Back in April 2017, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) announced that Cary Sherman, the industry group’s Chairman and CEO, would be retiring at the end of 2018 after a 40-plus year career in music.

In tandem it was revealed that Mitch Glazier, then Senior Executive Vice President of the RIAA, would be promoted to President of the world-famous music industry group. The plan was for Glazier, who formerly acted as Chief Counsel for intellectual property to the Judiciary Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives, to take the top job in January 2019.

The announcement was met with enthusiasm by a number of industry executives, including the top brass at Universal Music, Warner Music, and Sony Music Entertainment who all celebrated his 19-plus years with the RIAA. During his tenure, Glazier played a key role in some of the RIAA’s most-prominent anti-piracy actions.

“He helped the music community collaborate on multiple issues, from antipiracy and technology initiatives to landmark litigations such as MGM Studios, Inc. v. Grokster in 2005,” the industry group said.

“At a time when piracy was rampant and the authorized music marketplace was in its infancy, that case reshaped the legal landscape for actions against pirate sites and helped level the playing field for licensed music services.”

As envisioned back in 2017, Glazier has now become the Chairman and CEO of the RIAA, representing a “new leadership for a new era”, according to the industry group.

“Music matters. It shapes our culture. It inspires generations young and young at heart. It makes us who we are and binds diverse communities together,” Glazier said in a statement.

“I am honored to lead the RIAA during these exciting times as we fight for a music ecosystem that works for everybody – from artists and fans to labels and publishers and songwriters and music services alike.

“That will require that we both embrace digital music innovations, and protect what has always made music great – keeping the dream alive for the next generation of artists and music creators,” Glazier added.

Also moving onwards and upwards is Michele Ballantyne, who with immediate effect has been promoted to Chief Operating Officer of the RIAA.

A former Special Assistant to President Bill Clinton, Special Counsel to then-White House Chief of Staff John Podesta, and as General Counsel for Senator Tom Daschle, Ballantyne also played key roles in copyright protection.

“As COO, Ballantyne manages the day-to-day operations of the RIAA,” her bio now reads.

“A driving force for updating intellectual property laws for the digital age, she has played an instrumental role in advocating for congressional reforms including the Music Modernization Act, the PRO-IP Act that established the nation’s first Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator in the Executive Office of the President, and the Higher Education Opportunity Act of 2008 that provided colleges and universities with meaningful tools to reduce the illegal downloading of copyrighted works on campuses.”

Glazier is full of praise for Ballantyne’s achievements, declaring that “there is no one better suited to help lead the RIAA and no one I would rather have at my side than Michele.”

I am honored to lead the RIAA during these exciting times as we fight for a music ecosystem that works for everybody – from artists and fans to labels and publishers and songwriters and music services alike. https://t.co/3KaY9YRoo1

— Mitch Glazier (@mitch_glazier) January 2, 2019

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While the RIAA became synonymous with aggressive anti-piracy enforcement during the last decade, action against traditional pirate sites during the past few years has been sporadic at best.

Instead, the industry group has tackled the thorny issue of stream-ripping, shutting down YouTube-MP3 in 2017 and following up against similar platforms in 2018.

The industry group still has torrent sites and cyberlockers on its radar (and at times even Cloudflare) but at least for now seems more interested in generating better revenues from sites like YouTube while preventing unauthorized downloads from similar platforms.

That’s when it’s not trying to undermine ISPs’ copyright ‘safe harbors’ in repeat infringer cases (1,2,3).

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While the vast majority of BitTorrent users will simply visit their favorite pirate site for a list of what is available, very often content hasn’t been released online yet. From simply trying to soon to waiting for a delayed release, checking sites can be a bit hit and miss.

For those looking for more information on whether content has hit the Internet yet, it’s possible to use a so-called PRE Database, or PreDb for short. These sites, which can be automatically or manually maintained, contain lists which detail release names, when they became available online, and other relevant information.

While some PreDb sites sometimes contain links to torrents or NZB files, for example, most toe the line from a copyright perspective. They are simple archives of information that cannot be claimed by copyright holders. That, however, doesn’t stop them from trying.

Recently, TorrentFreak had a discussion with the operator of SweTracker, a PreDb/tracer service that focuses on providing information for Nordic releases.

“As a Nordic user I wanted to see where all the Nordic releases are, where to find them, and who had them first,” he explained.

“Swenews.info [another release tracking site] still existed back then, but it didn’t say in plain text which specific tracker had the content, so you had to visit all the possible trackers. So then I decided to create my own version of Swenews but detailing the specific tracker. This was about two years ago.”

