really sweet backup this codar, a fine job, thanks for sharing
Posts by Prophet
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After a decade of lawsuits, the iconic torrent site IsoHunt has settled its last remaining legal dispute. Gary Fung, the Canadian founder of the defunct search engine, has agreed to pay a $66 million settlement to the local music industry group and is glad he can move on with his life.
After years of legal battles, isoHunt and its founder Gary Fung are free at last.
Today, Fung announced that he has settled the last remaining lawsuit with Music Canada, formerly known as the Canadian Recording Industry Association (CRIA).
“After 10 long years, I’m happy to announce the end of isoHunt’s and my lawsuits,” Fung says, noting that he now owes the Canadian music group $66 million.
The multi-million dollar agreement follows an earlier settlement with the MPAA, for $110 million, on paper. While most site owners would be devastated, Fung has long moved beyond that phase and responds rather sarcastically.
“And I want to congratulate both Hollywood and CRIA on their victories, in letting me off with fines of $110m and $66m, respectively. Thank you!” he notes, adding that he’s “free at last”.
The consent order (pdf) signed by the Supreme Court of British Columbia prohibits isoHunt’s founder from operating any file-sharing site in the future.
It further requires Fung to pay damages of $55 million and another $10 million in aggravated punitive damages. The final million dollars is issued to cover the costs of the lawsuit.
Although isoHunt shut down 2013, it took more than two years for the last case to be finalized. The dispute initially began in the last decennium, when the Canadian music industry went after several prominent torrent sites.
In May 2008, isoHunt received a Cease and Desist letter from the CRIA in which they demanded that isoHunt founder Gary Fung should take the site offline. If Fung didn’t comply, the CRIA said it would pursue legal action, and demand $20,000 for each sound recording the site has infringed.
A similar tactic worked against Demonoid, but the isoHunt founder didn’t back down so easily. Instead, he himself filed a lawsuit against the CRIA asking the court to declare the site legal.
That didn’t work out as isoHunt’s founder had planned, and several years later the tables have been turned entirely, with the defeat now becoming final.
While the outcome won’t change anything about isoHunt’s demise, Fung is proud that he was always able to shield its users from the various copyright groups attacking it. No identifiable user data was shared at any point.
Fung is also happy for the support the site’s users have given him over the years.
“I can proudly conclude that I’ve kept my word regarding users’ privacy above. To isoHunt’s avid users, it’s worth repeating since I shutdown isoHunt in 2013, that you have my sincerest thanks for your continued support,” Fung notes.
“Me and my staff could not have done it for more than 10 years without you, and that’s an eternity in internet time. It was an interesting and challenging journey for me to say the least, and the most profound business learning experience I could not expect.”
The Canadian entrepreneur can now close the isoHunt book for good and move on to new ventures. One of the projects he just announced is a mobile search tool called “App to Automate Googling” AAG for which he invites alpha testers.
The original isoHunt site now redirects to MPAA’s “legal” search engine WhereToWatch. However, the name and design lives on via the clone site IsoHunt.to, which still draws millions of visitors per month – frustrating for the MPAA and Music Canada.
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ProgDVB Professional v7.14.5 (x86/x64)
Description: ProgDVB – the universal and very power software for watching digital TV and listening to radio channels! ProgDVB allows you to watch SAT-Television and listen to Radio channels directly from satellite by using DVB-PCI cards with hardware decoders on the board, SAT-dish, and personal computers with Microsoft Windows installed. It has options for working with network broadcasting and Audio/Video recording of the stream to different digital-media formats.
Features:
High Definition TV support including H.264/AVC
Picture-in-picture support as well as independent simultaneous recording/playback of several channels from one or more devices
Mosaic fast channels preview
Support for the majority of DVB, ISDB-T and ATSC devices including DiSEqC and CAM interfaces support
Support for all digital TV audio formats: MPEG, AC3, AAC,…
Time shifting functionality using the RAM or disk buffer of unlimited size
10 Bands equalizer
TV and Radio channels recording
And Many More.. -
It has been just over a day since KickassTorrents (KAT) was shut down by the U.S. Government, following the arrest of the site's alleged owner. While the official site is still offline mirrors and copies are being launched left and right, with some misleadingly claiming to be an "official" resurrection of KAT.
With an active community and millions of regular visitors, KickassTorrents has been the most used torrent site for quite some time.
This ended abruptly earlier this week, following the arrest of its alleged founder in Poland. A criminal complaint from the U.S. Government revealed that entire operation had been compromised by the Department of Homeland Security.
Starting a few hours ago, the first Kickass domain was signed over to the U.S. authorities. Others are expected to follow during the days to come.
Kickass.to now displays a seizure notice, which means that the associated domain registry was quick to respond to the U.S. warrant. People who visit the Kickass.to address today will see the following banner, specifically tailored for KAT.
As expected, the U.S. authorities are not the only ones to ‘lift’ KAT’s logo, many others are doing the same, but for a different reason.
Shortly after KAT went offline dozens of people began promoting mirrors and copies of the site. Some are just trying to keep lost files accessible, but there’s also a group trying to take over the brand, similar to the efforts seen following YIFY’s demise.
For example, the operator of Kickass.la sent an email to several reporters promoting a new KAT address. In a follow-up, we were told that the site is an “official backup,” and that a copy of the database is in their possession.
However, the site appears to be little more than a partial copy and the person behind it later admitted that they are not related to KAT.
Only adding to the confusion are the many other copies and alternatives claiming to be the official resurrection of KAT. Some even advertise themselves as such, but most have been available for a longer time as proxy/mirror sites.
