When people download content online using BitTorrent, they also distribute that content to others. This unlawful distribution attracts negative attention from rightsholders, who have sued hundreds of thousands of individuals worldwide.
Streaming is considered a much safer method to obtain content, since it’s difficult for content owners to track downloaders. However, the same can’t be said about those who stream content to the web for the benefit of others, as an interesting case in the UK has just revealed.
It involves 34-year-old Craig Foster who received several scary letters from lawyers representing broadcaster Sky. The company alleged that during last April’s bout between Anthony Joshua’s and Wladimir Klitschko, Foster live-streamed the multiple world title fight on Facebook Live.
Financially, this was a major problem for Sky, law firm Foot Anstey LLP told Foster. According to their calculations, at least 4,250 people watched the stream without paying Sky Box Office the going rate of £19.95 each. Tapped into Sky’s computers, the broadcaster concluded that Foster owed the company £85,000.
But according to The Mirror, father-of-one Foster wasn’t actually to blame.
“I’d paid for the boxing, it wasn’t like I was making any money. My iPad was signed in to my Facebook account and my friend just started streaming the fight. I didn’t think anything of it, then a few days later they cut my subscription,” Foster said.
“They’re demanding the names and addresses of all my mates who were round that night but I’m not going to give them up. I said I’d take the rap.”
While Foster says he won’t turn in the culprit, there’s no doubt that the fight stream originated from his Sky account. The TV giant embeds watermarks in its broadcasts which enables it to see who paid for an event, should a copy of one turn up on the Internet.
As we reported last year following the Mayweather v McGregor super-fight, the codes are clearly visible with the naked eye.
Sky watermarks, as seen in the Mayweather v McGregor fight
While taking the rap for someone else’s infringing behavior isn’t something anyone should do lightly, it appears that Scarborough-based Foster did just that.
According to Neil Parkes, who specializes in media litigation, content protection and contentious IP at Foot Anstey, Foster accepted responsibility and agreed to pay a settlement.
“Mr Foster broke the law,” Parkes said. “He has acknowledged his wrongdoing, apologised and signed a legally binding agreement to pay a sum of £5,000 to Sky.”
The Mirror, however, has Foster backtracking. He says he wasn’t given enough time to consider his position and now wants to fight Sky in court.
“It’s heavy-handed. I’ve apologized and told them we were drunk,” Foster said.
“I know streaming the fight was wrong. I didn’t stop my friend but I was watching the boxing. I’m just a bloke who had a few drinks with his friends.”
Unless he can find a law firm willing to fight his corner at a hugely cut-down rate, Foster will find this kind of legal fisticuffs to be a massively expensive proposition, one in which he will start out as the clear underdog.
Not only was Foster’s Sky account the originating source, both his iPad and his Facebook account were used to stream the fight. On top of what appears to be a signed confession, he also promised not to do anything else like this in future. Furthermore, he even agreed to issue an apology that Sky can use in future anti-piracy messages.
Of course, Foster might indeed be a noble gentleman but he should be aware that as a civil matter, this fight would be decided on the balance of probabilities, not beyond reasonable doubt. If the judge decides 51% in Sky’s favor, he suffers a knockout along with a huge financial headache.
No one wants a £5,000 bill but that’s a drop in the ocean compared to the cost implications of losing this case.
https://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/box-feat.jpg2501200Dimitrologyhttps://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/WEBSITE-LOGO-2020-SMALL.pngDimitrology2018-01-08 13:15:512018-01-08 13:15:51Sky Hits Man With £5k ‘Fine’ For Pirating Boxing on Facebook
Torrent sites have come and gone over past year. Now, at the start of 2018, we take a look to see what the most-used sites are in the current landscape.
The Pirate Bay remains the undisputed number one. The site has weathered a few storms over the years, but it looks like it will be able to celebrate its 15th anniversary, which is coming up in a few months.
The list also includes various newcomers including Idope and Zooqle. While many people are happy to see new torrent sites emerge, this often means that others have called it quits.
Last year’s runner-up Extratorrent, for example, has shut down and left a gaping hole behind. And it wasn’t the only site that went away. TorrentProject also disappeared without a trace and the same was true for isohunt.to.
The unofficial Torrentz reincarnation Torrentz2.eu, the highest newcomer last year, is somewhat of an unusual entry. A few weeks ago all links to externally hosted torrents were removed, as was the list of indexed pages.
We decided to include the site nonetheless, given its history and because it’s still possible to find hashes through the site. As Torrentz2’s future is uncertain, we added an extra site (10.1) as compensation.
Finally, RuTracker also deserves a mention. The torrent site generates enough traffic to warrant a listing, but we traditionally limit the list to sites that are targeted primarily at an English or international audience.
Below is the full list of the ten most-visited torrent sites at the start of the new year. The list is based on various traffic reports and we display the Alexa rank for each. In addition, we include last year’s ranking.
