by film director Johan Kaos, who got past the moderators on the world&#8217;s most infamous torrent site to play a never-seen-before prank on its users.</p>
<p>The joke involved Kaos&#8217; just released movie &#8216;<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2197128/">Pornopung</a>&#8216; (Norwegian slang for &#8220;shaven balls&#8221;), a Norwegian comedy featuring two pick up artists who share their tricks with a &#8216;novice&#8217; called Christian, enabling him to become more attractive to the opposite sex.</p>
<p>Those downloading the movie from The Pirate Bay got a decent copy to begin with, but little did they know that it was Kaos himself seeding the video. The director had heavily modified the rest of the movie, as they would soon discover. As can be seen below, after the first 10 mins or so the camera switches to Kaos who filmed himself chatting in his bathroom. Then things get very much worse.</p>
<p><center><img src="media/066c23de.kaos1.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/kaos1.jpg" alt="kaos" /></center></p>
<p>&#8220;Hehe. I thought the movie was going to end up on The Pirate Bay sooner or later anyway, so why not be a little ahead?&#8221; Kaos <a href="http://www.aftenposten.no/kultur/Pornopung-regissoren-la-ut-halvannen-time-med-barbert-pung-pa-Pirate-Bay-7346614.html">told</a> Aftenposten.no.</p>
<p>&#8220;The film clip was recorded as an impulse once I sat on the toilet. Actually, I considered filling the remaining 80 minutes by filming my butt, but then I realized how exceptionally bad it was going to be, aesthetically that is.&#8221;</p>
<p>So, confronted with the problem of filming something more pleasing to the eye than his own rear end, Kaos said he landed on an idea to delight file-sharers for the remaining 80 minutes of the movie.</p>
<p>&#8220;I created a clean-shaven scrotum,&#8221; Kaos said. &#8220;A little more thematically relevant and easily more aesthetically pleasing, it seems, at least in my opinion.&#8221;</p>
<p>Despite his memorable cultural contribution to The Pirate Bay, Kaos says he bears no animosity towards file-sharers.</p>
<p>&#8220;In no way do I bear any grudges against people who download my film. It&#8217;s just a compliment that people want to see it. I would obviously prefer it if they chose to see it in theaters, since for me as a director it has the most to do with the movie and the best movie experience,&#8221; he said.</p>
<p>The director, who is currently backpacking in Laos, says that reaction to the prank has been largely positive.</p>
<p>&#8220;Most of the feedback I&#8217;ve gotten so far has been from people who have laughed themselves to death, but there have also been some who have been pissed. Well, they certainly can&#8217;t accuse me of having given them something they didn&#8217;t ask for, when they download a movie called Pornopung,&#8221; Kaos concludes.</p>
<p>Anyone wanting to see a 10 min promo of Pornopung followed by 80 mins of Kaos&#8217; shaven extremities can do so <a href="media/dc2fdafd.Pornopung.2013.720p.AAC.x264.BDrip.mp4" data-original-source="http://thepiratebay.sx/torrent/8928611/Pornopung.2013.720p.AAC.x264.BDrip.mp4">here</a>. Have fun.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bay-downloaders-trolled-by-movie-director-with-balls-131022/">Pirate Bay Downloaders Trolled By Movie Director&#8217;s Shaven Balls</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78539
title: YouTube MP3 Converter Loses Court Battle But The Music Plays On
uri: YouTube-MP3-Converter-Loses-Court-Battle-But-The-Music-Plays-On
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/HEUevEY9_lY/
content:
<p><a href="media/63332699.youtube.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/youtube.jpg"><img src="media/63332699.youtube.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/youtube.jpg" alt="youtube" width="200" height="110" class="alignright size-full wp-image-35449" /></a>In addition to obtaining music from file-sharing networks, those looking for free tracks often get them from so-called tube-rippers, sites and services that transform YouTube videos into downloadable MP3s.</p>
<p>These tools are available in several formats including desktop packages, apps for mobile devices, and more commonly browser-based tools. In mid-2012 YouTube owners Google, believed to be under pressure from the music industry, started to make life more difficult for web-based YouTube converters and some cases issued <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/google-threatens-to-sue-huge-youtube-mp3-conversion-site-120619/">threats to sue</a>.</p>
<p>While some sites decided to shut down, many others continued business as usual, including the German site YouTube-MP3, one of the largest YouTube ripping services around with around 30 million visits per month. The site has <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/youtube-mp3-fights-google-with-lawyers-and-220k-signature-petition-120703/">long insisted</a> that it has a right to provide ripping services but having fought off Google it recently found itself up against fresh adversaries.</p>
<p>Three music companies under the umbrella of industry group BVMI challenged YouTube-MP3&#8242;s assertion that it operates legally and sued it in the Hamburg District Court. The companies said that while YouTube-MP3 claimed to be offering only a rip-and-download service, there were serious technical issues behind the scenes that rendered the site in breach of copyright law.</p>
