Stream-ripping tools have become a big deal for the music industry over the past several years.

Instead of having to revisit platforms like YouTube, Spotify or Deezer, users of ripping tools or sites are able to download content to their own machines. The labels argue this deprives artists and indeed platforms of revenue while breaching music licensing conditions.

Perhaps the biggest problem is presented by sites that allow people to rip content from YouTube, whether that’s video or audio, or audio alone. While this can be for legitimate purposes, millions use stream-ripping platforms to obtain copyrighted content for free.

One such site is YouTube-ripping service YouTubNow.com. According to SimilarWeb stats, the site currently receives around 15 million visits per month, with the highest share of its visitors hailing from the U.S.

“YouTubNow is a powerful service that allows you to find and download your favorite YouTube videos as well as music tracks quickly, easily and absolutely for free,” the site’s promo material reads.

“It’s an excellent YouTube to MP3 downloader as it makes any soundtrack a separate audio file tailored especially for you!”

This clearly isn’t something the RIAA appreciates. The music industry group targeted YouTubNow last week via a DMCA subpoena directed at the site’s domain name registrar, NameCheap.

In common with a similar process aimed at file-hosting platform NoFile and first reported here on TF, the RIAA filed its request at a federal court in Columbia, demanding that NameCheap hands over the personal details of its client. The Court was happy to oblige.

“We believe your service is hosting [YouTubNow.com] on its network,” a subsequent RIAA letter to NameCheap reads.

“The website associated with this domain name offers files containing sound recordings which are owned by one or more of our member companies and have not been authorized for this kind of use, including without limitation those referenced at the URL below.”

It isn’t clear whether the RIAA has already filed any DMCA takedown notices with YouTubNow via the email address published on the site. Nevertheless, from the ‘copyright notice’ published on the site itself, YouTubNow claims no responsibility for what users do with the service.

From the wording of the letter sent to NameCheap and the subpoena itself, the RIAA appears more concerned about the entire YouTubNow service, rather than just a few seemingly random URLs.

“The purpose for which this subpoena is sought is to obtain the identity of the individual assigned to this website who has induced the infringement of, and has directly engaged in the infringement of, our members’ copyrighted sound recordings without their authorization,” the RIAA writes.

In addition to demanding the operator’s name, physical address, IP address, telephone number, email address, payment information, account updates and account history, the RIAA suggests a termination of the service’s domain might also be in order.

“We also ask that you consider the widespread and repeated infringing nature of the site operator(s)’ conduct, and whether the site(s)’ activities violate your terms of service and/or your company’s repeat infringer policy,” the RIAA writes.

This is at least the third DMCA subpoena the RIAA has obtained against allegedly-infringing sites in recent weeks. TF previously reported that the group is targeting several ‘pirate’ sites that use Cloudflare and file-hosting platform NoFile.

A copy of the RIAA’s letter, obtained by TF, is available here (pdf)

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There are hundreds of file-hosting services on the Internet, each with their own strengths and weaknesses. 

Nofile is generally known as a no-nonsense service that’s free to everyone. The site launched two years ago and has been building a steady userbase ever since.

Recently, however, the site suddenly stopped working (it came back just hours ago). Checking the domain records revealed that the NS records had been removed, which made it impossible to access the site. The question was, why?

A search through U.S. court records provided some possibly relevant context. It revealed that the music industry group RIAA targeted the site through a DMCA subpoena, directed at Nofile’s domain name registrar Namecheap.

The RIAA requested the subpoena at a federal court in Columbia, which was swiftly signed off by a clerk. The paperwork includes a letter addressed to Namecheap, in which the music group demands detailed information on the customer associated with the file-hosting service’s domain.

“We have determined that a user of your system or network has infringed our member record companies’ copyrighted sound recordings,” the RIAA’s letter reads.

“The website associated with this domain name offers files containing sound recordings which are owned by one or more of our member companies and have not been authorized for this kind of use, including without limitation those referenced at the URL below.”

The URL in question is not just some random piece of music. It points to the upload of a leaked track by rapper ‘Tyler, the Creator,’ titled ‘Earfquake.’

The track has been circulating online for roughly a week. It was uploaded to hosting services such as Nofile.io and shared online through Leakth.is, 4Chan, Reddit, and other platforms. Whether Nofile.io played a significant role in the distribution is unknown, but it could be the site where it first appeared.

In any case, the RIAA would like to find out who’s running the site. The music group requests all electronic information that may help to identify the account holder, including IP-addresses, email, and payment information.

“As is stated in the attached subpoena, you are required to disclose to the RIAA information sufficient to identify the infringer. This would include the individual’s name, physical address, IP address, telephone number, e-mail address, payment information, account updates and account history,” the RIAA writes.