The Pirate Bay is the “king of torrents” once again and also the oldest site in this list. The past year has been relatively quiet for the notorious torrent site, which is currently operating from its original .org domain name.
RARBG, which started out as a Bulgarian tracker, has captured the hearts and minds of many video pirates. The site was founded in 2008 and specializes in high quality video releases.
1337x continues where it left off last year. The site gained a lot of traffic and, unlike some other sites in the list, has a dedicated group of uploaders that provide fresh content.
Torrentz2 launched as a stand-in for the original Torrentz.eu site, which voluntarily closed its doors in 2016. At the time of writing, the site only lists torrent hashes and no longer any links to external torrent sites. While browser add-ons and plugins still make the site functional, its future is uncertain.
YTS.ag is the unofficial successors of the defunct YTS or YIFY group. Not all other torrent sites were happy that the site hijacked the popuar brand and several are actively banning its releases.
The original TV-torrent distribution group EZTV shut down after a hostile takeover in 2015, with new owners claiming ownership of the brand. The new group currently operates from EZTV.ag and releases its own torrents. These releases are banned on some other torrent sites due to this controversial history.
Limetorrents has been an established torrent site for more than half a decade. The site’s operator also runs the torrent cache iTorrents, which is used by several other torrent search engines.
NYAA.si is a popular resurrection of the anime torrent site NYAA, which shut down last year. Previously we left anime-oriented sites out of the list, but since we also include dedicated TV and movie sites, we decided that a mention is more than warranted.
Torrents.me is one of the torrent sites that enjoyed a meteoric rise in traffic this year. It’s a meta-search engine that links to torrent files and magnet links from other torrent sites.
Zooqle, which boasts nearly three million verified torrents, has stayed under the radar for years but has still kept growing. The site made it into the top 10 for the first time this year.
The special 10.1 mention goes to iDope. Launched in 2016, the site is a relative newcomer to the torrent scene. The torrent indexer has steadily increased its audience over the past year. With similar traffic numbers to Zooqle, a listing is therefore warranted.
Alexa Rank: 2,358 / Last year #NA
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Disclaimer: Yes, we know that Alexa isn’t perfect, but it helps to compare sites that operate in a similar niche. We also used other traffic metrics to compile the top ten. Please keep in mind that many sites have mirrors or alternative domains, which are not taken into account here.
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Ten years ago, November 2007 to be precise, we published an article featuring the four leading torrent site admins at the time.
Niek van der Maas of Mininova, Justin Bunnell of TorrentSpy, Pirate Bay’s Peter Sunde and isoHunt’s Gary Fung were all kind enough to share their vision of BitTorrent’s future.
This future is the present today, and although the predictions were not all spot-on, there are a few interesting observations to make.
For one, these four men were all known by name, despite the uncertain legal situation they were in. How different is that today, when the operators of most of the world’s largest torrent sites are unknown to the broader public.
Another thing that stands out is that none of these pioneers are still active in the torrent space today. Niek and Justin have their own advertising businesses, Peter is a serial entrepreneur involved in various startups, while Gary works on his own projects.
While they have all moved on, they also remain a part of Internet history, which is why we decided to reach out to them ten years on.
Gary Fung was the first to reply. Those who’ve been following torrent news for a while know that isoHunt was shut down in 2013. The shutdown was the result of a lawsuit and came with a $110 million settlement with the MPAA, on paper.
Today the Canadian entrepreneur has other things on his hands, which includes “leveling up” his now one-year-old daughter. While that can be a day job by itself, he is also finalizing a mobile search app which will be released in the near future.
“The key is speed, and I can measure its speedup of the whole mobile search experience to be 10-100x that of conventional mobile web browsers,” Gary tells us, noting that after years of development, it’s almost ready.
The new search app is not one dedicated to torrents, as isoHunt once was. However, looking back, Gary is proud of what he accomplished with isoHunt, despite the bitter end.
“It was a humbling experience, in more ways than one. I’m proud that I participated and championed the rise of P2P content distribution through isoHunt as a search gateway,” Gary tells us.
“But I was also humbled by the responsibility and power at play, as seen in the lawsuits from the media industry giants, as well as the even larger picture of what P2P technologies were bringing, and still bring today.”
Decentralization has always been a key feature of BitTorrent and Gary sees this coming back in new trends. This includes the massive attention for blockchain related projects such as Bitcoin.
“2017 was the year Bitcoin became mainstream in a big way, and it’s feeling like the Internet before 2000. Decentralization is by nature disruptive, and I can’t wait to see what decentralizing money, governance, organizations and all kinds of applications will bring in the next few years.
“dApps [decentralized apps] made possible by platforms like Ethereum are like generalized BitTorrent for all kinds of applications, with ones we haven’t even thought of yet,” Gary adds.
Not everything is positive in hindsight, of course. Gary tells us that if he had to do it all over again he would take legal issues and lawyers more seriously. Not doing so led to more trouble than he imagined.
