Law enforcement agencies of Italy (Guardia di Finanza) have focused their efforts on 13 specific individuals through various regions in Italy and Germany. As part of this operation, a substantial sum totaling €620,000 in cash and cryptocurrency has been apprehended.
The Investigation
The recent crackdown on pirate IPTV services has yielded a momentous breakthrough for law enforcement agencies. A meticulous scrutiny was undertaken to identify and apprehend those involved in the illicit dissemination of copyrighted content through IPTV platforms. The authorities zeroed in on 13 suspects who were considered pivotal figures within this pirate network. The network sold pirated IPTV subscriptions for 10 euros a month or 90 for a whole year.
The investigation unfolded over an extended period, with close collaboration between law enforcement agencies to gather evidence and construct a robust case against the suspects. The authorities employed a myriad of sophisticated techniques, including digital forensics, surveillance, and international cooperation, to ensure a successful outcome.
Seizure of Funds
As a result of the operation, the police managed to seize a substantial sum of funds linked to the pirate IPTV network. The confiscated assets comprised a staggering €620,000 in cash and cryptocurrency, thereby shedding light on the lucrative nature of this illegal enterprise. The appropriation of these funds not only disrupts the financial infrastructure sustaining the pirate IPTV network but also serves as a deterrent to others involved in similar illicit activities.
Legal Ramifications
The crackdown on pirate IPTV services sends an unequivocal message regarding the gravity of intellectual property rights infringement. Those implicated in the unauthorized dissemination of copyrighted content face severe legal consequences, including fines and potential imprisonment. The successful outcome of this investigation serves as a stern warning to others who may be tempted to engage in comparable unlawful endeavors.
The investigation and subsequent dismantling of the pirate IPTV network bear substantial implications for the IPTV industry as a whole. Legitimate IPTV providers who adhere to copyright laws and licensing agreements will benefit from a more equitable playing field. This crackdown fosters an environment that promotes fair competition and safeguards the rights of content creators and copyright holders.
Conclusion
To conclude, the police investigation into pirate IPTV services and the focused targeting of 13 suspects have dealt a significant blow to the unlawful dissemination of copyrighted content. The seizure of €620,000 in cash and cryptocurrency sends a persistent message that such activities will not be tolerated. This successful operation acts as a deterrent to others and underscores the paramount importance of safeguarding intellectual property rights in the digital era.
Time for the next milestone release for Kodi 21 “Omega”. This is our second Alpha release for this cycle.
This is a major release, so, as you’d expect, it comes with many new features. However, with a core change to FFmpeg 6.0, there is a very good chance that some regressions may occur. As such, please be aware that installing this will most likely break things, and we’d really like your help at that point to identify the problems and get them fixed. Please raise Github issues with full debug logs to help us resolve any issues you wonderful testers come across.
Over the last couple of months we’ve merged 120 pull requests – fixing issues, adding features, and improving Kodi.
So… what’s actually changed?
Build/Dependencies
Apple platforms are now all built using newer version of Xcode (14.2) and the relevant SDKs. Thanks to a combination of a new M1 Mac mini hardware donation from long time supporter of the project, MacMiniVault.com, and also the Kodi foundation purchasing a second M1 Mac mini, we have been able to decommission our ageing Intel Mac mini’s that have been in use for a long time.
Building on Windows now uses the system curl executable instead of our formerly bundled (ancient) wget executable.
Improvements to dependency building have been made by @lrusak to make the downloading/hash checking more robust.
Estuary
Improvements to the seek window timeouts have been made to more correctly disappear after appropriate timeouts.
Fix visibility of ‘next recording’ label in PVRTimers was made by @ksooo.
FFmpeg
One of our newer team members, @neo1973 , has made some cleanups and fixed some crashes in our ffmpeg side data usage, as well as other improvements with our ffmpeg API usage.
General
Improvements made to handling of movement keys (e.g. PageUp, Down, Home, End) in certain lists such as Settings.
@rmrector has been endeavouring to improve image cache handling for GUI items. We look forward to the further work he has in the pipeline to improve the cache handling.
Extraart configurations in advancedsettings.xml for Kodi 18 will no longer be migrated to the new GUI settings when upgrading. If you had meaningful configuration there, check that the artwork settings in the GUI match your preferences.
@CrystalP extended the navigation history to track the line number of the selected item so that it can be restored when the item disappears from the list, instead of resetting the selection to the top of the list (usually the ..) after the end of playback or changing the watched status of an item.
The generation of thumbnails was fixed for pictures in portrait orientation. The existing thumbnails in KODI_HOME/userdata/Thumbnails/* must be deleted in order to have new correct ones recreated.
@joseluismarti has continued with more cleanups and improvements to the Android codebase. Each improvement makes things easier to manage, and is greatly appreciated.
@fritsch has been able to make further improvements to AudioTrack to handle hardware that has sinks that get “stuck”. Its always a fine line making changes in the Android world, as the multitude of hardware vendors have widely varying implementation qualities of the standard Android APIs.
