Earlier this week, black clouds began to form over the passionate iOS jailbreaking community. Tolerated by Apple through gritted teeth due to legal protection under the DMCA, the company took the unusual step of sending a DMCA notice targeting a developer’s tweet containing an encryption key.

While that tweet was later restored, the takedown came as a complete surprise and the knock-on effect from this unsettling act would set the scene for the company getting blamed for additional similar acts, this time on Reddit.

In the wake of the Twitter action, a moderator of the /r/jailbreak sub-Reddit revealed that Reddit’s legal team had removed five posts detailing iOS jailbreak releases checkra1n and unc0ver. All of the posts were deleted by Reddit’s admins after receiving a DMCA notice, ostensibly sent by Apple.

What followed was an hours-long information blackout, during which /r/jailbreak’s moderators sought but failed to obtain information from Reddit’s admins. With a credible fear that more notices could be filed and as a result label /r/jailbreak as a repeat offender under the DMCA, its moderators put the forum into lockdown.

Right from the very beginning there was no clear proof that Apple had sent any DMCA notices to Reddit, despite news headlines blaming the tech company for going to war against jailbreakers. It now transpires that waiting for proof would’ve been a more prudent option.

As revealed by checkra1n development team member ‘qwertyoruiopz’, the notice that targeted his project was actually a fake.

Update: The DMCA takedown that took the checka1n post down is fake.

— qwertyoruiop (@qwertyoruiopz) December 12, 2019

https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

And, according to fellow developer ‘axi0mX’, the fake notice wasn’t particularly well constructed either.

“We reviewed it and confirmed that it was someone impersonating Apple. It was not sent from their law firm, which is Kilpatrick Townsend. There are issues with grammar and spelling,” he revealed.

“This notice was obviously not submitted in good faith, and it was not done by someone authorized to represent Apple. Not cool. They could be sued for damages or face criminal charges for perjury.”

Being sued for sending a fake notice sounds like a reasonable solution in practice but history tells us, one particularly notable case aside, that is unlikely to happen. However, it’s clear that more can be done to mitigate the effects of malicious takedowns, starting with more transparency from Reddit’s admins.

While the moderators of /r/jailbreak knew about the complaints early on, they were given no information about who sent them or on what basis. This meant that the people against whom the complaints were made weren’t in a position to counter them, at least with knowledge on their side.

“My personal take on all this is that this should provide plenty of food of thought about the state of copyright laws in the US. A site like Reddit risks losing legal safe harbor protections if they don’t immediately act on such notices,” qwertyoruiopz says.

“Not sharing the notices by default is however very bad policy on Reddit’s end; I would even call this a vulnerability. It allows for nefarious parties to create false-flag takedowns that spark can infighting and has chilling effects (albeit temporary) on non-infringing content.”

There can be little doubt that Reddit takes its DMCA obligations very seriously, so it could be argued that taking down the posts in response to a complaint was the safest legal option. However, if a cursory review of the notices by those targeted revealed clear fraud within minutes, there is a very good case for those notices being shared quickly to ensure that the fraudulent notices don’t have the desired effect.

While Reddit has shown no signs of sharing DMCA notices with the Lumen Database recently, quickly sharing them with those who have allegedly infringed would be a good first step.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and more. We also have VPN reviews, discounts, offers and coupons.

Source link

To most users of mobile computing devices such as phones and tablets, they exist to be used however the consumer sees fit. However, the majority are restricted to prevent the adventurous from doing whatever they like with their own hardware.

To bypass these restrictions, users can utilize a so-called jailbreak tool. These unlock the digital handcuffs deployed on a device and grant additional freedoms that aren’t available as standard. As such, they are popular with modders who enjoy customizing their hardware with new features that otherwise wouldn’t exist.

Since it is viewed as one of the most restrictive manufacturers, Apple hardware and software face almost continual ‘attacks’ from people wanting to jailbreak its devices. There are many communities online dedicated to this scene, including Reddit’s 462,000-member /r/jailbreak forum.