As a former torrent site admin, he has thought about the piracy issue quite a bit over the years. And unlike some sites today, he was happy to look for possible solutions to stop piracy.
One solution Gary suggested to Hollywood in the past was a hash recognition system for infringing torrents. A system to automatically filter known infringing files and remove these from cooperating torrent sites could still work today, he thinks.
“ContentID for all files shared on BitTorrent, similar to YouTube. I’ve proposed this to Hollywood studios before, as a better solution to suing their customers and potential P2P technology partners, but it obviously fell on deaf ears.”
In any case, torrent sites and similar services will continue to play an important role in how the media industry evolves. These platforms are showing Hollywood what the public wants, Gary believes.
“It has and will continue to play a role in showing the industry what consumers truly want: frictionless, convenient distribution, without borders of country or bundles. Bundles as in cable channels, but also in any way unwanted content is forced onto consumers without choice.”
While torrents were dominant in the past, the future will be streaming mostly, isoHunt’s founder says. He said this ten years ago, and he believes that in another decade it will have completely replaced cable TV.
Whether piracy will still be relevant then depends on how content is offered. More fragmentation will lead to more piracy, while easier access will make it less relevant.
“The question then will be, will streaming platforms be fragmented and exclusive content bundled into a hundred pieces besides Netflix, or will consumer choice and convenience win out in a cross-platform way?
“A piracy increase or reduction will depend on how that plays out because nobody wants to worry about ten monthly subscriptions to ten different streaming services, much less a hundred,” Gary concludes.
Perhaps we should revisit this again next decade…
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The second post in this series, with Peter Sunde, will be published this weekend. The other two pioneers did not respond or declined to take part.
https://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/concert-crowd.jpg2501200Dimitrologyhttps://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/WEBSITE-LOGO-2020-SMALL.pngDimitrology2018-01-07 07:13:502018-01-07 07:13:50Torrent Pioneers: isoHunt’s Gary Fung, Ten Years Later
Gaining free access to copyrighted material is not a difficult task in today’s online world. Movies, TV shows, music, games, and eBooks are all just a few clicks away, either using torrent, streaming, or direct download services.
Over the years, however, the growth of piracy has been at least somewhat slowed due to the advent of official services. Where there was once a content vacuum, official platforms such as Netflix, Spotify, HBO, TIDAL, Steam, and others, are helping users to find the content they want.
While most services present reasonable value, subscribing to them all would be a massive strain on even the most expansive of budgets. But what if there was a way to access every single one of them, for just a few dollars a year – in total? Believe it or not, such services exist and have done for some time.
Described as ‘Account Generators’, these platforms grant members with access to dozens of premium services, without having to pay anything like the headline price. The main ones often major on access to a Netflix subscription as a base, with access to other services thrown in on top.
How much a year?
The screenshot above shows one ‘generator’ service as it appeared this week. On the far right is a Netflix offer for $2.99 per year or $4.99 for a lifetime ‘private’ account (more on that later). That is of course ridiculously cheap.
On the near left is the ‘All Access’ plan, which offers access to Netflix plus another 69 online services for just $6.99 per month or $16.99 per year. The range of services available is impressive, to say the least.
Movies and TV Shows: Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, HBO Now, Crunchyroll, DIRECTV/Now, Stream TV Live, CBS All Access, Funimation, Slingbox, Xfinity.
On the sports front: BT Sports, Fubo.tv, F1 Access, MLB.TV, NBA League Pass, NFL Game Pass, UFC Fight Pass, WWE Network.
For music, access is provided to Spotify, Deezer, Napster, Pandora, Saavn, SoundCloud, and TIDAL.
A small selection of the services available
How these services gain access to all of these accounts is shrouded in a level of secrecy but there’s little doubt that while some are obtained legitimately (perhaps through free trials or other account sharing), the roots of others are fairly questionable.
For example, when these services talk about ‘shared and ‘private’ Netflix accounts, the former often appear set up for someone else, with individual user accounts in other people’s names and suggestions for what to watch next already in place. In other words, these are live accounts already being paid for by someone, to which these services somehow gain access.
Indeed, there are notices on account generator platforms warning people not to mess with account passwords or payment details, since that could alert the original user or cause an account to get shut down for other reasons.
“Origin brings you great PC and Mac games. Play the latest RPGs, Shooters, Sim games, and more. These accounts are private (1 per person), however you MUST NOT change passwords,” one warning reads.
Since Origin has just come up, it’s probably a suitable juncture to mention the games services on offer. In addition to EA’s offering, one can gain access to Xbox Live, ESL Gaming, Good Old Games, League of Legends, Minecraft Premium, Steam (game keys) and Uplay.
And it doesn’t stop there.
Need a BitDefender key? No problem. Access to Creative Market? You got it. Want to do some online learning? Queue up for Chegg, CourseHero, Lynda, Mathway, Udemy, and more. There’s even free access to NYTimes Premium. As the image below shows, thousands of accounts are added all the time.