<p>YouTube-MP3 claimed that users of its service could enter the URL of a YouTube video and have the site convert and churn out an MP3 for download. Apparently, however, that wasn&#8217;t always the way it worked. Once a video had been converted to MP3, that audio was stored on YouTube-MP3&#8242;s servers. If another user subsequently entered the same YouTube URL, no conversion or ripping was carried out. They were simply handed a copy of the previously stored MP3 for download.</p>
<p><center><img src="media/7a75c85b.youtubemp3.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/youtubemp3.jpg" alt="YouTube-MP3" /></center></p>
<p>In a statement sent to TorrentFreak, BVMI said that this was a clear breach of copyright law.</p>
<p>&#8220;Contrary  to  the  common  assumption  that  YouTubeMP3  is  a streamripper that allows users to record songs from the Internet (much as cassette recorders were used to record  music from the radio  back in the day),  in fact the online converter often simply made the pieces  available  for download  without a license,&#8221; BVMI said.</p>
<p>BVMI said that by the time the case had arrived in court last month the owner of YouTube-MP3 had already signed cease and desist declarations and agreed to refrain from reproducing and distributing copyright content.</p>
<p>“The current case provides deep insights into the workings of so-called  ‘recording services’<br />
and exposes a trick that not only hoodwinks the rights owners but also misleads the users of<br />
these  services,&#8221; said BVMI Managing Director Dr Florian Drücke.</p>
<p>&#8220;Under the guise of private copying [YouTube-MP3] deceives people into thinking  that<br />
everything  is above-board, even though  the user  –  unwittingly  –  avails himself of an  illegal download platform. We have for some time pointed out that the vague  definition  of  ‘private copies’  encourages  cat-and-mouse games  in matters of streamripping, so  a clarification  at the political level is needed here.&#8221;</p>
<p>With the signing of the declarations the Hamburg District Court considered the case closed but ordered YouTube-MP3 to pay everyone&#8217;s costs.</p>
<p>TorrentFreak contacted the site&#8217;s owner for a comment but as yet we&#8217;ve received no response. Presumably life at YouTube-MP3 will continue, but without storing converted MP3s for subsequent download. The end result, of course, is that users of the site will still get ripped MP3s just as they did before, a point not lost on BVMI.</p>
<p>&#8220;One  thing  is  clear:  this  platform,  as  well  as  most  other streamripper sites,  generate considerable advertising income that is not shared with the artists or their partners.  This has nothing to do with fairness, nor does it fit with our current digital age, when many music sites – some of them free – can be used perfectly legally on the Internet,&#8221; BVMI conclude.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/youtube-mp3-converter-loses-court-battle-but-the-music-plays-on-131023/">YouTube MP3 Converter Loses Court Battle But The Music Plays On</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=77211
title: How NSA-Proof Are VPN Providers?
uri: How-NSA-Proof-Are-VPN-Providers
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/WDtg4KgPkdw/
content:
<p><a href="media/f408e481.cameraspy.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/cameraspy.jpg"><img src="media/f408e481.cameraspy.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/cameraspy.jpg" alt="cameraspy" width="170" height="164" class="alignright size-full wp-image-49625" /></a>Let&#8217;s start off by saying that no VPN service can ever guarantee your anonymity 100%. That said, there is good reason to believe that the most secure encryption schemes are nearly impossible to crack. </p>
<p>In theory, however, there&#8217;s always a possibility that certain agencies are operating several steps ahead of the game. For example, the NSA and others might be capable of cracking more advanced encryptions when data streams are stored for future decoding. </p>
<p>And then there&#8217;s the possibility of VPN providers being forced to hand over customer data. While <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/vpn-services-that-take-your-anonymity-seriously-2013-edition-130302/">no-logging policies</a> protect against traditional court orders, things get more complicated when government agencies issue gag orders, such as those contained in United States <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_security_letter">national security letters</a>.</p>
<p>To explore these issues TorrentFreak talked to BlackVPN, IPredator, Private Internet Access, VikingVPN and TorGuard.  </p>
<p>Below is an overview of the responses we received. On the one hand they address which encryption schemes are still safe, and which ones should be avoided. Separately, the U.S. based providers shared their thoughts on the discussions regarding national security letters. </p>
<p><center><br />
<h3>Does encryption still work?</h3>
<p></center></p>
<p>The first question is whether encryption still works. A few weeks ago many VPN users got concerned after <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-24173977">they read</a> that the NSA had compromised privacy software and cracked encryption algorithms.</p>
<p>So does that mean VPNs can no longer be trusted? While the various providers all have different opinions, they agree that the most secure encryptions are impossible to crack on the fly. Similarly, most providers warn that PPTP is flawed and should be avoided wherever possible. </p>
<h2><a href="https://www.blackvpn.com/">BlackVPN</a></h2>