Yesterday, however, chaos reigned after Reddit’s legal team received multiple DMCA notices against a number of threads detailing a pair of prominent jailbreak tools – Checkra1n and UNc0ver.

“Reddit Legal have removed 5 posts (all release posts) for checkra1n and unc0ver. We don’t know what exactly was the copyright about. Admins never told us, we just saw their actions in our mod log,” a moderator explained.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, many linked the issues facing /r/jailbreak to an earlier drama on Twitter when an iOS hacker called S1guza published an Apple decryption key that led to his tweet being taken down following a DMCA notice. It took a few hours but the tweet was ultimately reinstated last evening. No specific reasons were given for taking it down, and none were provided for putting it back up.

iPhone11,8 17C5053a sepi 9f974f1788e615700fec73006cc2e6b533b0c6c2b8cf653bdbd347bc1897bdd66b11815f036e94c951250c4dda916c00

— Siguza (@s1guza) December 8, 2019

https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

The Twitter takedown was sent by Kilpatrick Townsend & Stockton LLP, a company that has acted on Apple’s behalf in the past. The notice itself, published on the Lumen Database thanks to Twitter, also provides no useful details as to why the tweet was targeted.

Since Apple was behind the takedown on Twitter and the most obvious culprit in respect of the DMCA takedowns on Reddit, many fingers were pointed towards the Cupertino-based company. However, despite the best efforts of the moderators on /r/jailbreak, Reddit’s admins would not provide the necessary information to identify who filed the DMCA notices or on what grounds.

With uncertainty apparently the order of the day, moderators of the discussion forum took the drastic decision to put their platform into lockdown.

“Locking down the subreddit to prevent new threads is one of the ‘standard’ responses moderators take to show the admins that the mod team isn’t playing, and that they are serious and ready to remedy the issue,” a post from the mods reads.

“Too many DMCA notices eventually end up with a warn and a ban (or just a ban) from the admins to whatever subreddit these notices are being sent to.”

While the DMCA notices in themselves are clearly the biggest issue here, unlike Twitter and Google, for example, Reddit does not routinely share DMCA notices it receives with an external database such as Lumen. If it did, the additional transparency would perhaps help to shine some light on the topic and prevent heavy self-imposed actions, such as the voluntary lockdown of the jailbreak sub.

Moderators report that Reddit’s admins were initially unresponsive to requests for information and that a database that tracks DMCA notices sent to Reddit didn’t provide any helpful details on the sender of the notices.

Last evening, however, one of the affected jailbreak developers ‘qwertyoruiopz’
announced on Twitter that things were some way to being resolved on Reddit and the sub had been taken out of ‘lockdown mode‘.

Soon after, a welcome response from Reddit’s admins was published, effectively signaling the all-clear.

While the message was well-received, /r/jailbreak shouldn’t have been obliged to take such serious action to preserve its existence. The jailbreaking of iOS devices is considered legal in the US and the DMCA notices filed against Reddit clearly caught everyone by surprise.

It remains unknown whether they were indeed sent by Apple so the possibility remains that they were sent by some kind of imposter, trying to unsettle the community. Nevertheless, it is good news that all complaints have been lifted due to the claims being invalid, as per Reddit’s admins.

Without transparency from Reddit, however, the true nature of what happened is likely to remain a mystery. That being said, the moderators of /r/jailbreak deserve a big pat on the back for taking decisive action, quickly. Things could have really spiraled out of control but by showing good intent early on, things were brought back into line relatively quickly.

Now, let’s see those notices to determine who sent them, and why.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and more. We also have VPN reviews, discounts, offers and coupons.

Source link

That Google knows every detail of what its users search for is no secret – after all, the company itself processes all of the requests.