While many PreDb-style sites monitor for ‘Scene’ releases using information culled from IRC, SweTracker monitors BitTorrent trackers and publishes information on who won the ‘race’ to put content online first. It does not link to any pirate content whatsoever but anti-piracy companies regularly report the site to Google.

No infrining content but the complaints flood in

As the image above shows, SweTracker has been reported to Google many hundreds of times this year alone by anti-piracy companies who clearly cannot tell the difference between reporting news and offering pirate releases for download. SweTracker’s operator says he’s become used to the problem.

“My personal experience with [anti-piracy companies] is that they don’t really know how stuff works. They often state that users can download or stream movies directly from SweTracker, but that’s simply not true,” he explains.

“But, I try to make life easy and do remove the releases they ask me to remove.
They have contacted me via email several times.”

As far as we can tell, this level of cooperation really isn’t needed. However, SweTracker’s operator says that he’s had serious problems in the past when loose-cannon companies erroneously targeted his site.

He reveals that one company took its complaints about his site to Cloudflare and then to his own web-host, which responded by taking down his entire site until all of the files on it could be checked for infringement. This effort took almost a day during which the site was rendered completely inaccessible.

The problems facing SweTracker are not unique, however. There are perhaps a dozen similar sites online currently, with PreDb.org, PreDb.pw, and Pre.Corrupt-Net.org being among the most respected and visited.

PreDb.org states clearly on its main page that “There are absolutely NO downloads of copyright-protected works, hyperlinks to downloads, torrent files, magnet links, nzb files or similar content on any part of this web site” but that doesn’t prevent complaints.

Google’s Transparency Report indicates that at the time of writing, PreDb.org has had 2,204 URLs reported by content and anti-piracy companies, with Google removing the links from its indexes approximately 65% of the time.

A similar situation is faced by PreDb.pw, which has had 1,103 of its URLs reported to Google with requests that the company removes them from its search indexes. At the time of writing, Google has cooperated almost 85% of the time.

Quite why these sites are aggressively targeted isn’t clear, but it seems likely that simply having a release name on the site is enough to classify it as a full-on piracy resource. As we’ve pointed out dozens of times in the past, a simple whitelist could provide a very simple solution to this problem.

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Over the past 18 years, ever since P2P clients made their run into the big time, users have been trying to figure out a way to avoid expensive lawsuits.

At the beginning, no real solutions were available, so it was a roll of the dice from start to finish. People either got lucky, or they didn’t. The majority did but a significant number didn’t feel like taking so many chances.

Somewhere along the way, so-called ‘peer-blocking’ applications raised their head. These pieces of software act like a firewall on a user’s computer, with the aim of preventing ‘hostile’ IP addresses from connecting to a torrent client, for example, thus preventing lawsuits.

Over the years, millions of users installed these programs (along with the blocklists containing the supposed IP addresses of anti-piracy groups) believing that no ‘bad players’ could access their machines. Unfortunately for those using them, these blocklists were completely ineffective and remain so today.

Peer-blocking applications should have died a death more than a decade ago but for some inexplicable reason, torrent users on many public forums continue to post about them, asking whether they’re doing the job they’re supposed to and if additional precautions are needed.

Despite plenty of information to the contrary, some still swear by these lists and a few stubbornly believe they are “better than nothing”. If locking every window on a house but leaving the front door open is “better than nothing” to prevent burglars, then it’s difficult to disagree. If making sure is the aim, blocklists should be thrown in the trash can marked ‘placebo’.

The problem is the way these things work. Peer-blocking applications use lists of IP addresses (generally compiled by volunteers) which are thought to be connected to anti-piracy, copyright trolls, government bodies, and others interested in stopping piracy. The aim is that if all of these IP addresses can be blocked, the problem can be solved.

Years ago, when people had less understanding of these matters, blocklists seemed like the tool everyone needed. However, blocklists are massively incomplete, woefully out-of-date, and cannot ever hope to ‘know’ every IP address used by every anti-P2P group. For those that still aren’t convinced, let’s take site-blocking as an example.

When ISPs block ‘pirate’ websites, they prevent users from accessing either their domain names, IP addresses, or DNS. When customers try to access any or all of these things, a firewall on the ISP’s end prevents the connection. No further explanation is necessary because after a decade of blocking, most proficient users generally understand how these things work.

Now think for a moment how easily these blocks are defeated. As soon as an order is handed down, sites can grab a new domain, a new IP address, or have their traffic funneled through any number of proxies and mirrors. Users, for their part, can evade bans by using these modified services or utilizing tools like VPNs. Blocking is very easily bypassed.