Linux:
@lrusak has added the ability for users to select the audio backend with a command line switch when starting Kodi. This also allows seeing with which enabled audio backends Kodi was built. For more information check out the following PR.
macOS:
The minimum OS required for Kodi on macOS is now Mojave (10.14). This was done to allow the project to continue using more modern C++ 17 features. macOS Mojave was released on 24th September 2018 and hardware supported can be seen at Apple.com.
@enen92 has continued to further improve what is known as “Native windowing” for our macOS codebase that will eventually lead to a formal Apple Silicon version. Improvements to window resizing, menu’s, window blanking, improved multiple monitor handling and more.
For developers, Kodi can also now more easily be run from Xcode without having to alter schemes.
@ksooo has now correctly added Speechrecognition entitlements for Apple platforms (including iOS/tvOS) which fixes a crash when microphone usage was triggered.
Support for HiDPI resolutions, such as those marketed as Retina displays, has been introduced in the native windowing version. This enhancement allows Kodi’s graphical user interface (GUI) to showcase higher pixel densities, resulting in a sleek and polished appearance on modern Macs.
webOS
@sundermann and @craigcarnell have made further improvements to the new webOS platform. Screensaver support has been added, along with audio sink improvements and updates to codec hardware support.
Windows:
Minimum Windows supported version has been raised to Windows 8.1.
@CrystalP and @thexai have made a number of improvements to windows HDR/SDR/HLG display including tonemapping and hardware DXVA support for a number of combinations of those media types.
@thexai implemented support for “Video Super Resolution” for Nvidia (RTX ) and Intel (ARC) compatible hardware. Please note, we obviously cant test all combinations of hardware, so don’t expect this to work for every combination under the sun. Give it a try and report any issues WITH debug logs.
Bump to libdav1d to version 1.20 should improve AV1 playback support for windows platforms.
Python
A fix for a regression was made by @lrusak that puts addon paths at the front of the system paths. This fixes addons using system modules instead of potentially customised Kodi modules of the same name. This mostly affects Linux based systems.
If you love to live on the bleeding edge of new, you can get Alpha 2 from here. Select your platform of choice, and look in the “Prerelease” section. Again, though, please: expect some breakage, don’t use this as your daily installation unless you know how to get things working again, and please share your experiences back with us so we can really get going on those bugs.
As usual – well, it is open source – you can see what’s changed between v21 and v20 here.
For a more targeted look at the changes made since v21 Alpha 1, you can see those changes here.
Streaming piracy services have gained significant popularity in recent years, with millions of people turning to them for their entertainment needs. In this article, we will explore the reasons why individuals choose to use these services instead of opting for legal streaming platforms. From convenience and accessibility to cost and affordability, several factors contribute to the appeal of streaming piracy services.
Introduction
In today’s digital age, streaming piracy services have become a widespread phenomenon. These services provide users with access to a vast library of movies, TV shows, music, and other copyrighted content without the need for a subscription or payment. While piracy is illegal and unethical, it continues to attract a large number of individuals due to various reasons.
Convenience and Accessibility
One of the primary reasons why people turn to streaming piracy services is the convenience and accessibility they offer. With just a few clicks, users can access a wide range of content from the comfort of their homes. Unlike legal streaming platforms that require subscriptions and often have complex user interfaces, piracy services provide a straightforward and user-friendly experience.
Moreover, streaming piracy services offer content that may not be readily available on legal platforms. This includes the latest movies, TV shows, live events, sports, and music albums that may be exclusive to certain platforms or not yet released in specific regions. Users who want instant access to such content find piracy services appealing.
Cost and Affordability
The high cost of legal streaming services is another significant factor that drives people toward piracy. Many popular streaming platforms require monthly or yearly subscriptions, and the cumulative costs can be a burden for individuals with limited financial resources. Piracy services, on the other hand, offer content for free, eliminating the need for multiple, expensive subscriptions. As of May 2023 in the USA there are more than 20 streaming services: Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Hulu, Disney+, DirecTV, HBO Max, Apple TV+, Dazn, Peacock, Paramount+, YouTube TV, Sling TV, and FuboTV just to mention a few.
Additionally, some users simply cannot afford to pay for legal streaming services, especially in developing countries where disposable income is limited. Piracy services provide them with an opportunity to enjoy their favorite movies and TV shows without financial strain.
Content Exclusivity
Exclusive content available only on certain streaming platforms is another reason why people turn to piracy services. Major streaming services compete for exclusive rights to popular TV shows and movies, making it challenging for users to access all their desired content in one place. This exclusivity drives users to piracy services, where they can find a vast collection of content from various sources.
The desire to have a single platform that offers all the desired content is a significant factor that motivates individuals to opt for piracy. They seek a comprehensive library of entertainment options without the need to juggle multiple subscriptions and platforms.