<p>&#8220;OpenVPN is the best choice when available on your device. It&#8217;s easy to check that your VPN provider is using strong encryption algorithms and keys (like 256bit keys and AES encryption) by looking at the OpenVPN configuration files supplied by your VPN provider. Also it can be configured to use TCP on port 443 which makes it extremely difficult to block as it looks like standard HTTP over SSL traffic.&#8221; </p>
<p>&#8220;OpenVPN is slightly more effort to setup (download and install a client for Windows, OS X, IOS 5+ &#038; Android 4+) but it should be the default way for most people to connect to their VPN. We have been using OpenVPN securely (2048 bit RSA keys and AES-256) since our beginning in 2009 so previous traffic should still be secure from decryption.&#8221; </p>
<p>&#8220;L2TP/IPSec is a good choice if you want a quick and easy setup. However the encryption algorithms and keys used depend on your VPN provider and your device, and it is difficult to know if secure or insecure encryption is being used. Your data could be encrypted with AES-256 (more secure) or with 3DES (not secure) and you wouldn&#8217;t know. An evil or silly VPN provider could force all clients to use 3DES. Also Windows XP does not support AES and would use 3DES encryption instead.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;PPTP has known security weaknesses and should only be used as last option or where nothing else works with your device. There are no good reasons to use PPTP unless IPSec traffic is being blocked and you cannot install openVPN on your device. We would recommend only use PPTP if your security and privacy are not a concern &#8211; for example if you just want to access websites or content blocked in your country.&#8221; </p>
<h2><a href="http://ipredator.se">IPredator</a></h2>
<p>Sweden-based IPredator is also clear on the point that PPTP should be avoided by users who are looking for the most secure setup, but in common with many other VPN providers, they still offer these connections. </p>
<p>&#8220;We explicitly tell users that PPTP is insecure and that it&#8217;s not suitable for privacy related things anymore to protect against a government attacker. We could just turn it off BUT then people would just go to other providers who still offer it, so in my opinion it&#8217;s better to educate them.&#8221; </p>
<p>According to iPredator, OpenSSL with ECDHE + AES and without RC4 is the most secure option for VPN users at the moment.</p>
<h2><a href="http://torguard.net/">TorGuard</a></h2>
<p>According to TorGuard many of the strongest encryptions can still be trusted, and the company sees Open Source Software as a key element to keep intelligence agencies for implementing backdoors. </p>
<p>&#8220;Encryption still works and nothing has been mathematically broken. What has been broken is the consumer trust relationship between government and big business. The NSA has attempted to undermine VPN encryption not by brute force or mathematics, but by sabotaging secure technologies at the corporate level.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;Open source software is in the driver’s seat, everyone else is just along for the ride. Community driven code like what powers OpenVPN is continuously subject to scrutiny, making it virtually impossible for an outside agency to implement a secret backdoor.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;It is also important to point out that there is no known method that even comes close to breaking 128bit Blowfish encryption. For the ultra-paranoid, TorGuard offers AES-256 bit &#8216;Stealth&#8217; connections that actually disguise packets as regular HTTP traffic on the network. We will soon be offering these stealth AES-256 connections on all servers as standard options.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;True privacy in this digital age requires sound cryptography and companies who are willing to back it up – no matter the cost. If we expect to have any privacy in the future, the entrepreneurs and cypherpunks of today must work together in continuing to develop effective privacy solutions for tomorrow.&#8221;</p>
<p><center><br />
<h3>National Security Letters</h3>
<p></center></p>
<p>Aside from the worries about broken encryption and backdoors, there&#8217;s also the possibility that providers might find themselves served with a national security letter by U.S. security agencies or a foreign equivalent. Yesterday VPN provider <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/vpn-provider-shuts-down-after-lavabit-case-undermines-security-131022/">CryptoSeal shut its doors</a> in the belief it could no longer guarantee the privacy of its users following the Lavabit ordeal.</p>
<p>TorrentFreak asked three prominent U.S. based VPN providers to share their thoughts on this issue.</p>
<h2><a href="http://privateinternetaccess.com">Private Internet Access</a></h2>
<p>&#8220;Prior to the entire Lavabit ordeal, we had begun reaching out to the EFF, ACLU and FFTF in order to better understand the legal climate in which the internet operates such that we would better understand how we could hedge the company to better protect our &#8216;way of the internet&#8217;. Our CTO/co-founder, who many know as coderrr, the developer of privacy extensions from the early years of Bitcoin, moved out of the US along with our entire admin/development team.&#8221; </p>
