It’s no secret that scammers are constantly trying to trick torrent users into downloading malicious content.

These files are generally easy to spot and swiftly removed from well-moderated sites. As such, they are mostly a nuisance for novices.

But, when a well-known uploader with a “trusted’ status on some torrent sites gets involved, things change. Last week we reported that “CracksNow,” who shared tens of thousands of cracked software titles in recent years, had been banned from several sites after posting torrents with ransomware.

While we have reported on the torrent ecosystem for more than a decade, a reputable uploader ‘going rogue’ was something we had never seen before. Was it another sign of a decaying torrent community? Or perhaps an uploader who wanted to “cash in” on his work?

To find out more, we reached out to “CracksNow” days before we published our article. We initially received no response, but this week the uploader contacted us, explaining that there was no malicious intent on his part.

The ransomware was real and it did harm the computers of an unknown number of downloaders. However, CracksNow says he didn’t upload these malicious files. In fact, he went to quite a bit of trouble to ensure that his releases did not trigger any alarm bells.

“I had a person who checked all the files for malware before they were uploaded. All the files were run in a sandbox and were dynamically analyzed for malware,” CracksNow tells us.

When the malware reports kept coming in, resulting in bans for the uploader, the files were checked again. That’s when he noticed that some uploads were different.

“When I was demoted on TorrentGalaxy, I was testing all the files again for malware to see which torrents were infected. During my testing, I discovered that the infohash of the torrent file on my server was different from those on the torrent sites.”

An admin at TorrentGalaxy shared some of the account logs which revealed that CracksNow torrents were being deleted and replaced with new files. These newer files, presumably uploaded by someone else, came with the ransomware which caused all the trouble.

TorrentFreak reached out to TorrentGalaxy admin LRS, who confirmed that the site logs indeed showed that torrents were deleted and reuploaded.

However, by then the damage had already been done. After an admin at 1337x helped TorrentGalaxy by pointing out the ransomware issues, both sites banned the Cracksnow account.

The upload irregularities could mean that CracksNow’s accounts were compromised by an outsider. While this is impossible to verify independently, it sounds like a plausible explanation.

The uploader has no idea how someone managed to get his credentials but he doesn’t want to hide behind any excuses either. Even if someone else uploaded the malware, CracksNow takes full responsibility for what happened.

“It’s my responsibility to keep my account secure and I failed in that. A lot of users who trusted CracksNow got infected and got their files encrypted. I feel really bad about this and I am sorry to everyone who got infected,” CracksNow says.

The result is that the uploader lost his accounts with thousands of torrents at several popular sites, but he understands this as well. There was no way to check which uploads were infected, so deleting everything was the logical option.

“I fully support the decision. All the torrents should be deleted so that nobody else gets infected. I don’t want anyone to get infected because of me. The damage done to the reputation of CracksNow is irreversible. I will never be able to upload on the torrent sites again and I understand that.”

The good news for the uploader is that he still has his own site. However, this was also affected by last week’s news. The site was hacked over the past week and infected with malware. As a result, Google’s ominous red warning banner is now showing up in many web browsers.

While we felt obliged to report CracksNow’s side of the story, we are not passing any judgment one way or the other. It’s impossible to verify the complete backstory. This means that, as always, people should tread with caution, which applies anywhere on the web.

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

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Invented more than 15 years ago, BitTorrent has become the protocol of choice for file-sharers.

While BitTorrent is used by many pirates, the technology itself is neutral and does a lot of good for content creators as well.

This is also the message BitTorrent Inc, the parent company of the popular mainline and uTorrent clients, frequently communicated in the past. On numerous occasions, the company has distanced itself from those who download infringing content.

Last year, the company was acquired by TRON which will undoubtedly mean keeping to this course. However, the piracy stigma is persistent. That becomes clear when we look at a series of recent takedown requests issued by NBCUniversal.

The notices in question are addressed to Google. NBCUniversal has sent millions of these requests in recent years, most of which do indeed point out pirated content. However, the company also repeatedly flags BitTorrent’s official site, BitTorrent.com.

In fact, Google has received 387 reports containing BitTorrent.com URLs since it started keeping track, and more than three-quarters of these (293) came from NBCUniversal. As can be seen below, all recent requests for the domain come from the mass media conglomerate.