Geographical Restrictions
Geographical restrictions imposed by legal streaming services are another frustration for users, leading them to turn to piracy services. Many streaming platforms have limitations on the availability of their content in certain regions. This can be due to licensing agreements or other legal constraints.
Users who are unable to access their favorite movies or TV shows due to geographical restrictions feel left out and disadvantaged. In such cases, piracy services provide a way to bypass these restrictions and access the desired content without any limitations.
Delayed Releases
Another reason why people resort to streaming piracy services is the time gap between international releases. Movies and TV shows are often released in different countries at different times, causing delays for viewers who are eager to watch them. This delay can be frustrating, especially in today’s era of instant gratification.
Piracy services offer a solution by making content available as soon as it is released in any part of the world. This allows users to stay up to date with the latest releases without having to wait for official distribution in their region.
User Experience
User experience plays a crucial role in the choice between legal streaming platforms and piracy services. While legal platforms invest in providing a seamless streaming experience, some users may encounter technical issues such as buffering, playback errors, or poor video quality. These problems can hinder the enjoyment of content and lead users to seek alternative options.
Piracy services, on the other hand, often prioritize a smooth and uninterrupted streaming experience. They optimize their platforms for efficient streaming, ensuring that users can watch their favorite content without any interruptions or technical glitches. This superior user experience can be a significant factor in attracting users to piracy services.
Lack of Legal Alternatives
In certain countries or regions, there may be a lack of legal streaming services altogether. While global streaming giants have expanded their reach to many countries, some nations still do not have access to these platforms. Users in such areas are left with limited options to legally stream content, pushing them towards piracy services as an alternative.
Furthermore, even in countries where legal streaming services are available, niche content or lesser-known movies and TV shows may not be readily accessible. Piracy services often provide a broader range of content, including niche genres and international releases that may not be available on legal platforms. This attracts users who have specific tastes or preferences and cannot find their desired content through legal means.
Social Influence
The influence of friends, family, and online communities also plays a significant role in the popularity of streaming piracy services. Recommendations and word-of-mouth can sway individuals to try out piracy services based on the positive experiences and convenience shared by others. The acceptance and normalization of piracy in certain circles further contribute to its popularity.
When users see their peers accessing and discussing pirated content without facing any immediate consequences, they may be more inclined to follow suit. The social influence and collective acceptance of piracy services create a sense of community and validation, making it a tempting option for many.
Privacy and Anonymity
Privacy concerns and the desire for anonymity are additional factors that drive people towards piracy services. Legal streaming platforms often require users to create accounts and provide personal information, which some individuals may find intrusive or risky. They may be concerned about their data being collected or their online activities being monitored.
Piracy services, on the other hand, allow users to access content without the need for personal information or account creation. This anonymity provides a sense of security and peace of mind for individuals who prioritize their privacy online. They can enjoy their favorite content without worrying about their personal data being compromised or shared with third parties.
Conclusion
While streaming piracy services are illegal and unethical, there are several reasons why people turn to them. The convenience, accessibility, and affordability they offer, coupled with the superior user experience and the availability of exclusive and unrestricted content, make them appealing to many individuals. Factors such as geographical restrictions, delayed releases, and the lack of legal alternatives also contribute to the prevalence of streaming piracy services.
It is important to note that engaging in piracy is illegal and has negative consequences for content creators, artists, and the entertainment industry as a whole. Piracy deprives them of rightful revenue and undermines their ability to produce high-quality content. It is crucial to support legal streaming platforms and respect copyright laws to ensure the sustainability and growth of the entertainment industry.
However, to effectively combat piracy, it is necessary to address the underlying reasons that drive people to piracy services. By focusing on improving the accessibility, affordability, and user experience of legal streaming platforms, content creators and distributors can reduce the appeal of piracy services and encourage users to choose legal alternatives.
Ultimately, the fight against piracy requires a combination of legal enforcement, industry collaboration, and consumer education. By raising awareness about the negative impact of piracy and providing economic legal alternatives, we can work towards a future where creators are fairly compensated for their work and consumers can enjoy a wide range of content through legitimate means.
https://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/1511517833_love-piracy.jpg2451200Dimitrologyhttps://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/WEBSITE-LOGO-2020-SMALL.pngDimitrology2023-05-11 15:56:332023-05-11 15:56:35Why People Turn to Streaming Piracy Services
Systems have been rebuilt from scratch with new images, software and patches.
All users will need to reset their passwords before they can log in.
Forum registration is now open for new users.
Known issues
Fixed: We identified a login bug in the forum software which we’ve fixed and are reporting to the authors. The resolution may require some users to reset their passwords again.
Fixed: There was an initial problem with registration of new accounts on the forum after we re-enabled registrations. This has now been resolved.
Open: MyAlerts/Pings were not available because there’s no supported plugin to provide this functionality. We believe that we’ve found a fix, though, so will let you know soon.
Open: Some users are having issues with unexpected logouts. Monitoring to understand.