<p>&#8220;Moving or establishing a VPN company outside of the US/EU would do little to protect against these kinds of issues as long as anyone with access to the machines remains within said regions. As such, he and the entire admin/development team are committed to remain outside of the US, and in fact, the team in its entirety are decentralized across the globe in countries that have historically been very reluctant to assist the US. Simultaneously, our research team has been implementing and increasing our available crypto-suite.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;As for myself [Andrew Lee], I love my country. Please do not misunderstand, as a minority born, raised and living in the US, I am certainly not screaming, &#8216;MERIKA FUK YAH!&#8217; However, this country has provided a climate in which people can work hard to better their lives and, as well, enjoy great liberties which, in reality, most/many countries fail to match. As such, I, myself, remain in the US in order to help see to it that this country is able to continue/return to being a land of liberty and freedom. To this extent, we&#8217;re really putting our money where our mouths are.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;However, to remain in the US, meant, as well, the relinquishing of my access to the PIA systems/network. Administrators, developers and co-founders everywhere can relate to the difficulty of doing so, but the reality is that it was a requirement if I was to remain here. This policy is in place, and relinquished access I have.&#8221; </p>
<p>&#8220;With regard to the gag orders, recently a US judge ruled the gag order provision to be unconstitutional, in violation of First Amendment rights. We do consider this to be a win for our side, in our quest to bring our privacy and civil liberties back to levels which we as a society can decide for ourselves. With that said, it&#8217;s not the end of the battle, as the ruling is currently being appealed, and as such, no decision is certain at present.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;However, we&#8217;re a company that operates, as we said on our privacy policy, within the spirit and letter of the law. As such, we believe in constitutionally provided privacies and liberties and, to this extent, I&#8217;d like to make it unequivocally clear that we will fight any gag order to the fullest extent given that it clearly undermines First Amendment rights and the transparency of governmental interactions with private entities.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;While I&#8217;d like to yell some kind of statement as many have before that most certainly could never be upheld, our customers and TorrentFreak readers deserve to know that we&#8217;re fighting to the best of our abilities, within the confines and maturity of the existing societal infrastructure. This is not the only way, but this is currently the best way for us to make a meaningful broad impact.&#8221;</p>
<h2><a href="http://torguard.net/">TorGuard</a></h2>
<p>&#8220;Lavabit’s actions to suspend operations and preserve its client’s privacy were truly inspiring. This serves as an excellent example for other companies to not let big government push them around and stand up by legally challenging unlawful data requests or gag orders. Curbing the power of government surveillance on the corporate sector won’t be easy, but it needs to start now with increased transparency and corporations that take an oath of privacy no matter the cost to business. In Lavabit’s case – if you can’t leave Texas then burn the servers.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;A big misconception going around is that one’s data is far safer from scrutiny with foreign based corporations. Unfortunately, the US isn&#8217;t the only country with a spy agency and they certainly are not confined by domestic borders. We&#8217;ve seen countless incidents in the recent past where both domestic and international surveillance agencies abused power to gain access to servers and customer data – no gag order required.&#8221; </p>
<p>&#8220;Just because a company is incorporated in &#8216;Timbuktu&#8217; doesn&#8217;t mean the third-party data centers they lease servers from won’t open the door when federal agents come knocking. That’s why more transparency is needed on a global scale, not just from US service providers, but also by these international based ISPs, Data Centers, Domain Registrars and Merchant Providers..(the list goes on).&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;While TorGuard does have US-based representation, we are an internationally owned company with 90% of our employees and server resources based abroad. As owner/operator, I’ve pledged an oath of privacy to our client base and I intend to uphold this promise to the best of my abilities, even if it means temporarily suspending services or relocating company assets. We have backup plans for our backup plans, and travel light.&#8221;</p>
<h2><a href="https://vikingvpn.com/">VikingVPN</a></h2>
<p>&#8220;Knowing whether or not a company has been compromised by a national security letter is deceptively simple. All you have to do is ask. Right now, I can confidently say that VikingVPN has not been served a National Security Letter. Feel free to ask me again later. If I don&#8217;t reply at some point in the future when you ask me, then you&#8217;ll know. See how easy that was?&#8221;  </p>
