Like most countries, France is struggling to find ways to stop online piracy running rampant. A number of options have been tested thus far, with varying results.

One of the more interesting cases has been running since 2015, when music industry group SNEP took Google and Microsoft to court demanding automated filtering of ‘pirate’ search results featuring three local artists.

Before the High Court of Paris, SNEP argued that searches for the artists’ names plus the word “torrent” returned mainly infringing results on Google and Bing. Filtering out results with both sets of terms would reduce the impact of people finding pirate content through search, they said.

While SNEP claimed that its request was in line with Article L336-2 of France’s intellectual property code, which allows for “all appropriate measures” to prevent infringement, both Google and Microsoft fought back, arguing that such filtering would be disproportionate and could restrict freedom of expression.

The Court eventually sided with the search engines, noting that torrent is a common noun that refers to a neutral communication protocol.

“The requested measures are thus tantamount to general monitoring and may block access to lawful websites,” the High Court said.

Despite being told that its demands were too broad, SNEP decided to appeal. The case was heard in November where concerns were expressed over potential false positives.

Since SNEP even wants sites with “torrent” in their URL filtered out via a “fully automated procedures that do not require human intervention”, this very site – TorrentFreak.com – could be sucked in. To counter that eventuality, SNEP proposed some kind of whitelist, NextInpact reports.

With no real consensus on how to move forward, the parties were advised to enter discussions on how to get closer to the aim of reducing piracy but without causing collateral damage. Last week the parties agreed to enter negotiations so the details will now have to be hammered out between their respective law firms. Failing that, they will face a ruling from the court.

If this last scenario plays out, the situation appears to favor the search engines, who have a High Court ruling in their favor and already offer comprehensive takedown tools for copyright holders to combat the exploitation of their content online.

Meanwhile, other elements of the French recording industry have booked a notable success against several pirate sites.

SCPP, which represents Warner, Universal, Sony and thousands of others, went to court in February this year demanding that local ISPs Bouygues, Free, Orange, SFR and Numéricable prevent their subscribers from accessing ExtraTorrent, isoHunt, Torrent9 and Cpasbien.

Like SNEP in the filtering case, SCPP also cited Article L336-2 of France’s intellectual property code, demanding that the sites plus their variants, mirrors and proxies should be blocked by the ISPs so that their subscribers can no longer gain access.

This week the Paris Court of First Instance sided with the industry group, ordering the ISPs to block the sites. The service providers were also told to pick up the bill for costs.

These latest cases are yet more examples of France’s determination to crack down on piracy.

Early December it was revealed that since its inception, nine million piracy warnings have been sent to citizens via the Hadopi anti-piracy agency. Since the launch of its graduated response regime in 2010, more than 2,000 cases have been referred to prosecutors, resulting in 189 criminal convictions.

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The Chinese government’s grip on power is matched by its determination to control access to information. To that end, it seeks to control what people in China can see on the Internet, thereby limiting the effect of outside influences on society.

The government tries to reach these goals by use of the so-called Great Firewall, a complex system that grants access to some foreign resources while denying access to others. However, technologically advanced citizens are able to bypass this state censorship by using circumvention techniques including Virtual Private Networks (VPNs).

While large numbers of people use such services, in January 2017 the government gave its clearest indication yet that it would begin to crack down on people offering Great Firewall-evading tools.

Operating such a service without a corresponding telecommunications business license constitutes an offense, the government said. Now we have a taste of how serious the government is on this matter.

According to an announcement from China’s Procuratorate Daily, Wu Xiangyang, a resident of the Guangxi autonomous region, has just been jailed for five-and-a-half years and fined 500,000 yuan ($75,920) for building and selling access to VPNs without an appropriate license.

It’s alleged that between 2013 and June 2017, Wu Xiangyang sold VPN server access to the public via his own website, FangouVPN / Where Dog VPN, and Taobao, a Chinese online shopping site similar to eBay and Amazon.

The member accounts provided by the man allowed customers to browse foreign websites, without being trapped behind China’s Great Firewall. He also sold custom hardware routers that came read-configured to use the VPN service, granting access to the wider Internet, contrary to the wishes of Chinese authorities.

Prosecutors say that the illegal VPN business had revenues of 792,638 yuan (US$120,377) and profits of around 500,000 yuan ($75,935). SCMP reports that the company previously boasted on Twitter at having 8,000 foreigners and 5,000 businesses using its services to browse blocked websites.

This is at least the second big sentence handed down to a Chinese citizen for providing access to VPNs. Back in September, it was revealed that Deng Jiewei, a 26-year-old from the city of Dongguan in the Guangdong province, had been jailed for nine months after offering a similar service to the public for around a year.

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For a long time UHD Blu-Ray discs have been the holy grail for movie rippers.

Protected by the ‘unbreakable’ AACS 2.0 encryption, pirates were left with regular HD releases. While that’s fine for most people, it didn’t sit well with the real videophiles.

This year there have been some major developments on this front. First, full copies of UHD discs started to leak online, later followed by dozens of AACS 2.0 keys. Technically speaking AACS 2.0 is not confirmed to be defeated yet, but many discs can now be ripped.

This week a popular name jumped onto the UHD Blu-Ray bandwagon. In its latest beta release, AnyDVD now supports the format, relying on the leaked keys.

“New (UHD Blu-ray): Fetch AACS keys from external file for use with ‘UHD-friendly’ drives,” the release notes read.

The involvement of AnyDVD is significant because it previously came under legal pressure from decryption licensing outfit AACS LA. This caused former parent company Slysoft to shut down last year, but the software later reappeared under new management.