No further action: We do not have, nor do we plan on implementing, Tapatalk integration.
https://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/Latest-Status-on-Forum-et-al.webp.webp12801920Dimitrologyhttps://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/WEBSITE-LOGO-2020-SMALL.pngDimitrology2023-05-01 18:33:462023-05-01 18:33:46Latest Status on Forum et al.
As you may have seen on other posts, we’re broadly back on line now, with the forum, Wiki and paste sites all operational. It’s been a huge effort by several key team members – I won’t name names, but you know who you are – and we’re all immensely grateful for their work.
So, without putting on a hair shirt…in the interests of transparency and minimising the chances of anything like this happening again, we’ve really had to dig into this to see what we can learn.
First of all – what happened?
This is probably the most important question, and actually one of the hardest to definitively answer.
We’ve been open about the attack vector being an old administrative account. What we can’t wholly conclude is how this was used to gain access.
Access logs from the period in question are not available any more, so we can’t see who accessed what, how, or when.
A ‘brute force’ attack on an account is unlikely given that MyBB locks accounts quickly if there are too many login attempts.
The version of MyBB we were using didn’t have any publicised security issues that would permit an unauthorised admin login.
We’ve had limited background from the owner of the account, but we’ve no reason to believe they were complicit in any way.
It’s most likely that login data from another breach was used – depending on how often this person changed their password (and, given they were inactive, it’s likely to be some time ago), this may well have been years ago.
It’s possible that their browser was compromised, but we’re not aware of any other credentials being stolen.
Similarly, it’s possible that a current session was hijacked, but these should have long-since timed out and disconnected, so there shouldn’t have been an active session to open up.
And, finally, some XSS vulnerability in the forum might have been used (these did exist) to hijack the session of an administrator.
All difficult to prove, and it’s very much bolting stable doors after the horse has bolted and long since run away. We will continue to look, though.
So, next up – what have we done?
Given that we can’t categorically say what the cause was, all we can do is take as many actions as possible to eliminate as many likely vectors as possible – which is good practice, anyway. Actions we’ve taken, then, include:
The hosting server(s) have all been rebuilt from scratch, with latest OS and application patches and further hardening wherever we thought it appropriate.
Server software (MyBB for the forum) has been reinstalled from scratch – again, latest software versions, latest plugin versions.
Where we haven’t simply started again, we’ve checked configuration files to ensure there are no obvious unauthorised changes or vulnerabilities.
Unmaintained or deprecated forum plugins have been removed (which may impact functionality in some instances, but we’ll have to live with this).
Password hashing has been updated, so we’re using a more modern algorithm instead of the older MD5 mechanism.
We’ve followed and implemented MyBB’s recommendations and best practices.
In addition, we initially disabled new user registration for a few days to keep things calm and testable. For existing users, we’ve reset all passwords and made sure every active session is logged out – you’ll need to use the “lost password” function to your registered email address to regain access.
We’ve also gone through a host of non-forum actions, including:
We’ve reported the security breach to the overseeing information authorities and to the national police in whose jurisdiction the “theft” occurred.
We’ve audited admin rights and made sure we’ve no other inactive-but-privileged accounts.
We’ve taken the opportunity to reduce the number of privileged accounts wherever we can.
We’ve improved our “ageing out” process for inactive members. This is an ongoing challenge given the revolving door nature of open source contributors, but we need to manage this better.
We’ve implemented MFA on all admin-level accounts where practical.
We’ve shared all affected email addresses with haveibeenpwned.com (interestingly, the majority of addresses were already in their database from previous breaches on other sites – a lesson to all of us to change our passwords regularly).
We think we’re most of the way there, but there will inevitably be further tweaks, adjustments, and general bug-fixes as we get things back to an acceptable standard on the new infrastructure. Please, expect further downtime and hiccoughs in the coming days as we iron out any remaining problems – we’ll open and maintain a pinned post of known issues, so please check this and let us know if you see anything.
https://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/pexels-lecture-theatre.webp.webp12801920Dimitrologyhttps://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/WEBSITE-LOGO-2020-SMALL.pngDimitrology2023-04-30 22:31:392023-04-30 22:31:39Forum Data Breach – Lessons Learned, Actions Taken
This release is so fresh that we don’t yet even have an image… oops!
It’s been a hectic last couple of months in the world of Kodi, but the wheels keep on turning. Without any further ado, we are happy to announce the first Alpha release for Kodi 21.x “Omega”.
This is a major release, so, as you’d expect, it comes with many new features. However, with a core change to FFmpeg 6.0, there is a very good chance that some regressions may occur. As such, please be aware that installing this will most likely break things, and we’d really like your help at that point to identify the problems and get them fixed. Please raise Github issues with full debug logs to help us resolve any regressions you wonderful testers come across.
So, all that aside… what’s actually changed?
Build/Dependencies
Build support for GCC13 has been fixed by some users. This allows Kodi to be built on newer toolchains that refactored some header inclusions.