<p>&#8220;The reason this works is that the Govt. cannot compel you to lie, but they can (apparently) compel you to remain silent. I would actually argue that the national security letters, and indeed the entire PRISM/XKeyScore system are illegal and unconstitutional, but obviously I don&#8217;t sit on the FISA court or Supreme Court, so my opinion holds little weight.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;I would encourage TorrentFreak to reach out to all the US VPN providers and simply ask them if they have received a national security letter. If they don&#8217;t reply within a reasonable time-frame you will have your answer. I would even encourage you to keep a running list of VPN providers that reply. You could ask them once a month.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;Further, VPNs have always been about trust. You&#8217;re entrusting your data to the VPN service provider, and hoping they don&#8217;t betray you. Any VPN service provider could be secretly logging and passing your data to a 3rd party without your permission. Some of this trust can be gained (or lost) from reputation.&#8221;  </p>
<p>&#8220;Do users of the service report betrayals in the form of legal notices? Some of the trust has to come from knowing just who runs the VPN service. VikingVPN has been very transparent about this. You can see who myself and my partners, Justin Greene &#038; Derek Zimmer, are. You can see that we&#8217;re not connected to any Intelligence Agencies or Copyright bodies. You can also view the kinds of political speech we engage in. We&#8217;re vehemently anti-spying and anti-PRISM.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;US VPNs can still be trusted because you can place a honeypot anywhere in the world when it comes to VPN services. The paranoia surrounding US-based VPNs simply is not thought through very well. The UK and Sweden both have similarly intrusive dragnet programs, and there seems to be little concern for VPN services out of those nations. Furthermore, you can save all the packets you want, unless the VPN itself is compromised it isn&#8217;t going to matter.&#8221;</p>
<h3>Conclusion</h3>
<p>The conclusion brings us right back to the start of this article. No VPN provider can guarantee that any type of encryption is 100% secure. Hopefully the above has given people some pointers on what to avoid, and what the more secure alternatives are. </p>
<p>But even if people pick the strongest encryption possible, one still has to <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/can-you-trust-your-vpn-provider-130929/">trust VPN providers</a> to keep his or her data safe, regardless of where the company is located. </p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/how-nsa-proof-are-vpn-providers-131023/">How NSA-Proof Are VPN Providers?</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78595
title: Google Removes ExtraTorrent Homepage From Search Results
uri: Google-Removes-ExtraTorrent-Homepage-From-Search-Results
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/2QJONJU_KUA/
content:
<p><img src="media/db5234e3.extratorrent-logo.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/extratorrent-logo.png" alt="extratorrent-logo" width="225" height="68" class="alignright size-full wp-image-78612" />With millions of visitors every day ExtraTorrent is one of the <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/top-10-most-popular-torrent-sites-of-2013-130106/">most-visited torrent indexes</a> on the Internet. </p>
<p>The site is a thorn in the side of the entertainment industries who have labeled it a &#8220;rogue site&#8221; on numerous occasions. In recent weeks, however, more concrete actions have been taken.</p>
<p>In September, ExtraTorrent suffered a massive blow when City of London Police <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/uk-police-orders-registrars-to-suspend-domains-of-major-torrent-sites-131009/">convinced its registrar</a> to seize their .com domain. ExtraTorrent was not happy with this decision and <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/extratorrent-threatens-legal-action-over-police-ordered-domain-seizure-131010/">threatened legal action</a>. </p>
<p>The registrar eventually decided to redirect the .com domain to the new .cc TLD, but still refuses to return it. </p>
<p>Smelling blood, the MPAA jumped in last week by sending a DMCA request to Google, asking the search engine to remove ExtraTorrent&#8217;s new homepage from its search results. The Hollywood group sent a targeted DMCA notice listing only two URLs <a href="http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/requests/826434/">including ExtraTorrent.cc</a>. </p>
<p>Interestingly, Google refused to take action and decided to keep the site listed, presumably because the copyrighted content referenced by the studios was no longer linked there. Needless to say, ExtraTorrent&#8217;s staff was delighted with Google&#8217;s backing.  </p>
<p>&#8220;We are happy to know that Google took the right decision,&#8221; ExtraTorrent&#8217;s Sam told TorrentFreak earlier this week, when we asked for a comment on Google&#8217;s refusal.  </p>
<p>&#8220;MPAA thought that we would be vulnerable after the domain drama, and that the time was right to go after us using the same tactics London police used with our old clumsy registrar. However, they forgot that Google is not like our old registrar and that they are not as easily manipulated,&#8221; he added.</p>
<p><center><br />
<h5>ExtraTorrent.cc not removed</h5>
<p><img src="media/b9d0eb56.notremoved.png" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/notremoved.png" alt="notremoved" width="488" height="175" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-78604" /></center></p>
<p>However, just when we were about to publish our findings today we noticed that the new ExtraTorrent.cc domain had disappeared after all. The search giant hadn&#8217;t backpedaled on its earlier decision, but it turns out the MPAA wasn&#8217;t the only one going after ExtraTorrent&#8217;s new home. </p>