Thousands of accounts, all the time…
While these generator platforms are undoubtedly popular with people on a budget, almost everything about them feels wrong. Staring into someone’s private Netflix account, with what appear to be family names, is unsettling. Looking at their private email addresses and credit card details feels flat-out criminal.
Quite how these services are able to prosper isn’t clear but perhaps the big question is why the platforms whose accounts are being offered haven’t noticed some kind of pattern by now. Maybe they have, but it’s probably a pretty difficult task to sweep up the mess without a lot of false positives, not to mention the risks of ensnaring those who pay for their accounts officially.
The video below, from late 2016, gives a decent overview of how an account generator platform works. Even for many hardcore pirates, especially those who demand privacy and respect the same for others, parts of the viewing will be uncomfortable.
https://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/bitcoin-featured.jpg2501200Dimitrologyhttps://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/WEBSITE-LOGO-2020-SMALL.pngDimitrology2018-01-06 16:12:502018-01-06 16:12:50People Pay Pennies For Netflix, Spotify, HBO, Xbox Live & More
In recent years we have covered a wide range of newly-assigned patents with a clear anti-piracy angle.
From IBM’s printer that doesn’t copy infringing content, through NBC Universal’s piracy detection system, to Philips’ ambient lighting solution to camcording pirates in theaters.
Today we add another newly-awarded patent from software vendor Corel to the list. Known for its signature CorelDRAW and WinZIP software, the company has quite a bit of experience with sketchy pirates. This has cost a lot of money over the years, Corel claims.
“Software piracy has become a financial burden to the software industry as well. Popular software programs, sold in the tens or hundreds of millions, may have pirated versions numbering in the millions,” the company writes.
The software company notes that current anti-piracy tools are often easy to break or bypass, which makes them inadequate. In their patent, titled: “Software product piracy monetization process,” they, therefore, take a different approach.
Instead of blocking pirates outright, Corel proposes to engage with these people more directly. By sending a message in the form of a pop-up, for example.
“The message may include instructions to change the state of a feature property of the software product to alert a user that the software product is not legitimate,” the patent reads.
If pirate, then…
If someone is running a product with an invalid serial, he or she can be informed by the software. This can be a friendly note, but also one that threatens criminal charges unless the pirate agrees to an amnesty deal.
This creates a win-win situation where the pirate escapes prison and the publisher is paid, so to speak.
“The amnesty offer may, for example, agree not to bring criminal charges in exchange for the user purchasing a legitimate copy of the product,” Corel writes.
“In this manner, the user of the pirated version is given the opportunity to purchase a legitimate copy which, if acted on, increases revenue for the manufacturer.”
While the patent was recently awarded, the idea to monetize piracy in this way isn’t new. In fact, Malwarebytes has sent messages to pirating users for years, and also offered them amnesty and a free upgrade in the past.
Whether Corel has any intentions of implementing their own idea is yet unknown.
https://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/money-feat.jpg2501200Dimitrologyhttps://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/WEBSITE-LOGO-2020-SMALL.pngDimitrology2018-01-06 01:11:502018-01-06 01:11:50Corel Patents System to Monetize Software Piracy
Fifteen years ago BitTorrent conquered the masses. It offered a superior way to share large video files, something that was virtually impossible at the time.
With the shift to online video streaming, BitTorrent has lost prominence in recent years. That’s a shame, since the technology offers many advantages.
This is one of the reasons why Stanford University graduate Feross Aboukhadijeh invented WebTorrent. The technology, which is supported by most modern browsers, allows users to seamlessly stream videos on the web with BitTorrent.
In the few years that it’s been around, several tools and services have been built on WebTorrent, including a dedicated desktop client. The desktop version basically serves as a torrent client that streams torrents almost instantaneously on Windows, Linux, and Mac.
Add in AirPlay, Chromecast and DLNA support and it brings these videos to any network-connected TV as well. Quite a powerful tool, as many people have discovered in recent months.
This week Feross informed TorrentFreak that WebTorrent Desktop had reached the one million download mark. That’s a major milestone for a modest project with no full-time developer. But while users seem to be happy, it’s not perfect yet.
“WebTorrent Desktop is the best torrent app in existence. Yet, the app suffers from performance issues when too many torrents are added or too many peers show up. It’s also missing important power user features like bandwidth throttling,” Feross says.
The same is true for WebTorrent itself, which the desktop version is built on. The software has been on the verge of version 1.0.0 for over two years now but needs some more work to make the final leap. This is why Feross would like to invest more time into the projects, given the right support.
Last month Feross launched a Patreon campaign to crowdfund future development of WebTorrent including the desktop version. There are dozens of open issues and a lot of plans and with proper funding, the developer can free up time to work on these.
“The goal of the campaign is to allow me to spend a few days per week addressing these issues,” Feross says, adding that all software he works on is completely free and always has been.