Some general version bumps have been made for an assortment of dependencies for Android/Apple/CI platforms. Thanks @craigcarnell, @fuzzard.
@lrusak has endeavoured to improve the way some of the Android/Apple/CI dependency systems work and handle different states.
@Rechi has fixed a few cmake deprecations and pkgconfig detection issues.
Documentation
Some new contributors noted some of our contributing guideline documentation was lacking. A few people have helped contribute to hopefully make them more helpful/informative.
@fixthething has updated some of the Ubuntu build documentation to reflect some modern package names used in more recent Ubuntu versions.
FFmpeg
Use upstream FFmpeg. This is a big achievement and allows easier FFmpeg updates in the future.
Update to version 6.0. This puts us inline with the latest FFmpeg release. Compatibility with 5.1.x has been retained for Linux distro support.
Filesystem
With the introduction of NFSv4 support, a number of issues were quickly discovered by users. @thexai has fixed a many of these, such as timeouts/chunk size defaults for NFSv4.
General
@repojonray has provided a number of general fixes/improvements to various areas to address e.g. memory leaks and performance improvements.
Modernisation of several areas of Kodi have been undertaken by a number of developers. A lot of this work will go unseen by users, however it’s helping to make Kodi’s huge amount of code more maintainable for the future. @lrusak, @neo1973 , @repojohnray, @enen92, @Rechi .
Add setting to disable screensaver while playing audio.
@DeltaMikeCharlie has contributed some improvements to the UX regarding date format options.
Games
Improvements are continually being made to the Retroplayer ecoystem by several devs/users. Thanks to @KOPRajs, @garbear .
JSON-RPC
genre has been added to the Video.Fields.Episodes field.
Music
Add support for reading (and writing) M3U8 playlist files. This provides support for non-ASCII characters in the playlist files (UTF-8 character support).
Platform Specifics
Android:
Improved Dolby Vision detection and compatibility: implemented support of DV in MKV containers, better handling of different DV profiles with fallback to HDR10 when is possible and display is not DV capable. For some devices, we can now also support hardware tone mapping DV profiles 4, 5 to SDR. Supported profiles vary on different Android devices: for example, the 2019 Shield supports profiles 4, 5, 7, 8 in DV and fallback to HDR10 (profiles 7, 8) but not HW tone mapping to SDR. Similarly, the Fire TV Stick doesn’t supports profile 7 although it does support HW tone mapping of profile 5 to SDR (profiles 4, 5, 8 are supported with DV display).
Implemented minimise shutdown function in Power Saving settings.
Multiple small internal improvements and use of newer Android APIs to replace deprecated ones.
@joseluismarti is slowly improving/updating a number of Android-specific features that enable the project to stay up to date with Google Play Store submission requirements.
iOS/TVOS:
Support for Channel Up/Down keys when using the iPhone Apple TV Remote app connected to an Apple TV has been added.
Linux:
Pipewire:
Fix implementation to work properly with AudioEngine.
Add support for passthrough formats. This includes HD audio formats like DTS-HD and TrueHD.
GBM:
Add support for libdisplay-info to help parse EDID information and determine display capabilities.
macOS:
@enen92 has been slowly but surely improving lots of the macOS native windowing implementation (mouse, resizing, menu bar, shortcut key handling, etc.) that was introduced in Nexus. The official macOS builds do not use this functionality at this point, but with enen92’s work, we are inching closer to using it as our default for v21.
macOS CD/DVD drive handling has been fixed. This also allows M1-based machines to read disks correctly.
Windows:
Minimum Windows supported version has been raised to Windows 8.1.
If they’re available, we will now use displays’ friendly names in settings (e.g. "LG TV #1").
Added a setting to use the Windows HDR/SDR brightness balance setting for GUI and subtitles when the display is in HDR PQ mode, and also improved the curve of internal method GUI SDR max peak luminance.
Improved read performance over SMB in some special cases, e.g. playing full Blu-ray folders.
Improved graphics compatibility and fallback to enable running in some limited VM hardware (Hyper-V) even without video decoding support.
Various improvements in DXVA render method to avoid incompatibilities in old hardware or Windows 8, especially in the case of sources with BT.2020 colour space.
Implemented support for DXVA2 AV1 hardware video decoding 8-bit and 10-bit.
Specific SDK requirements for building UWP packages have been removed to allow the use of newer SDKs from Visual Studio.
Picture
Fix security issues discovered regarding image EXIF metadata. Further fixes were also backported from the upstream EXIF data parsing library that is in use in Kodi.
PVR
Add possibility to sort channel groups to your liking.
Settings
Some fixes to regressions in Settings visibility have been made.
Subtitles:
The display of MKV files containing text subtitle entries without the duration set on the Matroska block were fixed, retaining Kodi v19 behaviour. This includes the teletext autoconversion to srt done in PVR backends (e.g. tvheadend).
Fixed setting of subtitle offset when auto-close video OSD is set.
@CastagnaIT has continued to support/fix issues with the new subtitle system as they are reported.