Based on reports from several AnyDVD users, the UHD ripping works well for most people. Some even claim that it’s faster than the free alternative, MakeMKV.

The question is, however, how long the ripping party will last. TorrentFreak has learned that not all supported Blu-Ray disc drives will remain “UHD-friendly.”

According to one source’s information, which we were unable to independently verify, device manufacturers have recently been instructed to patch the holes through firmware updates.

This indeed appears to be what’s happening. According to several user reports, LG’s WH16NS40 is no longer able to read and rip UHD Blu-Rays after the most recent firmware change.

Ironically, LG advertises it as “Improved BD UHD disc compatibility.”

So, while ripping tools such as AnyDVD are joining in to support UHD ripping, AACS LA and disc drive manufacturers appear to be patching security holes. But whatever they do, rippers are unlikely to stop their efforts until they’ve reached the holy grail.

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In common with most other countries, demand for movies is absolutely huge in India. According to a 2015 report, the country produces between 1,500 and 2,000 movies each year, more than any other country in the world.

But India also has a huge piracy problem. If a movie is worth watching, it’s pirated extremely quickly, mostly within a couple of days of release, often much sooner. These early copies ordinarily come from “cams” – recordings made in cinemas – which are sold on the streets for next to nothing and eagerly snapped up citizens. Who, incidentally, are served by ten times fewer cinema screens than their US counterparts.

These cam copies have to come from somewhere and according to representatives from the local Anti-Video Piracy Committee, piracy groups have begun to divert “camming” duties to outsiders, effectively decentralizing their operations.

Their targets are said to be young people with decent mobile phones, students in particular. Along with China, India now has more than a billion phone users, so there’s no shortage of candidates.

“The offer to youngsters is that they would get 10 US dollars into their bank accounts, if they videographed and sent it on the first day of release of the film,” says Raj Kumar, Telugu Film Chamber of Commerce representative and Anti-Video Piracy Committee chairman.

“The minors and youngsters are getting attracted to the money, not knowing that piracy is a crime,” he adds.

Although US$10 sounds like a meager amount, for many locals the offer is significant. According to figures from 2014, the average daily wage in India is just 272 Indian Rupees (US$4.24) so, for an hour or two’s ‘work’ sitting in a cinema with a phone, a student can, in theory, earn more than he can in two days employment.

The issue of youth “camming” came up yesterday during a meeting of film producers, Internet service providers and cybercrime officials convened by IT and Industries Secretary Jayesh Ranjan.

The meeting heard that the Telangana State government will soon have its own special police officers and cybercrime experts to tackle the growing problem of pirate sites, who will take them down if necessary.

“The State government has adopted a no-tolerance policy towards online piracy of films and will soon have a plan in place to tackle and effectively curb piracy. We need to adopt strong measures and countermeasures to weed out all kinds of piracy,” Ranjan said.

The State already has its own Intellectual Property Crimes Unit (IPCU) but local officials have complained that not enough is being done to curb huge losses faced by the industry. There have been successes, however.

Cybercrime officials previously tracked down individuals said to have been involved in the piracy of the spectacular movie Baahubali 2 – The Conclusion which became the highest grossing Indian film ever just six days after its release earlier this year. But despite the efforts and successes, the basics appear to elude Indian anti-piracy forces.

During October 2017, a 4K copy of Baahubali 2 was uploaded to YouTube and has since racked up an astonishing 54.7m views to the delight of a worldwide audience, many of them enjoying the best of Indian cinema for the first time – for free.

Still, the meeting Monday found that sites offering pirated Indian movies should be targeted and brought to their knees.

“In the meeting, the ISPs too were asked to designate a nodal officer who can keep a watch over websites which upload such data onto their websites and bring them down,” a cybercrime police officer said.

Next stop, YouTube?

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As the largest search engine on the Internet, Google has received its fair share of takedown requests. Over the past year, the company removed roughly a billion links from its search results.

However, this doesn’t mean that Google will remove everything it’s asked to. When a Canadian court demanded the search engine to delist sites that offered unlawful and competing products of Equustek Solutions, it fought back.

After several years in court, the Supreme Court of Canada directed Google to remove the websites from its search results last summer. This order wasn’t limited to Canada alone, but applied worldwide.

Worried about the possible negative consequences the broad verdict could have, Google then took the case to the US, and with success.

A federal court in California already signed a preliminary injunction a few weeks ago, disarming the Canadian order, and a few days ago ruled that Google has won its case.

Case closed

According to the California court, the Canadian Supreme court ruling violates the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, putting free speech at risk.

It would also go against Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which offers search engines and other Internet services immunity from liability for material published by others.

“The Canadian order would eliminate Section 230 immunity for service providers that link to third-party websites,” the court wrote.

“By forcing intermediaries to remove links to third-party material, the Canadian order undermines the policy goals of Section 230 and threatens free speech on the global internet.”

After a legal battle that kept the Canadian court busy since 2014, the US case was solved rather quickly. Equustek Solutions didn’t show up and failed to defend itself, which made it an easy win.

Now that the permanent injunction is signed the case will be closed. While Google still has to delist the contested pages in Canada, it no longer has to do the same worldwide.

As highlighted previously, the order is very important in the broader scheme. If foreign courts are allowed to grant worldwide blockades, free speech could be severely hampered.

Today it’s a relatively unknown Canadian company, but the damage could be much more severe if the Chinese Government asked Google to block the websites of VPN providers, or any other information they don’t like.

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