Feross and cat
Thus far the fundraising campaign is going well. WebTorrent’s developer has received support from dozens of people, totaling $1,730 a month through Patreon alone, and he has signed up the privacy oriented browser Brave and video site PopChest as Platinum backers.
Community-driven funding is a great way to support Open Source projects, Feross believes, and he is encouraging others to try it out as well.
“I’ve been promoting Patreon heavily within my community as a way for open source software developers to get paid for their work,” Feross says.
“The norm in the industry right now is that no one gets paid — it’s all volunteer work, even though we’re generating a lot of value for the world! Patreon is a really promising solution for software people like me.”
People who want to give WebTorrent Desktop a try can download a copy from the official site. More information on the core WebTorrent technology and its implementations is available there was well. And if you like what you see, Feross still needs a bit of help to reach his Patreon goal.
https://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/hearts-feat.jpg2501200Dimitrologyhttps://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/WEBSITE-LOGO-2020-SMALL.pngDimitrology2018-01-05 10:10:512018-01-05 10:10:51WebTorrent Desktop Hits a Million Downloads
Since the advent of the first truly mass-market videogames consoles, people have dreamed about removing the protection mechanisms that prevent users from tinkering with their machines.
These modifications – which are software, hardware, or combination of the two – facilitate the running of third-party or “homebrew” code. On this front, a notable mention must go to XBMC (now known as Kodi) which ran on the original Xbox after its copy protection mechanisms had been removed.
However, these same modifications regularly open the door to mass-market piracy too, with mod-chips (hardware devices) or soft-mods (software solutions) opening up machines so that consumers can run games obtained from the Internet or elsewhere.
For the Nintendo Switch, that prospect edged closer at the end of December when Wololo reported that hackers Plutoo, Derrek, and Naehrwert had given a long presentation (video) at the 34C3 hacking conference in Germany, revealing their kernel hack for the Nintendo Switch.
While this in itself is an exciting development, fresh news from a veteran hacking group suggests that Nintendo could be in big trouble on the piracy front in the not-too-distant future.
“In the light of a recent presentation at the Chaos Communication Congress in Germany we’ve decided to come out of the woodwork and tease you all a bit with our latest upcoming product,” the legendary Team-Xecutor just announced.
While the hack announced in December requires Switch firmware 3.0 (and a copy of Pokken Tournament DX), Team-Xecutor say that their product will be universal, something which tends to suggest a fundamental flaw in the Switch system.
“This solution will work on ANY Nintendo Switch console regardless of the currently installed firmware, and will be completely future proof,” the team explain.
Xecutor say that their solution opens up the possibility of custom firmware (CFW) on Nintendo’s console. In layman’s terms, this means that those with the technical ability will be able to dictate, at least to a point, how the console functions.
“We want to move the community forward and provide a persistent, stable and fast method of running your own code and custom firmware patches on Nintendo’s latest flagship product. And we think we’ve succeeded!” the team add.
The console-modding community thrives on rumors, with various parties claiming to have made progress here and there, on this console and that, so it’s natural for people to greet this kind of announcement with a degree of skepticism. That being said, Team-Xecutor is no regular group.
With a long history of console-based meddling, Team-Xecutor’s efforts include hardware solutions for the original Playstation and Playstation 2, an array of hacks for the original Xbox (Enigmah and various Xecuter-branded solutions), plus close involvement in prominent Xbox360 mods. Their pedigree is definitely not up for debate.
For now, the team isn’t releasing any more details on the nature of the hack but they have revealed when the public can expect to get their hands on it.
In broad terms, there are two types of unauthorized online streaming of live TV. The first is via open-access websites where users can view for free. The second features premium services to which viewers are required to subscribe.
Usually available for a few dollars, euros, or pounds per month, the latter are gaining traction all around the world. Service levels are relatively high and the majority of illicit packages offer a dazzling array of programming, often putting official providers in the shade.
For this reason, commercial IPTV providers are considered a huge threat to broadcasters’ business models, since they offer a broadly comparable and accessible service at a much cheaper price. This is forcing companies such as US giant Dish Networks to court, seeking relief.
Following on from a lawsuit filed last year against Kodi add-on ZemTV and TVAddons.ag, Dish has just filed two more lawsuits targeting a pair of unauthorized pirate IPTV services.
Filed in Maryland and Texas respectively, the actions are broadly similar, with the former targeting a provider known as Spider-TV.
The suit, filed against Dima Furniture Inc. and Mohammad Yusif (individually and collectively doing business as Spider-TV), claims that the defendants are “capturing
broadcasts of television channels exclusively licensed to DISH and are unlawfully retransmitting these channels over the Internet to their customers throughout the United States, 24 hours per day, 7 days per week.”
Dish claim that the defendants profit from the scheme by selling set-top boxes along with subscriptions, charging around $199 per device loaded with 13 months of service.