UPnP:
Improved compatibility with official smart TV applications when displaying and browsing served UPnP Kodi libraries.
Fix artwork when playing/refreshing UPnP items.
As this blog is, let’s say, slightly delayed from when the actual Alpha 1 downloads were available, there are already a number of fixes that have been made to issues found in this release. If you come across any issues, it may be worthwhile testing a newer nightly of your desired platform, otherwise, please do log any issues so we can continue improving for Omega v21.
If you love to live on the bleeding edge of new, you can get Alpha 1 from here. Select your platform of choice, and look in the “Prerelease” section. Again, though, please: expect some breakage, don’t use this as your daily installation unless you know how to get things working again, and please share your experiences back with us so we can really get going on those bugs.
As usual – well, it is open source – you can see what’s changed between v21 and v20 here. Even though its only been 3 months, it’s a long list…
In the last 24 hours we became aware of a dump of the Kodi user forum (MyBB) software being advertised for sale on internet forums. This post confirms that a breach has taken place.
MyBB admin logs show the account of a trusted but currently inactive member of the forum admin team was used to access the web-based MyBB admin console twice: on 16 February and again on 21 February. The account was used to create database backups which were then downloaded and deleted. It also downloaded existing nightly full-backups of the database. The account owner has confirmed they did not access the admin console to perform these actions.
The admin team have disabled the account used in the breach and have conducted an initial review of team infrastructure the team member had access to.
The nightly full backups that were downloaded expose all public forum posts, all team forum posts, all messages sent through the user-to-user messaging system, and user data including forum username, email address used for notifications, and an encrypted (hashed and salted) password generated by the MyBB (v1.8.27) software. At the current time, we have found no evidence of unauthorised access to the underlying server that hosts the MyBB software.
Although MyBB stores passwords in an encrypted format we must assume all passwords are compromised. This requires actions from the team, and forum users:
The admin team are investigating how best to perform a global password reset and how best to assure the integrity of the server host and associated software. The forum server has been taken offline while this activity completes. This will also impact the Kodi pastebin and wiki sites. There is currently no time estimate for the forum server being online again; our focus is being thorough, not being quick.
Users must assume their Kodi forum credentials and any private data shared with other users through the user-to-user messaging system is compromised. If you have used the same username and password on any other site, you should follow the password reset/change procedure for that site. Once the Kodi forum comes back online we will provide instructions on how to complete a reset of your Kodi forum password.
We will post more information as it becomes available.
https://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/hacker.jpg12801920Dimitrologyhttps://dimitrology.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/WEBSITE-LOGO-2020-SMALL.pngDimitrology2023-04-09 04:51:332023-04-09 04:51:33IMPORTANT: Kodi Forum – Data Breach
Welcome, everyone, to Kodi Devcon 2023, coming to you this year from halfway up an Italian mountain overlooking Lake Iseo. We’re full of coffee, it’s seven degrees outside, we don’t have enough power outlets, and we’re struggling to stream over dubious Internet connectivity (courtesy of Mr Musk). What could be better?
A slightly different format this year: we want to use the time together as productively as we can, so there’ll be less discussion and more collaboration than previously. So, let’s go…
Finance
We kicked off the day with an overview on our financial position: income, reserves, commitments, sponsorships. We’re doing okay, but the combination of Covid and the global cost-of-living crisis is showing. If you’re reading this, and would like to drop us a small donation or buy some merchandise, it really would be helpful.
Team Kodi Internals
A recap on all things internal to Team Kodi, for both old and new team members: how we use GitHub issues to track internal activities, how we’re organised, where to find recordings of team meetings, and so on. We also rattled through a round of introductions and retrospectives on our involvement with Kodi, just to make some of us feel very old.
Python
A quick discussion on sunsetting Python 2 – when do we drop it completely, what would the implications be (specifically for anyone still using older Kodi versions), do we keep “legacy” components available for a period, are there any blockers or reasons not to, etc.
Release Management
A discussion on streamlining releases, specifically what can we script and automate around building, tagging and publishing dozens of addons. We already have some basic tools, so we can perhaps start with these.
Hackathon
As the previous topic is potentially something we can work on while we’re together this weekend, this quickly segued in to a conversation about other potential “mini projects”: resurrecting an abandoned radio addon, website improvements, Flatpak build, skins/UI, revisiting open PRs and issues, server/infrastructure stuff, some kind of semi-automated “this week in Kodi” to summarise current commits.
Release Management II
Back to the previous conversations – what else can we do to manage the systems permissions needed during release management? How can we improve control and auditability of any changes? How can we better manage and review PRs during a release cycle so we get things merged ready for any new release? How can we help people to contribute, what tips and best practice can we better publicise? What additional documentation could we provide?
Timeshift for everyone
A presentation about work that’s been done to make the PVR “Timeshift” functionality more universally-applicable. By adding timeshift mode to inputstream.ffmpegdirect using a local circular buffer (so the user can set a maximum duration), timeshift can be used in any PVR add-on, video add-on or STRM file.