Now for the big non-surprise: anti-piracy groups can deploy just as many and more techniques to ensure that their entries on blocklists are out-of-date or completely irrelevant. Their tracking machines can be shifted around IP addresses in the blink of an eye, through datacenters or even residential ISPs, if there is a real need for stealth.

No one anywhere on the planet – no matter how clever or resourceful – has the skill or resources to keep up with these changes and/or make a blocklist that deals with them all. A hundred people couldn’t manage it, nor could a thousand. The information required simply isn’t made public and the result is the publication of blocklists that massively overblock legitimate resources while letting through who-knows-what.

The only real way to ensure that your IP address is never connected to ‘bad players’ while using torrents is to use something like a VPN. Or, of course, don’t share copyrighted content in the first place.

Blocklists have never worked to the extent required and will never work in the future. Anyone who trusts them may as well use a fishing net as a rain hat. It’ll still catch some fish but don’t expect it to keep you dry.

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Over the past couple of years, unauthorized IPTV services have been making their presence known in the ‘pirate’ TV space.

As recently reported, pirate IPTV services are accessed by 5.5% of US and Canadian households. The range of content is phenomenal, with few – if any – official entertainment companies in a position to compete.

Such services are typically accessed via set-top boxes, from ubiquitous Android-based platforms through to dedicated IPTV hardware. None of these devices are designed to be infringing but with the addition of third-party services, they can be transformed into piracy powerhouses.

For those looking for a premium IPTV experience, the MAG box range from Ukraine-based Infomir are the tools of choice. The compact devices are used by thousands of consumers to access legitimate content via a beautiful interface but like any such hardware, these boxes can also be used to access infringing streams.

Infomir has understandably distanced itself from this kind of illicit consumption but until now doesn’t appear to have interfered with the choices of its customers. Moving forward, however, it’s clear that will change.

“Infomir is an international company operating in over 150 countries globally. As a manufacturer of multimedia devices, we are subject to copyright and related rights legislation, which we respect and adhere to,” the company says.

“Upon receiving complaints from a copyright holder, Infomir is obliged to restrict access from its devices to any portal suspected of copyright infringement. The restriction will be maintained until the issue with the copyright holder is resolved.”

IPTV services (both legal and less so) often supply a URL which enables MAG and similar devices to access their ‘portal’. These are entered into the device’s setup page, with the box typically being authorized at the provider’s end by verifying its MAC address against a pre-registered one.

However, Infomir appears able to prevent certain portal URLs from being accessed via its set-top devices and there are some unconfirmed reports online which indicate this may be happening already.

TorrentFreak spoke with Infomir to find out more about this development. Will the company block portals following straightforward copyright complaints, for example, or is a court order required?

“The complaints need not be necessarily backed up by a court order. The form and contents of a copyright complaint must conform to the DMCA requirements,” Infomir Legal Counsel Vladislav Larionov informs TF.

“Our policy is to comply with the EU and US legislation on copyright and take into account best practices in the area of handling of copyright infringement reports. In particular, we only process the reports of copyright infringement that contain all the elements of notification envisaged by the DMCA.”

Some IPTV providers not only provide access to ‘pirate’ streams but also other content that has the potential to be non-infringing, depending on a users’ circumstances. For instance, there could be questions raised over legality when the holder of a UK TV license only accesses BBC One and similar channels via an IPTV service.

Speaking in more general terms, TF asked Infomir if over-blocking is a concern. The company told us that they require detailed complaints from rightsholders to block portals and they give services that are blocked the right to file a counter-complaint.

“We respect the rights of legitimate service providers, and we are concerned that such service providers might be reported by mistake or due to misidentification. That is why we request that copyright infringement reports submitted to us comply with the DMCA and contain a statement under penalty of perjury that the report is true and accurate,” Larionov explains.

“We also review each copyright infringement report to prevent false or abusive ones. Finally, we provide every service provider with a possibility to oppose a copyright infringement report. In case there is a dispute between a copyright holder and a service provider, we will request a court order to maintain access restriction to a portal.”

While copyright holders who file for blocking injunctions in court can be identified fairly easily, discovering who has filed a complaint with Infomir is less straightforward. The company told TF that it cannot provide information on who has requested a block other than to say it is mostly “big copyright holders, anti-piracy associations, and companies that provide copyright management and protection services.”

Finally, it’s not entirely clear how MAG devices are prevented from accessing portal URLs and Infomir informs TF that it won’t provide that information as it might “downgrade” its “access restriction system”. There is already some speculation on specialist forums that firmware updates may be responsible but no clear confirmation is currently available.

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