<p>On Monday, Fox also <a href="http://www.chillingeffects.org/notice.cgi?sID=1254767">sent a takedown notice to Google</a>. This notice listed only one URL &#8211; extratorrent.cc &#8211; and no less than 110 copyrighted movies and TV-shows including Family Guy, Homeland, Avatar and Life of Pi.</p>
<p>While the DMCA notice doesn&#8217;t list any links to individual pages where .torrent files can be downloaded, Google has removed ExtraTorrent&#8217;s homepage from its search results after this second request.</p>
<p>Talking to TorrentFreak, ExtraTorrent says they are disappointed that Google gave in so quickly. They are considering contacting the search engine to file a counter notice to get the domain reinstated. </p>
<p>Whether the delisting of the homepage will have a pronounced affect on ExtraTorrent&#8217;s traffic has yet to be seen, but Hollywood certainly believes this will be the case. As we have pointed out in the past, with <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/mpaa-kicks-kickasstorrents-off-google-with-precision-takedown-130623/">precision attacks</a> the MPAA and individual movie studios are increasingly asking Google to remove the homepages of &#8220;pirate&#8221; sites. </p>
<p>Thus far results have been mixed. Kickass.to, EZTV and 1337x&#8217;s homepages are no longer appearing in Google&#8217;s search results, but Google <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/google-refuses-to-remove-the-pirate-bay-homepage-130909/">refused to delist ThePirateBay.sx</a> and Torrentz.eu as these URLs don&#8217;t link directly to copyrighted works.</p>
<p>Unfortunately for ExtraTorrent the Google ban and the domain issues are not the only pushback they&#8217;re facing at the moment. </p>
<p>The site is also being blocked by Internet providers in several countries including <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/court-orders-isps-to-block-several-major-torrent-sites-131017/">Italy</a> and <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/belgian-isps-quietly-expand-torrent-site-blockade-130828/">Belgium</a>. To help users circumvent these blockades, ExtraTorrent just launched a dedicated proxy on <a href="http://extratorrentlive.com/">Extratorrentlive.com</a>.  </p>
<p>For the time being, the proxy&#8217;s homepage is still indexed by Google&#8230;.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/google-removes-extratorrent-homepage-from-search-results-131024/">Google Removes ExtraTorrent Homepage From Search Results</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78581
title: File-Sharing Site Was A Year-Long Pirate Honeypot
uri: File-Sharing-Site-Was-A-Year-Long-Pirate-Honeypot
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/o93nYD1iZbw/
content:
<p><a href="media/aae7b176.snitch.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/snitch.jpg"><img src="media/aae7b176.snitch.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/snitch.jpg" alt="snitch" width="180" height="165" class="alignright size-full wp-image-53823" /></a>Paranoia can be high in the file-sharing world so it will come as no surprise that there are regular rumors that site X or user Y cannot be trusted. While it&#8217;s almost certain that on some sites there are staff members who don&#8217;t have the community&#8217;s best interests at heart, evidence of serious foul play is a rare occurrence.</p>
<p>Today, however, the owner of a file-sharing discussion forum confirmed that his site was actually a pirate honeypot, setup with the aim of gathering otherwise confidential information on uploaders, file-hosts and web companies involved in the piracy ecosystem. Adding insult to injury, that site and the admin&#8217;s services have been acquired by a U.S.-based anti-piracy company.</p>
<p>WDF, real name unknown, is the founder of UploaderTalk.com, a web forum designed to attract individuals who like to make money from uploading files to file-hosting sites. Part of the idea is that they join the site and interact with others with similar aims, such as representatives from file-hosting sites touting their affiliate schemes.</p>
<p>UploaderTalk was founded pretty much a year ago today after WDF was banned from a similar but much larger site called WJunction, probably the largest uploader/file-hosting hangout anywhere on the web.</p>
<p>However, WDF wasn&#8217;t any old member. After joining up to WJunction in September 2011, WDF later became a moderator then super moderator on the site, meaning that he had access to a lot of private information such as email and IP addresses. The implications for file-hosting sites and uploaders hardly need to be pointed out.</p>
<p>It&#8217;s not clear why WDF was eventually removed from WJunction but there was clearly some kind of falling out. Shortly after WDF&#8217;s departure around 12 months ago internal leaks of information from WJunction were published on the web, ostensibly from some kind of third party hack.</p>
<p><a href="media/0fdc72be.warez.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/warez.jpg"><img src="media/0fdc72be.warez.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/warez.jpg" alt="warez" width="200" height="139" class="alignright size-full wp-image-45883" /></a>UploaderTalk reported on these leaks regularly including the November 2012 <a href="http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:cFQXtRspmx0J:www.uploadertalk.com/content/adultking-exposes-wjunction-owner-gfy-116/%3Fpostid%3D374+&#038;cd=5&#038;hl=en&#038;ct=clnk">revelations</a> by Robert King of the StopFileLockers anti-piracy campaign which claimed to contain the identities of WJunction&#8217;s owners and backers.</p>