Recent takedown requests that include BitTorrent.com

So what exactly does the media giant see as infringing pages?

According to a request sent last week, the Spanish download page for the Mainline client infringes the rights of the thriller “Dream House.” A few days earlier the company flagged the BitTorrent Speed and BitTorrent Pro pages, accusing them of linking to a pirated copy of the movies “About Time” and “Upgrade” respectively.

Upgrade?

While the BitTorrent Pro page features a large “Upgrade Now” banner, that’s not the Upgrade NBCUniversal is after.

We have no doubts that this is an honest mistake and that NBCUniversal will correct their anti-piracy bots to prevent this from happening in the future. Still, it shows that these types of automated filters are far from perfect.

Luckily for BitTorrent, their website hasn’t been downgraded in search results, as Google caught the false positives before any real harm was done.

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Citizens of the United Kingdom with a taste for free content are becoming more and more familiar with the idea of website blocking.

Thousands of ‘pirate’ domains are blocked by major Internet service providers such as Sky, Virgin, TalkTalk, and BT, following legal action from the movie and music industries.

These blocking efforts are all officially sanctioned by the High Court via injunction but a new pirate-blocking initiative just announced by the London Grid for Learning (LGfL) appears to be entirely voluntary.

Among other things, LGfL – a not-for-profit Charitable Trust – supplies high-speed broadband to around 3,000 schools in the UK. It also has a mission to save schools money and keep children safe. It now appears that will involve preventing them from accessing very large numbers of pirate sites whilst in school.

LGfL DigiSafe (LGfL’s ‘safeguarding arm’) has just announced that it will work with the Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit (PIPCU) to ensure that pirate sites are rendered inaccessible to anyone using the LGfL network.

The list of domains to be blocked will be obtained from PIPCU’s ‘Infringing Website List’ (IWL), a database of platforms deemed by the authorities to be engaged in copyright infringement. The same list is used by EU advertisers to prevent brand ads appearing on pirate sites, as detailed earlier this month.

According to LGfL DigiSafe, blocking the sites will help prevent children and teachers from accessing “risky” content while allowing schools to be more relaxed about the implications of copyright infringement taking place on site.

“LGfL DigiSafe is committed to partnering with relevant stakeholders in order to achieve our mission of saving schools money and keeping children safe,” says Mark Bentley, Online Safety and Safeguarding Manager at LGfL DigiSafe.

“By working with City of London police to block its List of Infringing Websites to our community of over two million students we not only prevent children accessing inappropriate material but also provide reassurance to senior leaders that this illegal activity cannot be committed on the school site, meaning headteachers do not need to fear liability for copyright infringements.”

Detective Constable Steve Salway of PIPCU says that his unit is pleased that LGfL will be keeping students safe by utilizing its database of infringing sites.

“The online safety of school children is of paramount importance and our IWL is able to prevent them from viewing inappropriate material. It will also put a stop to them accessing copyright infringing content, leaving London schools with extra peace of mind,” Salway notes.

LGfL literature indicates that 97% of London schools are part of its network, meaning that the capital will be the first city in the UK to face an almost complete ‘pirate blackout’ in its schools.

Still, with most kids these days spending large amounts of time on legal platforms such as YouTube and Spotify, there shouldn’t be too much of a drought of free media, should pirate sites be eliminated. However, YouTube is often restricted on LGfL’s network too, so the party may be coming to an end, at least for those who don’t have a smartphone and 4G.

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China has long been associated with rampant counterfeiting and copyright infringement, with the country facing criticism in the West on an almost daily basis.

Over the past couple of years, however, Chinese authorities have become increasingly vocal when these activities are perceived to have a negative effect locally. In particular, the government appears to have a new interest in curtailing movie piracy.

Last year, MPAA chairman Charles Rivkin declared that China will become the world’s top movie market “in short order”, overtaking the likes of the United States and Canada, despite the country (at least officially) capping foreign films to around three dozen per year.

At this scale, China clearly sees importance in protecting revenues in its local market and to this end has just announced fresh moves to curtail piracy in the region, declaring it a “priority” for 2019.

The National Copyright Administration (NCAC) says that it will pour resources into reducing the unauthorized recording of movies in theaters, an act known colloquially as “camming”. Given that the majority of the movies released in the region are local productions, it seems unlikely that the West will benefit greatly, but the action will be welcomed nonetheless.