Shortly after the subpoena was granted Nofile.io became unreachable. When we started writing this article it was still offline but just before publication, it returned. The leaked file the RIAA referenced is still hosted there as well.

Interestingly, this is the second DMCA subpoena the RIAA has obtained in a short period of time. Little over a week ago we reported that the group is also going after several ‘pirate’ sites that use Cloudflare.

Both requests use boilerplate language and only require a clerk’s signature to become enforceable. This makes it a rather cheap and effective option to find out more about site owners so it would be no surprise if we see these more often going forward.

Whether it’s the RIAA’s main goal to shut down the site is questionable though. In this case, the music group will likely be more interested in finding out who uploaded the leaked file, if that’s the source.

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A copy of the RIAA’s letter to Namecheap is available here (pdf).

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Section 115a of Australia’s Copyright Act allows copyright holders to apply for court injunctions that compel local ISPs to block subscribers from accessing ‘pirate’ sites.

Since it became active in 2015, the legislation has been used a number of times to block large numbers of mainly torrent and streaming platforms. However, such sites are often quick to adapt, deploying alternative domains, mirrors and proxies to undermine the blockades.

While Google has nothing to do with these actions, it has been regularly criticized for allowing users to carry out searches which enable them to find these workarounds. That has provoked harsh criticism from rightsholders, in particular Village Roadshow chief Graham Burke.

To tackle this and other loopholes, in November 2018 Australia passed new legislation that allows rightsholders to expand blocks without having to go to court. It also compels search providers to remove links to sites detailed in court orders from their search results.

While this framework is easily understood, this morning a report appeared in SMH declaring that peace has effectively broken out between rightsholders and Google.

The latter has reportedly entered into a “voluntary agreement” to remove 832 “sites” currently blocked by ISPs from its search results, despite the court orders covering these locations not necessarily applying to Google.

“This means we, as content owners, will be able to avoid the expense, effort, time and uncertainty of going to court,” Roadshow’s Burke said.

“We’ve gone from being enemies to being allies … because I believe Google is doing the right thing by Australians,” he added.

“[The] pirates’ business model is robbing and scamming people, they have sophisticated ways to take your information. Google has come down on the side that is right.”

Burke’s praise for Google is somewhat of a surprise and the turnaround in his tone quite remarkable. Equally, Google entering into a voluntary agreement over a process it slammed last year also raises eyebrows.

In particular, Google opposed any process that didn’t have the “direct oversight of the Federal Court” while noting that “there is no utility in extending site blocking schemes beyond ISPs to other online service providers.”

TorrentFreak contacted Google for additional detail last evening and it provided the following statement.

“Google supports effective industry led measures to fight piracy, and we invest significantly in the technology, tools and resources that prevent copyright infringement on our platforms,” a spokesperson said.

Google is clearly reluctant to put any additional meat on the bones of this “voluntary agreement” but TorrentFreak has learned that this scheme only affects Australia and is directly linked to the new legislation passed last year.

It seems possible then that this mass de-indexing of pirate resources represents a game of catch-up.

A large proportion of existing pirate sites are already blocked under existing court orders that were granted under earlier legislation that didn’t require search engine de-indexing. It therefore seems likely that in order to have Google remove the sites from its results, copyright holders would have to return to court.

For 832 sites (832 domains seems more realistic) this would be a time-consuming exercise and one with a guaranteed outcome. It therefore seems reasonable to conclude that the parties agreed to save time and money by cutting out the middle man and conceding to the inevitable.

Burke suggests the de-indexing has already taken place so TF carried out some tests using various sites, including the most obvious blocking and de-indexing target (ThePirateBay.org) to see the effects.

First, we used two Australian IP addresses (one in Melbourne, the other in Sydney) to access Google.com. We then searched for The Pirate Bay, which appeared as the top result each time.

We then switched to Google.com.au and tested again with same IP addresses but ThePirateBay.org appeared as the top result again.

We presented Google with these results and asked if it could explain the precise parameters of its de-indexing so we could report more accurately.

The company declined to comment but it’s possible that not all de-indexing operations have been carried out yet. It’s also possible that only users of the ISPs specifically listed in the original court orders are affected, such as those using Telstra, Optus, Vocus, TPG, and Vodafone, plus subsidiaries.

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Tor is an anonymity tool and operating a relay or exit point basically means that the traffic of hundreds or thousands of users hit the Internet from your IP-address.

When pirates use Tor, it will then appear as if the traffic comes from this connection. This can lead to liability issues as Oregon resident John Huszar found out the hard way.

Back in 2015, the company behind the movie Dallas Buyers Club, which is known for its vigorous pursuit of online pirates, filed a federal lawsuit against the IP-address 173.11.1.241.