<p>UT, as UploaderTalk became known, was never destined to challenge WJunction as the leading site of its kind. However, in addition to its regular readers, over the past 12 months the site gathered nearly 1,000 fully signed up members of the uploading and file-hosting community. For them today&#8217;s announcement will be an unpleasant one.</p>
<p>&#8220;UT is now closed. UT was set up for a number of reasons. But mostly to be a sounding board, proof of concept.[.].and to collect data,&#8221; WDF said in a statement today.</p>
<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s right the biggest swerve ever. I, WDF, work for the anti-piracy people! I have collected information on many of you. I collected info on file hosts, web hosts, websites.&#8221;</p>
<p>The official announcement from WDF confirmed what many people have suspected for some time &#8211; that WDF had been playing on both sides of the fence.</p>
<p>&#8220;How is it I was able to protect some sites and people? Because I was working for the other side!&#8221; WDF said.</p>
<p>&#8220;How is it I knew so many things? Well think about it, I suckered shitloads of you. I built a history, got the trust of some very important people in the warez scene collecting information and data all the time.&#8221;</p>
<p>It&#8217;s unclear what WDF intends to do with the information obtained so far but for now it has to be presumed that he will be sharing it with his new employer, NukePiracy LLC, a company <a href="http://www.sos.arkansas.gov/corps/search_corps.php?DETAIL=410860&#038;corp_type_id=&#038;corp_name=NukePiracy&#038;agent_search=&#038;agent_city=&#038;agent_state=&#038;filing_number=&#038;cmd=">registered</a> on October 2013 in Nashville, Tennessee.</p>
<p>&#8220;So what happens now? I am already working with a different ID, a new persona, and still collecting data. You never know who I will be or where I will turn up. I work for Nuke Piracy now, this is very bad for anyone profiting from piracy,&#8221; WDF concludes.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/file-sharing-site-was-a-year-long-pirate-honeypot-131024/">File-Sharing Site Was A Year-Long Pirate Honeypot</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78631
title: Comcast, Verizon and Co. Want to Stop Mass Piracy Lawsuits
uri: Comcast-Verizon-and-Co-Want-to-Stop-Mass-Piracy-Lawsuits
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/gfOBS1ejOcw/
content:
<p><img src="media/12bdbb91.running.jpg" data-original-source="http://torrentfreak.com/images/running.jpg" align="right" alt="piracy" />In recent years hundreds of thousands of Internet subscribers have been sued for downloading copyrighted material in the United States, but not a single case has gone to trial. </p>
<p>Most of the defendants are sued in bulk, with copyright holders joining hundreds or thousands of alleged copyright-infringing IP-addresses in a single complaint. The rightsholders then ask the court to grant a subpoena to identify the account holders behind the IPs, who are then approached with settlement requests of a few thousand dollars. </p>
<p>After an initial avalanche of mass piracy lawsuits in 2010 and 2011, federal courts in several districts ruled that these cases should be restricted to one defendant each. Last year several ISPs asked for a similar ruling in the District of Columbia, but without success.</p>
<p>Judge Beryl Howell ruled against the Internet providers and granted the adult movie company AF Holdings the right to obtain the personal details of more than 1000 Internet users suspected of downloading their works using BitTorrent.</p>
<p>The adult film studio and its controversial law firm Prenda celebrated the verdict as a huge win, since many other judges had previously rejected joining so many defendants in one lawsuit. Adding to the controversy, Judge Howell told the ISPs who joined the case that they were <a href="http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120823/10444420138/riaa-lobbyist-turned-judge-isps-deserve-copyright-trolls-not-stopping-infringement.shtml">not doing enough</a> to stop online piracy.</p>
<p>The ISPs were disappointed with the ruling and Comcast, Verizon, AT&#038;T, Time Warner and Cox filed an appeal hoping to reverse it. The case has been lingering for a few months but yesterday the ISPs <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/178928593/appeal-isps-torrentfreak-pdf">filed their latest brief</a>. </p>
<p>The providers argue that the request for customer information is not supported by good cause, as previous cases have shown that AF Holdings has no intention of actually serving the defendants. &#8220;In 118 multi-Doe actions filed by Plaintiff’s counsel during a two-year period, none has resulted in a defendant being named and served,&#8221; they write. </p>
<p>In addition, the ISPs note that the adult studio is only attempting to generate as many settlements as it can, at the lowest cost without knowing whether the defendant is actually the person who downloaded the copyrighted work. </p>
<p>&#8220;Plaintiff’s primary purpose in seeking the personal information for hundreds or thousands of Internet subscribers per lawsuit is to extract payments without conducting any investigation into whether the subscriber — rather than another person using the subscriber’s Internet connection — is indeed responsible for accessing Plaintiff’s film without paying for it.&#8221;  </p>