Dima Furniture is a Maryland corporation, registered at Takoma Park, Maryland 20912, an address that is listed on the Spider-TV website. The connection between the defendants is further supported by FCC references which identify Spider devices in the market. Mohammad Yusif is claimed to be the president, executive director, general manager, and sole shareholder of Dima Furniture.
Dish describes itself as the fourth largest pay-television provider in the United States, delivering copyrighted programming to millions of subscribers nationwide by means of satellite delivery and over-the-top services. Dish has acquired the rights to do this, the defendants have not, the broadcaster states.
“Defendants capture live broadcast signals of the Protected Channels, transcode these signals into a format useful for streaming over the Internet, transfer the transcoded content to one or more servers provided, controlled, and maintained by Defendants, and then transmit the Protected Channels to users of the Service through
OTT delivery, including users in the United States,” the lawsuit reads.
It’s claimed that in July 2015, Yusif registered Spider-TV as a trade name of Dima Furniture with the Department of Assessments and Taxation Charter Division, describing the business as “Television Channel Installation”. Since then, the defendants have been illegally retransmitting Dish channels to customers in the United States.
The overall offer from Spider-TV appears to be considerable, with a claimed 1,300 channels from major regions including the US, Canada, UK, Europe, Middle East, and Africa.
Importantly, Dish state that the defendants know that their activities are illegal, since the provider sent at least 32 infringement notices since January 20, 2017 demanding an end to the unauthorized retransmission of its channels. It went on to send even more to the defendants’ ISPs.
“DISH and Networks sent at least thirty-three additional notices requesting the
removal of infringing content to Internet service providers associated with the Service from February 16, 2017 to the filing of this Complaint. Upon information and belief, at least some of these notices were forwarded to Defendants,” the lawsuit reads.
But while Dish says that the takedowns responded to by the ISPs were initially successful, the defendants took evasive action by transmitting the targeted channels from other locations.
Describing the defendants’ actions as “willful, malicious, intentional [and] purposeful”, Dish is suing for Direct Copyright Infringement, demanding a permanent injunction preventing the promotion and provision of the service plus statutory damages of $150,000 per registered work. The final amount isn’t specified but the numbers are potentially enormous. In addition, Dish demands attorneys’ fees, costs, and the seizure of all infringing articles.
The second lawsuit, filed in Texas, is broadly similar. It targets Mo’ Ayad Al
Zayed Trading Est., and Mo’ Ayad Fawzi Al Zayed (individually and collectively doing business as Tiger International Company), and Shenzhen Tiger Star Electronical Co., Ltd, otherwise known as Shenzhen Tiger Star.
Dish claims that these defendants also illegally capture and retransmit channels to customers in the United States. IPTV boxes costing up to $179 including one year’s service are the method of delivery.
In common with the Maryland case, Dish says it sent almost two dozen takedown notices to ISPs utilized by the defendants. These were also countered by the unauthorized service retransmitting Dish channels from other servers.
The biggest difference between the Maryland and Texas cases is that while Yusif/Spider/Dima Furniture are said to be in the US, Zayed is said to reside in Amman, Jordan, and Tiger Star is registered in Shenzhen, China. However, since the unauthorized service is targeted at customers in Texas, Dish states that the Texas court has jurisdiction.
Again, Dish is suing for Direct Infringement, demanding damages, costs, and a permanent injunction.
Torrent sites come in all shapes and sizes, but generally speaking there’s a clear divide netween private and public sites.
The latter includes the likes of The Pirate Bay and are open to anyone, while private trackers require an account to gain access.
Because many of these close communities also enforce ratio requirements and other rules, they can log quite a bit of data. This generally isn’t the type of information users would like to see out on the streets, but such leaks are no rarity.
In recent days the Danish torrent tracker Hounddawgs.org also ran into some issues. Out of the blue, the site’s 40,000 users received a message signed by ‘Anonymous’ stating that it had been hacked.
Hacked?
The hacker also noted that everyone had been promoted to “staff” but soon after the site went dark. It eventually returned with a message from the operator, accusing another private torrent site of ‘messing around.’
“We’re sorry, but due to server maintenance, we’ll be offline for a little while. Some kiddies from another Danish torrent site don’t like to share users so they found a way to mess a little with the site,” the notice read.
“No harm has been done, and we will be back up as soon as we have found the error and corrected it.”
The message seemed reassuring, but at the same time, a partially redacted file with usernames, emails, and IP-addresses started to circulate.
As a result, the rumor mill went into full swing, and people reported that other accounts where they used the same information, were being compromised. The Hounddawgs operators maintained, however, that allegations of a full database breach were false.
The site’s staff posted a new message refuting the hacking claims. At the same time, they also announced that the site would remain offline indefinitely.
Hounddawgs’ operators say they started the site as a counter-movement to the “tyranny” of other Danish trackers. However, these other trackers allegedly didn’t like the newcomer and fought back, up to a point where Hounddawgs decided to throw in the towel.
Private tracker feats are by no means new. They’re as old as private trackers. And while there are plenty opinions, since most of it takes place behind closed doors, the truth is often hard to find.