Armed with this data, Google publishes its annual ‘Year in Search‘ report, the latest of which appeared yesterday. From our perspective, there were very few – if any – piracy-related aspects to report, something which should be encouraging to rightsholders.

However, after the BBC published its take on Google’s UK search statistics, noting that several questions in the “How to” category were directed at how to watch sports events and TV shows, the Federation Against Copyright Theft took to Twitter to issue a warning.

“Whether it’s a re-stream on social media, a piracy site, or using a TV-connected device, avoiding official providers to access content is illegal,” FACT wrote, linking to the BBC article.

Of course, it is FACT’s job to draw attention to such things but we wondered, given that Google is quite specific about the top titles searched for in 2019, whether Google’s search results were worthy of particular panic. Or, indeed, whether “where to watch” searches should always be considered dangerous and piracy related. But first, some background.

Over the past several years, copyright holders and anti-piracy groups have regularly complained that Google and other search engines help people find content online in a way that prioritizes pirated over legitimate content.

That isn’t the company’s intention, of course, but there have been numerous instances of pirate sites appearing higher in searches than those offering licensed content. In the UK, Google and various industry players agreed to tackle this and similar issues with the signing of a voluntary anti-piracy agreement back in 2017.

So, when placed alongside these top “how to” searches, has it worked?

#1: How to watch Champions League Final

This search clearly related to the match between Tottenham Hotspur and Liverpool from which the latter emerged victorious, two goals to nil. However, the related Google search is particularly interesting since all of the top results showed users how to watch the match for free.

While that might sound like a cause for concern, these results linked exclusively to completely legal streams offered via established broadcasters. Clearly, the incentive to pirate had been mostly eliminated by giving consumers what they want.

#2: How to watch Game of Thrones

As one of the most popular shows in living memory, it’s no surprise that Game of Thrones appears in Google’s top search lists for the UK. In past years, this kind of search would’ve likely displayed ‘pirate’ results prominently but that is no longer the case. In our tests we had to go through several pages of Google results with links to either buy the show or articles detailing how to watch the show legally first. Pirate results were not prominent.

#5: How to watch KSI vs. Logan

Given the controversy surrounding this pair of YouTube celebrities, searches on how to watch the fight were bound to score highly. However, a search for the fight yet again yielded pages and pages of legitimate sources or articles detailing how to access the bout legally.

#10: How to watch Chernobyl

The results displayed following a “where to watch Chernobyl” search are very similar to those that are returned following a similar Game of Thrones query. One has to skip through pages and pages of legitimate results to find any pirate sources and, on the way, the emphasis to go legal is clear.

The legal choices, as they appear in Google’s results, are as follows: YouTube, Google Play, Amazon, NowTV, HBO, Sky, Hulu, iTunes, Showmax, DirectTV, HBONordic, HBOGo, and Verizon. Admittedly, not all of those are available to UK users, but that’s four pages deep into the results and not one pirate link in sight.

Conclusion

While this is a very limited sample, there does appear to have been a notable change in the way that Google displays its results in the UK when faced with a basic query of “where to watch X”. There is now a pretty clear bias towards legitimate sources in results presented in the first few pages.

Of course, those that wish to refine their searches to actively seek out pirated content will have more immediate success, that’s the way searches work. However, it’s now more difficult to argue that users will be diverted to pirated sources when they’re seeking out legal options, at least for the samples listed above.

It’s worth noting, however, that pirate users’ viewing habits are probably shifting. There is now less reliance on search engines and more emphasis on apps and tools that are designed to produce infringing results by default, which is the exact opposite of what Google offers in respect of the above.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and more. We also have VPN reviews, discounts, offers and coupons.

Source link

Pirate IPTV providers have become a pretty big deal in recent years.

Offering cut-price access to otherwise subscription TV channels, PPVs, and video-on-demand archives, customers have flocked to them in their millions.

One popular provider operating in the space is Helix Hosting but if a message that appeared on the service’s homepage is anything to go by, the Christmas period may become memorable for all the wrong reasons.