<p>The ISPs continue by citing several similar cases in which judges ruled that joining so many defendants in one case is not allowed. If the current verdict is upheld, they fear that the District of Columbia will become a &#8220;unique venue&#8221; for copyright holders to &#8220;gain the Doe defendants’ personal information and coerce payment from them&#8221;</p>
<p>Finally, the ISPs mention the controversial nature of the law firm Prenda, who were recently punished in court for their mob-like tactics. Among other things they note that Prenda’s principals <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/copyright-troll-ran-pirate-bay-honeypot-comcast-confirms-130815/">used The Pirate Bay as a honeypot</a>, relied on fictitious persons as clients, and submitted fake documents in support of their lawsuits.</p>
<p>&#8220;In the wake of these revelations, virtually all of Prenda Law’s multi-Doe cases have been dismissed or transformed into investigations into misconduct by AF Holdings’ principals and counsel. Yet, incredibly, Plaintiff derides the ISPs for objecting &#8216;with an air of moral superiority&#8217; to Plaintiff’s ongoing efforts to extract personal subscriber information from them,&#8221; the brief notes.</p>
<p>The ISPs tell the court that this &#8220;lack of candor&#8221; should be addressed, and they ask the judge to throw out the case, or reduce the number of defendants from 1,058 to just one.</p>
<p>It’s good to see that Comcast, Verizon, AT&#038;T, Time Warner and Cox are attempting to protect their subscribers. Of course it’s in their own interests, but it also helps to minimize the profitability of these classic copyright troll lawsuits.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/comcast-verizon-and-co-want-to-stop-mass-piracy-lawsuits-131025/">Comcast, Verizon and Co. Want to Stop Mass Piracy Lawsuits</a></p>
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feed_id: http://torrentfreak.com/?p=78630
title: Anti-Piracy Group Seeks Sweden-Style File-Sharing Crackdown
uri: Anti-Piracy-Group-Seeks-Sweden-Style-File-Sharing-Crackdown
url: http://feed.torrentfreak.com/~r/Torrentfreak/~3/mzvJ11eqiQY/
content:
<p>From a region where online file-sharing has traditionally thrived, Scandinavia has become an area more focused than many on the issue of online piracy.</p>
<p>As the spiritual home of The Pirate Bay, Sweden in particular has long been associated with free-and-easy attitudes to infringement and as a result dozens of sites were founded in the site&#8217;s wake. This eventually prompted a more organized approach to dealing with operators of file-sharing sites and now that model is being eyed by others in the region.</p>
<p>Writing today in <a href="http://jyllands-posten.dk">Jyllands-Posten</a>, RettighedsAlliancen&#8217;s (Rights Alliance) Maria Fredenslund says that in the face of rampant illegal downloading the time has come to subject Danish Internet pirates to stiffer penalties via a dedicated anti-piracy task force, such as the ones in place in both Sweden and London.</p>
<p>&#8220;A special unit that works consistently with intellectual property crime would be a marked improvement on the current situation. Such a facility would enable police and prosecutors to build the relevant skills through their daily operational work with intellectual property cases,&#8221; Fredenslund writes.</p>
<p>&#8220;Experiences from abroad, such as the special IP unit in Sweden that has been a conspicuous success, show us that a task force will strengthen copyright holders and weaken the criminal masterminds. This is supported by the fact that the number of convictions has increased significantly over a very short period of time.&#8221;</p>
<p>Fredenslund says that a dedicated force would free regular police from having to start from scratch each time a new case arises and would ensure that police resources are used in a more efficient manner than is currently the case. But apparently there are other problems too.</p>
<p>In a separate article published by veteran Danish anti-piracy lawfirm Johan Schlüter, it seems that Rights Alliance have grown weary of committing large resources to anti-piracy investigations only to have them ruined when police didn&#8217;t handle the complaint in a way the anti-piracy organization would have liked.</p>
<p>&#8220;When we at Rights Alliance choose to report a case to the police, it follows years of exploration and work. Notification is always done on the basis .[..] that a person or company is behind the extensive distribution of illegal products, typically for profit,&#8221; the company <a href="http://www.jslaw.dk/2013/10/rigsadvokaten-styrker-indsatsen-mod-ipr-kriminalitet/">explained</a>.</p>
<p>&#8220;Unfortunately, what we have seen repeatedly is that the police choose to call and inquire about these suspicions before steps have been taken towards a preservation of evidence. Such calls obviously give suspects an opportunity to deny the accusations and eliminate all kinds of evidence. That leaves Rights Alliance with a bad case and many hours of wasted work.&#8221;</p>
<p>However, there are now clear signs that the Danish authorities are ready to progress on the issue. In July the Attorney-General said there would be a strengthening of responses to piracy and last month further discussions with Danish rightsholders took place. Whether the proposals will be enough for the entertainment companies remains to be seen, but history tells us that a mutually satisfactory solution is unlikely.</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/anti-piracy-group-seeks-sweden-style-file-sharing-crackdown-131025/">Anti-Piracy Group Seeks Sweden-Style File-Sharing Crackdown</a></p>
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