After the site’s operators said their goodbyes, pointing users to the new infinity-t.org tracker, the alleged hacker responded once more. This time posting over 20 gigabytes of data, said to be the full database and the site’s code.
“But how is that possible? The superheroes of the world, the people behind Hounddawgs, clearly stated on their frontpage that no database was leaked, so how could I possibly have it?” the hacker posted.
“They are lying! Like they have done for years, they don’t care one bit for their users,” the message adds, noting that the server was minimally secured.
The leaked files do indeed include site code and a database, which several people claim to be legitimate. The operators of Hounddawgs also changed their earlier tune. In a message posted on the site yesterday. They now apologize for not dealing with the security issues.
“It has NEVER been our intention to hurt any of you, and we were very happy with all the good users we had. We chose to close the site as a precaution, but unfortunately too late,” they write.
The site was running on the Gazelle script which logs quite a bit of data by default, including users’ IP-addresses. With this info out in the open, many users fear that anti-piracy groups may use the logs to identify individual pirates.
While it’s unlikely that copyright holders will pursue casual sharers based on leaked files, it’s never a pleasant thought to have one’s IP-addresses and other information leaked.
Although the local anti-piracy group, RettighedsAlliancen, might not spring into action right away, it won’t mind seeing the second largest tracker in Denmark go offline.
https://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/shattered-broken-glass-fea.jpg2511200Dimitrologyhttps://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/WEBSITE-LOGO-2020-SMALL.pngDimitrology2018-01-03 13:07:522018-01-03 13:07:52Popular Danish Torrent Tracker Shuts Down After Hack
For as long as piracy has been mainstream, people have tried to find ways to monetize the system. While many have had good intentions, only models focusing on the negative (copyright trolling, for example) have enjoyed any level of success.
Blockchain startup White Rabbit is hoping to buck that trend but it’s not going to be easy. Then again, nothing worthwhile is, so what do they have to offer?
White Rabbit begins with the assumption that while they love their pirate sites, a many as 60% of pirates would happily reward creators if it was made easy enough. The startup deals with this by inviting pirates to carry on using the kinds of unauthorized sites and services they’re using already, but with a twist.
By installing the White Rabbit browser plug-in, the company will be able to see what content the user is accessing. It will then attempt to match that download to deals it’s made with the companies behind those movies or TV shows. They’ll then get paid a set amount.
“White Rabbit is a content ecosystem accessed through a plugin that recognizes the film and series you stream. The streaming sites are P2P or open server, meaning users can choose where they want to stream,” White Rabbit CEO Alan R. Milligan informs TF.
“We already have a library of films that have won and been nominated for Oscars, Cannes, Berlin and Venice film festival best film prizes – but will continue adding more films and series as we near launch.”
It’s envisioned that this mechanism will prove popular with reluctant pirates since instead of paying Netflix, Amazon, and dozens of other services, users can pay for content through one channel. And, since White Rabbit uses blockchain technology, rights holders can be ensured complete financial transparency, with user payments going straight to them without delay, cutting out the middleman.
“Users are anonymous but can offer filmmakers, artists or other content right holders (investors, distributors, sales agents) our tokens (WRT) as good faith that they are willing to pay for the content. Should the rights holders accept, we enter into a contract with the rights holder that allows them to receive revenue – and accept P2P streaming. We find, and research shows, that most people that are forced to piracy [do so] because they are just not able to access content,” Milligan adds.
White Rabbit’s CEO, who is a filmmaker himself, also sees opportunities to bring fans and filmmakers closer together. Once users have paid for content, they continue to get access via something called the Rabbit Hole, an interface which provides extras that are normally found on a DVD, such as deleted scenes etc.
The team behind White Rabbit describe themselves as “responsible rebels” hoping to spark a revolution. While that’s clearly the goal, by any measure there is a mountain to climb, not least on the content front.
When TorrentFreak first started speaking with the startup in October last year, we were told they were “closing in on 500 films” with contracts, although they wouldn’t elaborate on who might be on board. Nevertheless, that is quite a lot of movies, especially given the mainstream studios’ hatred of pirate sites and anything they might be involved in.
However, subsequent discussion suggests that those with more niche tastes might be White Rabbit’s initial target audience.
“I believe timing is of big relevance and right now a lot of producers are scared of where they´re going to go now that Netflix is enforcing its 50/50 policy. There are also so many amazing films out there that get no or little digital distribution at all,” Milligan says.
“As a Norwegian film producer there is little chance of the film being streamed in my home country – even if we won awards in Cannes and Venice. My latest film Valley of Shadows got US digital distribution, but in Norway – nada.
“My colleagues around the world are suffering the same way, not to mention all the fans who cant watch local films and series. So the indie part of the industry – which is most of us (and still representing 20-30% of cinema sales) – are very ready for change.”