The statement, published hours ago on the official Helix Hosting homepage, claimed that Helix had been hacked and was being held to ransom. The implication of the message was typical: Helix should pay up to appease the attackers or face potential damage to their business.

“Helix Hosting Has Been Hacked – They have had the option to pay a small amount to protect its customers or have all customer details leaked online putting you all at risk,” the message read.

“They have chosen to not accept this offer and would prefer your details to be leaked online.”

The overall threat was to release the personal details of all customers and resellers of Helix but to “make it fair”, the proposed leak would also expose “at the least” one owner and/or staff member of the service along with their name, address, phone numbers, and IP addresses.

While someone had clearly placed the message on the front page of the site, other areas of the Helix site remained functional for a while. At the time the ‘hacked’ notice appeared, Helix’s app and repo indexes were functioning normally and its web player login page was also accessible.

However, as the minutes passed by, other aspects of the web portal were apparently disabled and the ransom message disappeared too. This morning, however, the ‘hacked’ message is back for all to see.

Only time will tell how this episode will end and whether the threats to go nuclear on Helix over its failure to “pay a small amount” will be carried out. It’s also unclear what information Helix holds and what use that information would be to third-parties, even if it was leaked online.

The warning currently on display still mentions a 23:00 deadline to pay the ransom but there is no indication of which day, country, or time zone that refers to. So, depending on the timing, the leak could’ve happened already, could be about to happen, or may not even happen at all.

That said, giving in to blackmail is a big decision to make, especially when copies of data are easily made leaving attackers in a position to have a second bite at the cherry on a whim.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and more. We also have VPN reviews, discounts, offers and coupons.

Source link

The Pirate Bay is well known for its huge database of magnet links which allow users to download most types of content imaginable.

Over the past few days, however, the platform has been adding a brand new feature that will please those who prefer to access movies and TV shows instantly, rather than waiting for them to download.

As the image below shows, in addition to the familiar magnet and trusted uploader icons displayed alongside video and TV show releases, the site also features a small orange ‘B’ graphic.

In some cases (but currently not all), pressing these buttons when they appear next to a video release diverts users to a new platform called BayStream. Here, the chosen content can be streamed directly in the browser using a YouTube-style player interface.

Loading times appear swift when the content is actually available and as the screenshot below shows, the material appears to be sourced, at least in some cases, from torrent releases.

The new feature appears to be in its early stages of development and in tests doesn’t always perform as planned. In particular, accessing the ‘B’ links using various Pirate Bay ‘proxy’ sites can cause them to break with various errors. Nevertheless, when things go to plan (usually when selecting more popular content) the system appears effective.

When one accesses the BayStream homepage directly, without using links found on TPB, what appears is a fairly plain file-hosting upload interface. It claims that files up to 20GB can be uploaded and stored on the platform and at least for now, there’s no mention of premium accounts or affiliate programs.

The big question, perhaps, is whether this is a Pirate Bay-operated platform or one run by outsiders. The familiar ‘Kopimi‘ logo at the bottom suggests that it could be someone who supports the ‘pirate’ movement but anyone can use the image freely, so that’s not the best pointer.

Public sources reveal that the site does have other links to Sweden and in some cases entities linked, however loosely, to the Kopimist movement. But again, those don’t provide solid pointers to the nature or identities of the operators of the site.

The Pirate Bay previously launched its own file-hosting platform, BayFiles, way back in 2011. That disappeared after the 2014 raid on a Stockholm datacenter but was later relaunched under new ownership.

The addition of BayStream links to The Pirate Bay isn’t the first time that the world’s most famous torrent site has dipped its toes into streaming waters. In 2016, the site experimented with ‘Stream It!” links next to all video torrents, playable via a browser plug-in called Torrents-Time.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and more. We also have VPN reviews, discounts, offers and coupons.

Source link