PVR for Everyone
Similar to the above, but using IPTVSimple as an integration point for anything in Kodi. Video add-ons can use aggregation add-ons to push their content to IPTVSimple, but this can be problematic as it usurps the original purpose of that add-on. PVR Recordings can now be used for VOD, this speeds up channels/EPG; multi-instance support in PVR helps with this – each add-on can have their own data – but support is still needed in the Python API to keep per-instance settings separate. We will still need some way to integrate the output into Kodi’s Video Library.
Github
We’ve used Github for a long time to host our code and provide elements of workflow (PRs, issues, and others), but it could potentially offer more. This, then, was a conversation about what else it might be used for, particularly around project management using Kanban and Projects.
Kodi v20 ‘Nexus’ Recap
General feedback is that the release went well, certainly from a process perspective. We continue to be slightly hampered by the inevitable different schedules on various platforms, especially via the curated app stores – there’s not much we can do about this, however, beyond perhaps going to 100% availability more quickly. In terms of functionality and user experience, there was very little noise – nothing significant broke, and anything missed was quickly mopped up in 20.1 – with the possible exception of some Android specifics that are broadly outside of our control (permissions and API level).
Kodi v21 ‘Omega’ Plans
Our rough plan is to start Alpha releases very shortly, with regular updates through Alpha and Beta phases before targetting a final release around the end of 2023 or early 2024.
Savestate Manager
A demonstration of new functionality that brings multiple savestate support to Retroplayer. Previously, you could only have one save per emulator, and you needed to manually copy this somewhere to avoid it being over-written by the next save. With this new feature, you can save multiple times, rename them, delete them, and generally switch around between different saves per emulator.
OpenGL/ES Combined Builds
We used to have separate builds for each windowing implementation on Linux – so, you needed to know in advance which version to build, ship or install. This was simplified into a single runtime-selectable build. The logical next step is now to do similar on the rendering systems, and effectively switch to a one-size-fits-all model. We have a current proposal that achieves this, but there’s still some more work needed to see whether this is actually desirable – and, if so, whether this is the right approach (e.g. whether there’s an existing abstraction/wrapper library we could use instead).
Vulkan
Vulkan is a cross-platform graphics API that aims to replace things like OpenGL and DirectX. This presentation was around an initial implementation of Vulkan support in Kodi – it doesn’t cover all forms of rendering, and it’s limited to Wayland only. More work is required – extension to other rendering forms, how we’d handle maturity of Vulkan on different GPU chipsets, co-existence with or replacement of OpenGL/ES and similar API libraries.
Pipewire
Pipewire is a low-level multimedia server subsystem for Linux. Basic Pipewire support – focused on audio – was built into Kodi v20, but significant new code is now in place for v21. These changes will give noticeable improvements in support for e.g. HD audio.
Logging Uniformity and Styling
Just because of the size, complexity and history of Kodi, we have very many inconsistencies in how we report and log messages. Ideally, we’d streamline all of this and introduce a much more common “language” for all messages. Unfortunately, you can’t rely on a simple search-and-replace because of the nature of some of the messages, and so we’ve got many thousands of changes to make by some other means – which isn’t something to be done by hand. So, various approaches were discussed to see if any of these couple help simplify the required changes.
Textures
Investigative work on how we render our UI and how we can improve it, particularly on low-end systems and single-board computers. At the moment, even basic skins can render multiple layers (background, fanart, and other overlays), many with transparency, and this can demand a heavy load on the GPU. We also have the potential to resize some graphics elements and textures beforehand, rather than scaling on the fly, which would also remove some of the GPU demand.
Moderator Update
Moderation is generally going well, with one notable exception – the rise of ChatGPT-generated posts, which are likely precursors to spammers. We’re in control, but always need more help, as we’ve struggled to get new lasting mods. We’ve also had a couple of issues with certain mods behaving as independent agents, so we maybe need to revisit our approach to retired/former members.
Hackathon Update
Lots of sideline projects – finishing outstanding tasks, starting some new ones, prototyping, ideas. Too much in too rough a state to report here (website updates and upgrades, new merges, prototype news roundup, addons, logging…), but you can expect many of the activities to find their way into production in due course.
Kodi and Apple Macs
We’ve seen a growth in people using Macs for development, so we took some time to explain some features and quirks of this environment, specifically how to install and run portable apps. This not only allows multiple different versions of Kodi to coexist for test/development purposes, but also the different ARM and x86 architectures that modern Macs support. We also explored some specifics about building and cross-compiling both Kodi and addons on this platform, as it’s much more Linux-like than perhaps the Windows platforms people had maybe used before.
And that’s it for Devcon 2023 – friendships made and rekindled, beer drunk, code written, plans made. Special thanks go out to Beppe at for hosting us at Ai Ciar, and to Alec and Michal from RudeChefKitchen for keeping us fed throughout.