But while indie producers could benefit nicely from White Rabbit, Milligan highlights problems that the big studios have, and suggests that they might like to see the startup succeed too.
“The studios will likely want to see our business model work – but they also have a problem with Netflix which has become a studio. So they´re competitors now, but Netflix has a 100M subscriber advantage. Will they all break out and create each their streaming site for their content only? That would be terrible for fans,” he notes.
That would indeed be a huge problem and it’s an issue we’ve raised here on TF on several occasions. However, if White Rabbit is to succeed, it needs to overcome significant hurdles. We raised just a handful of these with its CEO. First up, Partner Streaming Sites (PSS).
PSS sites appear to be pirate sites that will partner with White Rabbit, so the latter can tap into the formers’ userbases. When White Rabbit users stream ‘pirate’ content from a PSS, that content will be monetized, with the creator getting paid quickly and transparently. At that point, it seems, the content will become non-infringing.
But while that sounds intriguing in theory, plenty of questions remain. White Rabbit says it will share “up to $1M” from its token sale “with the most innovative, brand conscious, film and series loving streaming sites either already out there, planned or about to launch.”
The start-up says the best projects could get $100,000 each but, since its goal is to convert pirates, that necessarily means doing business with pirate sites.
So we asked; how will it be possible to do business with people that are regularly described as criminals? How will it then become possible to secure deals with filmmakers that will undoubtedly come under huge pressure from industry players not to participate in the White Rabbit scheme?
“What we are trying to do is to change digital distribution to everyone´s benefit. We have no interest in financing illegal content, we are interested in spurring innovation in streaming, access for fans and due payment for the rights holders,” Milligan explains.
“That´s what PSS can help us achieve using the WRT (White Rabbit Token) – that helps us find out who wants to be part of this model. No revenue exchanges hands until rights holders accept the token. What is important for rights holders is that we generate more revenue for them than current business models, and we haven´t even included the Rabbit Hole revenue yet.”
So what happens if a White Rabbit user tries to stream something that isn’t part of the program? According to Milligan, PSS sites must remove the content and let White Rabbit users know they must get the content legally elsewhere.
Clearly, the vast majority of pirate site users aren’t White Rabbit users now, nor will they be so in the future, so the removal of content is massively counter-productive for pirate sites. Indeed, it’s this reluctance to take down infringing content that causes them most of their problems.
So, hypothetically, what happens when the operators of streaming site X (that previously partnered with White Rabbit) get arrested and their site shut down for distributing Hollywood content that isn’t part of the program?
“PSS´s would never distribute illegal content, we are offering an opportunity to monetize. We are allowing a platform to those that see monetized P2P as beneficial to their income stream,” Milligan says.
“Hollywood is tricky though, I admit. The proof is in the pudding, so if we have to prove the value through indie and arthouse films first that´s OK. That is still 30% of the multi-billion dollar film market, so we are OK to start with that.”
The final issue is the price and where revenue goes. White Rabbit envisions a user paying $2 for film and $1 for a TV show, although producers are free to set their own price. That means 11 TV shows or five movies per month, given the Netflix model/budget of roughly $11.00 for the same period.
Revenue generated would then be split, with 75% going to the rightsholders, 15% to White Rabbit, and 10% to PSS sites. There’s also a provision for non-PSS sites to be a part of the program, but they would only get 5%, with the remaining 5% going to White Rabbit.
With an incredibly ambitious project like this, it’s easy to find reasons why it might not succeed or even fail to get off the ground. But the team behind the operation have lots of experience in relevant fields and from what we’ve seen are putting considerable effort into getting things moving, as their white paper (pdf) explains.
Currently, White Rabbit is seeking conversation with prospective Partner Streaming Sites, who will provide the content on which White Rabbit will survive. It will certainly be interesting to see which sites put themselves forward for consideration.
This is one of those projects that raises a dizzying volume of questions, with each living up to their billing as part of the Rabbit Hole. The big question is whether the Rabbit Hole will eventually lead to Wonderland or will render everyone who ventures inside feeling surreal and disorientated.
https://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/wr-long.jpg2811200Dimitrologyhttps://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/WEBSITE-LOGO-2020-SMALL.pngDimitrology2018-01-02 22:06:552018-01-02 22:06:55Blockchain Startup White Rabbit Calls on Pirate Sites to Do Business, Legally
When people download content online using BitTorrent, they also distribute that content to others. This unlawful distribution attracts negative attention from rightsholders, who have sued hundreds of thousands of individuals worldwide.
Torrent sites have come and gone over past year. Now, at the start of 2018, we take a look to see what the most-used sites are in the current landscape.
Ten years ago, November 2007 to be precise, 
In recent years we have covered a wide range of newly-assigned patents with a clear anti-piracy angle.
Fifteen years ago BitTorrent conquered the masses. It offered a superior way to share large video files, something that was virtually impossible at the time. 
Torrent sites come in all shapes and sizes, but generally speaking there’s a clear divide netween private and public sites.