A few months later, this complaint was amended to list “Integrity Computer Services” as the defendant. As part of the proceedings, the filmmakers served a request for admissions, asking the defendant to respond to several statements.

This request remained unanswered, which turned out to be a crucial mistake. Not responding typically means that the court can assume the statements are true. In this case, it included an admission that Huszar unlawfully distributed a copy of Dallas Buyers Club, which seemingly opened the door to a substantial financial claim.

That John Huszar later repeatedly denied that he personally downloaded a pirated copy of the film in follow-up proceedings was irrelevant, according to the filmmakers.

Backed by the admission, Dallas Buyers Club proceeded to file a motion for summary judgment, asking the court to confirm that Huszar did indeed willfully commit copyright infringement.

This issue went to U.S. Magistrate Judge John Acosta earlier this year who, in his report and recommendation, sided with the movie company.

“The court finds the admissions resulting from Huszar’s failure to deny allegations in the operative complaint or respond to requests for admissions clearly establish Huszar willfully infringed on Dallas’s copyrighted material in violation of the Act,” Acosta wrote.

In most cases, these recommendations are accepted by the district court judge. That was bad news for Huszar, as it would make him liable for thousands of dollars in potential damages.

However, the order that came out this week shows that a previously overlooked issue turned the tables in favor of Huszar.

United States District Judge Michael Simon reviewed the objections that were pointed out by the defense, which highlight a crucial issue. When the request for admissions was served back in 2016, Huszar was not named as a defendant. 

At the time the complaint listed his company Integrity Computer Services as the defendant. This was replaced by Huszar in an amended complaint a few months later. However, that meant that the request for admission (RFA) wasn’t directed at Huszar personally.

“The only defendant in the case at that time was simply “Integrity Computer Services,” (no ‘a/k/a’) and that is the only defendant named in the First Amended Complaint,” Judge Simon writes in his order.

“Huszar, therefore, was not the party served with the April 12, 2016 RFAs. The facts sought in those requests thus cannot be deemed admitted by Huszar for failure to respond, and the Court’s order finding such admission is withdrawn.”

As such, the court decided not to adopt the report and recommendation. 

The procedural issue was missed by the defense initially, likely because Huszar was defending himself at the time, but the oversight has saved him for now.

“It is a technical issue that no ‘pro-se’ would likely catch. But RFA’s can affect a case significantly as was clear from the Magistrate’s decision.  This is the error we brought up to the District Court’s attention that led to the ruling in our favor,” Huszar’s attorney J. Curtis Edmondson informs TorrentFreak.

While Huszar escapes a ruling of willful copyright infringement based on the admissions, the case is not over yet. The motion for summary judgment is now reverted back to Judge Acosta for consideration on the merits. 

Huszar’s cross-motion of non-infringement is still on the table. Among other things, Huszar has argued that the evidence gathering software used in this case is flawed and unreliable.

Both sides are now allowed to submit supplement pleadings. Huszar ultimately hopes to prove that he is not guilty and have his legal bills paid. The filmmakers, on the other hand, plan to prove that the Tor exit node operator is guilty and demand damages.

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A copy of United States District Judge Michael Simon’s order is available here (pdf).

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With over 20 million subscribers of its main channel and over 30 million over its entire network, WatchMojo is one of the largest players on YouTube.

The Montreal-based video production company has been around for well over a decade and continues to expand its viewership, despite fierce competition.

While WatchMojo owes a lot of its success to YouTube, the company is also growing increasingly frustrated with rampant copyright abuse on the platform. We’re not talking about people who steal their content, but about companies that unlawfully claim their videos.

These complaints are far from new and we have highlighted these issues repeatedly over the years. However, when a channel the size of WatchMojo sounds the alarm bell, people should pay attention. This includes abusive rightsholders, which could be liable for millions of dollars in damages.

But let’s start with the basis for the recent uproar. Last weekend WatchMojo’s CEO Ashkan Karbasfrooshan published a video in which he exposed some of the worst Content-ID abusers. The video provides several examples of companies that claimed WatchMojo content which, according to the channel, is protected under fair use.

For example, when WatchMojo published a video commenting on an Avengers movie trailer, an outfit called Hexacorp (which does business as Orfium) claimed it, arguing that the trailer’s music was used without permission. Hexacorp represented Ramen Music, which licensed the track to Marvel, but apparently, WatchMojo wasn’t allowed to show it.

WatchMojo disagreed and protested the claim citing fair use. After all, the trailer and music were clearly used for commentary purposes. This worked and Hexacorp eventually let the claim go, but many other channels with less legal knowledge simply accepted the claim, allowing Hexacorp to monetize their videos.