As is always inevitable in software, we are back with a new release of Kodi 20.x “Nexus”.
An assortment of bug fixes, some backports, no real new features. Full changelog since 20.0 on Github, as usual.
Release notes
Audio
@fritsch has been working feverishly on Android-related audio issues over the past couple of months, and in combination with @thexai has introduced an algorithm to look to overcome some audio issues particularly aimed at Android devices. A summary is:
Algorithm runs for 30 seconds to learn what is going on: during this time no corrections are done, but the internal m_disconAdjustTimeMs is updated to a new value whenever when the sync error is found to increase. After 30 seconds the learning stops and the final m_disconAdjustTimeMs is set as: m_disconAdjustTimeMs * 1.15 + 5.0.
With firmware specialities for AudioTrack Write behaviour now kind of “well known” the systematic issue can be worked around easily. This helps users on affected system to not have to create an advancedsettings.xml for a manual fix.
DVD
Playback of DVD folder structures over network sources (e.g. SMB/NFS/HTTP, etc.) has been fixed.
Filesystems
A fix in Samba was made that “corrected” a long-standing assumption – it turns out that documentation doesn’t always match code implementation. We now handle both the old Samba implementation and the new “correct” implementation.
Further improvements to the new NFS4 implementation have been made by @thexai . This fixes stalls/errors and brings some performance improvements to our NFS implementation.
Game/Retroplayer
Assorted fixes to the new Savestate Manager to improve usability. Thanks to @KOPRajs for reporting, and also providing the PR to fix the issues found.
An assortment of OSD improvements by @garbear resolving further issues reported by @KOPRajs.
A number of performance improvements (memory reads, faster dialogs/savestates).
Input fixes have been made that allow resetting multitap controller inputs, as well as fixing an issue around “ignored” input buttons not being saved.
Sync of some of the common controller types has been made
game.controller.default
game.controller.keyboard
game.controller.mouse
game.controller.snes
General
Fixes various overflows when using new chrono infrastructure. This fixes “keep audio device alive” when passthrough is used with an AVR.
A number of fixes by @ksooo that aim to fix regressions regarding context menu items/behaviour.
A fix for an issue on 32-bit systems that affected the sorting of items. Thanks @vpeter4.
Fixes regarding the rework of the Favourites window have been addressed. This returns behaviour found in v19 for the following:
Support actions up/down plus key mapping for u and d keys.
Support action delete plus key mapping for delete key.
Change keymaps to open the Favourites Browser window instead of the Favourites dialog as currently.
A fix by a returning team member (@CrystalP) that resolves crashes due to Unicode characters.
Platform Specific
Android
Fix packaging regression that affected some parts of the Python PyCryptodome module.
Windows
A fix was made to address an issue where some less-than-usual dimension videos were causing AMD systems to fallback to software decoding instead of using DXVA.
A packaging issues on Windows platforms meant that Chorus was unable to be used. A fix was found by @CrystalP, so users wanting to access Chorus from a Windows host can now rejoice.
PVR
A fix to resolve PVR Channel Groups to correctly show channels ordered as provided by a PVR backend.
Python
A bump of cPython to 3.11.2 was made to fix an upstream issue with the ElementTree binary module. This fixes crashes on Android when an installed addon uses the common ElementTree Python module.
Subtitles
A regression was fixed regarding Right to Left language subtitles placing punctuation incorrectly. It turns out that @CastagnaIT‘s implementation was too correct, and an informal standard adopted by subtitle creators to place punctuation in Left to Right positions in Right to Left subtitles was worked around.
A couple of fixes for WebVTT subtitles were made to resolve overlapping of segments.
Line spacing has been altered in our use of libass to avoid overlapping of text boxes.
UPnP
@enen92 has made a number of improvements and fixes when Kodi is being used as a UPnP server. He has fixed a number of regressions around listings and artwork.
Thanks, as always, to everyone who has helped us track down and fix any issues. We endeavour to minimise the issues everyone experiences, but with such a large project, and the fact everyone contributing to Kodi is a volunteer, issues and bugs are a part of life. if you happen to experience any bugs/issues, don’t hesitate to reach out on the forums, or raise an issue on Github.
As this is a point release, there are no major changes since the previous version, and you should be fine to install this straight over the top of any existing Kodi 20.x installation – indeed, this will happen automatically on many platforms. However, as for all software installations, back up your userdata beforehand if you’ve any doubts or have anything you can’t afford to lose (and definitely do this if you’re going for a major version upgrade).
A list of all changes for this version can be found at GitHub. If you want to read back on the full history of v20 itself, or of previous versions, you can find the corresponding articles in the relevant blog posts.
Application deployment on different platforms (notably the Microsoft Store) can vary considerably due to circumstances outside of our control, so just be patient, and the update will inevitably find its way through.
Android Deployment
We always do whats known as a “staged” deployment roll out for Android. So if you don’t receive the update immediately, be patient, as it will come through over the next week.
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