The NCAC adds that with the assistance of the China Film Administration, the Ministry of Public Security, and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, it will “dig deep” into the sources of piracy and “sternly investigate” online platforms that help to distribute pirated content, such as websites, chat platforms, and smartphone apps.

In serious cases, the NCAC says platforms will be dealt with under a criminal process but at the same time, major Internet platforms will also be encouraged to strengthen their “corporate responsibility” when dealing with infringement complaints.

The NCAC suggests that sites outside the country are mainly responsible for hosting pirated movies (with links shared locally) so it intends to improve cooperation with other interested parties internationally. This is of particular interest given a piece published on the NCAC site on Monday.

While written by an outside source, the article on the copyright agency site appears to praise the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment, the global anti-piracy organization headed up by the MPAA.

“[T]he Motion Picture Association of America and its member companies have joined forces with 30 companies around the world, such as Netflix and Amazon, to form a global organization,” the piece reads.

“Through the cooperation between global companies, we will make full use of the technology and experience of all parties to enhance the level of combating online piracy.”

Again, the article wasn’t written by the NCAC, but the fact that it chose to publish the piece in full tends to suggest that the agency agrees with the strategy. There are certainly strong indications that the way forward is through collaboration on a global scale, but that’s not to say there isn’t work to be done at home.

Last week, the NCAC asked the public to report discovered instances of piracy through direct messages on Weibo, WeChat, and email. 

“Please provide infringement clues and clean up the online copyright environment. Let’s work together,” the agency wrote.

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Besides website blocking, which is gradually spreading all over the world, targeting the domain names of pirate sites is considered to be a somewhat effective anti-piracy tool.

For years, copyright holders and local enforcement authorities have reached out to domain registries and registrars, asking these companies to terminate sites for alleged copyright infringements.

In addition, Hollywood’s MPAA also struck voluntary deals with companies in the domain name industry, to suspend the domain names of infringing sites. While these agreements are criticized by some outsiders, the participating parties appear to be happy with it.

Recently we learned of a relatively new voluntary agreement that also targets pirate domains, but not for copyright infringement.

The International Intellectual Property Alliance’s (IIPA) latest submission to the US Government explains that Hollywood’s MPA has a voluntary agreement with the National Internet Exchange of India (NIXI) and India’s Department of Industrial Policy & Promotion (DIPP).

Under this agreement, which has been in place for a while, copyright holders can report “pirate” sites with an .IN domain. Not for copyright infringement, but because they used false Whois data to register the domain in question.

“In 2017, the Motion Picture Association (MPA) agreed to a voluntary arrangement with DIPP and NIXI to suspend infringing websites based on false whois information; it focused on domains in breach of statutory and contractual obligations to maintain accurate and complete whois information,” IIPA writes.

As far as we know this deal hasn’t been made public until now. However, it is seen by copyright holders as an effective anti-piracy tool in addition to site blocking.

“This [agreement] has led to disruption of dozens of websites in India and should be considered an additional enforcement tool to traditional enforcement or site blocking,” IIPA notes. 

The ‘false Whois’ suspensions are not the only domain name actions taken in India. The relatively new Maharashtra Cyber Digital Crime Unit (MCDCU) is also taking action against pirate sites, which resulted in suspensions of more than 200 domains.

The Digital Crime Unit has taken a page from the City of London Police, reporting sites that are suspected of crimes to various domain registrars.

“In addition, since 2017, the MCDCU has suspended 203 domains impacting approximately 160 million users accessing these sites per month. In conjunction with fighting to suspend these domains, convicting those involved in content theft is also under the MCDCU’s jurisdiction.”

It’s unclear how many domain registrars rejected the suspension requests from the Digital Crime Unit. A few years ago we revealed that most domain name registrars refused to suspend domains based on a mere accusation from the City of London Police.

In addition to domain suspension, the Indian unit was also involved in other enforcement actions. This includes including the arrests of four people in connection to a leaked episode of Game of Thrones last year, which was covered by news media all around the world.

IIPA notes that there is still plenty of improvement possible when it comes to copyright enforcement and anti-piracy actions in India. It is happy with the help from MCDCU and NIXI though and encourages these outfits to continue their “excellent work” suspending domain names.

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