What plays a major role here is that protesting Content-ID claims may eventually lead to copyright notices. These notices can result in “strikes” which can then cause people to lose all content in their YouTube channels. That’s not a risk many channels want to take.

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TorrentFreak spoke to WatchMojo’s CEO who informed us that this is just one of the many examples. Every month they receive hundreds of Content-ID claims across their channels. However, WatchMojo vigorously fights back and prevails on nearly every occasion.

Karbasfrooshan notes that Content-ID abusers come in all shapes and sizes. Some stand out in terms of volume but are quick to let go of claims once a channel protests. Others send only a few complaints but protest when channels push back.

While there’s no doubt that rightsholders should be able to pursue legitimate claims, WatchMojo believes that many see the system as a revenue-generating opportunity. They simply issue thousands of frivolous claims, knowing that many won’t be protested, even though there are clear arguments for fair use.

This means that the rightsholders will scoop up extra revenue with very little expense. After all, most Content-ID claims are automated.

In addition, WatchMojo also signals a possible anti-competitive angle. The channel receives a lot of strikes for content from the music company BMG.  These, again, often target fair use videos and are sometimes issued globally, even though the rights can only be enforced in certain countries.

The full expose is explained in detail in WatchMojo’s video, where Karbasfrooshan highlights that BMG’s parent company, Bertelsmann, also has a stake in ZergNet, which happens to be a direct competitor of WatchMojo on YouTube.

“Bertelsmann, through their investment arm BMDI, has invested in our direct competitor ZergNet, whose assets Looper, Nicky Swift and a bunch of others compete with us for the same audience, fighting for the same ad dollars, competing for the same eyeballs,” WatchMojo’s CEO notes.

Whether the behavior is anti-competitive or not, the overarching problem is that many rightsholders ‘abuse’ the Content-ID system, willingly or not. According to US case law, they are required to consider fair use when issuing takedown requests, something that doesn’t happen very often it seems.

Content-ID is a voluntary system that’s not rooted in law. However, WatchMojo believes that abusive rightsholders are opening themselves up to millions of dollars in potential damages from YouTube channels. One way this could happen is through a class action lawsuit.

Karbasfrooshan floated this idea in his initial video which triggered a lot of response from fellow channel operators. The basic idea is that a group of affected channels files a class action suit against an abusive rightsholder, with the goal of obtaining a settlement for unlawfully claimed and monetized videos.

In a follow-up video, WatchMojo explains in detail how this would work. What is clear, is that the potential damages are massive. According to a calculation made by the channel, rightsholders earned over $2 billion through unlawfully claimed videos over the past several years.

Whether the calculations hold up or not, it is clear that companies that send out a lot of claims against fair use content could theoretically face substantial damages. This, of course, has to be backed up in court, but according to WatchMojo’s CEO, who has plenty of legal experience, it’s a viable option.

“We are now actively exploring taking legal action against a couple of targets where we have built up a lot of evidence of wrongdoing, abuse, and received additional evidence from other channels too,” Karbasfrooshan tells TorrentFreak.

For now, WatchMojo is not ready to serve as a representative plaintiff in a class action suit. It hopes that by highlighting the potential risks for copyright holders, the associated companies will do the right thing and properly consider fair use.

WatchMojo has complained about Content-ID abuse for quite a while and it believes that some type of legal action against an abuser is inevitable. Whether that’s through a class action suit or not.

“It’s a matter of time, if not us, someone will come along and sue and win big,” Karbasfrooshan tells us.

WatchMojo’s CEO has spoken to lawyers who, once they were informed about what was going on, were also convinced that some type of legal action is inevitable.

“I assure you that once I explained how Content-ID worked vs. copyright law, and then how rightsholders abused it, the general consensus was: ok, these rightsholders are going to get sued,” Karbasfrooshan says.

“Now, whether that’s done via a class action suit or a direct lawsuit is a different matter. I think the former is interesting but the latter is practically more likely,” he adds.

Still, Karbasfrooshan hopes that lawsuits are not needed to address this. Ideally, copyright holders should change the way they operate and respect fair use, he says.

And there’s also a major role for YouTube here. They can make a simple change and whitelist channels that have good standing, so these are not harmed by frivolous claims.

“The answer is simple: it’s time for a separate class of channels for those who use the platform in a professional manner,” Karbasfrooshan notes.

The latter angle will be discussed in the third episode of WatchMojo’s four-part series on Content-ID abuse. In addition, the channel will also launch “The FU Show”, where it will break down and discuss fair use (FU) issues in regards to content claims. 

Needless to say, these videos are very informative, and there’s something in there for channel operators as well as copyright holders. 

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