Kickasstorrents.to, for example, has been around for a long time, hosting cached pages of the original site. The latter is also true for others, such as Dxtorrent.com. But in any case, there is no true backup with freshly added content available.
Another mirror that has been widely discussed is kickasstorrents.website.
Unlike others, the people behind this site are very clear about the fact that they are not related to the original KAT team. Their copy currently lists torrent files from the past one and a half years, but like other mirrors it doesn’t have a working forum or upload functionality.
“It’s not perfect but if users need to save and archive something it’s time. We don’t know how long it can last, but at least it’s something,” the site’s operator told TorrentFreak.
The people behind the site, who describe themselves as a group of individuals who stand for freedom of the Internet, also launched a petition on Change.org calling for the release of KAT’s alleged owner Artem Vaulin.
“We are protesting against violent attack on our right to share information and arrest of Kat.cr founder Artem Vaulin. Our freedom to share is the human right which Artem Vaulin has been providing to millions of users from all over the world,” they say.
While a notable effort, the banner promoting the cause appears to show a photo of an entirely different Artem Vaulin. The image was removed from the petition after we pointed this out, but it’s still present in the manifesto at the time of writing and being shared in news articles and on social media.
What is clear is that former KAT users are grasping at straws to get their old community back. While mirrors and copies do look like their old home, without a working forum and new content they don’t provide much of an alternative.
For now, people are probably better off not trusting any “KAT resurrection” claims. The chance of getting your password stolen is higher than finding a site with a true backup of the user database.
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Following the news that KickassTorrents (KAT) has been shut down and its alleged owner arrested, another big site has disappeared from the Internet. Popular streaming portal Solarmovie went offline overnight without explanation and it seems possible that connections to KAT are to blame.
In the most dramatic turn of events since the raid of The Pirate Bay in December 2014, KickassTorrents went dark yesterday.
Previously the world’s largest torrent site, KAT shut down following the arrest of its alleged founder. Artem Vaulin, a 30-year-old from Ukraine, was arrested in Poland after his entire operation had been well and truly compromised by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
When large sites are raided it is common for other sites in a similar niche to consider their positions. This phenomenon was illustrated perfectly when the 2012 raids on Megaupload resulted in sites such as BTjunkie taking the decision to shut down.
At this point, most other torrent sites seem fairly stable but there appears to have been at least one ‘pirate’ casualty following yesterday’s drama.
For many years, Solarmovie has been one of the most visible and visited ‘pirate’ streaming portals. Like many others, the site has had its fair share of domain issues, starting out at .COM and more recently ending up at .PH. However, sometime during the past few hours, Solarmovie disappeared.
No official announcement concerning the site’s fate has been made but it’s clear from the criminal complaint filed against KickassTorrents that Artem Vaulin had close connections to Solarmovie.
As reported yesterday, the Department of Homeland Security obtained a copy of KickassTorrents’ servers from its Canadian host and also gained access to the site’s servers in Chicago. While conducting his inquiries, the Special Agent handling the case spotted an email address for the person responsible for renting KAT’s servers.
Further investigation of Vaulin’s Apple email account showed the Ukrainian corresponding with this person back in 2010.
“The subject of the email was ‘US Server’ and stated: ‘Hello, here is access to the new server’ followed by a private and public IP address located in Washington DC, along with the user name ‘root’ and a password,” the complaint reveals.
Perhaps tellingly, the IP address provided by this individual to Vaulin was found to have hosted Solarmovie.com from August 2010 through to April 2011. Furthermore, up until just last month, the IP address was just one away from an IP address used to host KickassTorrents.
“As of on or about June 27, 2016, one of the IP addresses hosting solarmovie.ph was one IP address away (185.47.10.11) from an IP address that was being used to host KAT (185.47.10.12 and 185.47.10.13),” the complaint adds.
While none of the above is proof alone that Vaulin was, for example, the owner of Solarmovie, it’s clear that at some point he at least had some connections with the site or its operator.
On the other hand, in torrent and streaming circles it’s common for people to use services already being used by others they know and trust, so that might provide an explanation for the recent IP address proximity.
In any event, last night’s shutdown of Solarmovie probably indicates that the heat in the kitchen has become just a little too much. Expect more fallout in the days to come.
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The U.S. Government has arrested the alleged owner of KickassTorrents, the world's largest torrent site. The 30-year-old Ukrainian was arrested in Poland today and is charged with criminal copyright infringement and money laundering. In addition, a federal court in Chicago has ordered the seizure of several KAT domain names.
With millions of unique visitors per day KickassTorrents (KAT) has become the most-used torrent site on the Internet, beating even The Pirate Bay.
Today, however, the site has run into a significant roadblock after U.S. authorities announced the arrest of the site’s alleged owner.
The 30-year-old Artem Vaulin, from Ukraine, was arrested today in Poland from where the United States has requested his extradition.
In a criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Chicago, the owner is charged with conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement, conspiracy to commit money laundering, and two counts of criminal copyright infringement.
The complaint further reveals that the feds posed as an advertiser, which revealed a bank account associated with the site.
It also shows that Apple handed over personal details of Vaulin after the investigator cross-referenced an IP-address used for an iTunes transaction with an IP-address that was used to login to KAT’s Facebook account.
“Records provided by Apple showed that tirm@me.com conducted an iTunes transaction using IP Address 109.86.226.203 on or about July 31, 2015. The same IP Address was used on the same day to login into the KAT Facebook,” the complaint reads.
In addition to the arrest in Poland, the court also granted the seizure of a bank account associated with KickassTorrents, as well as several of the site’s domain names.
Commenting on the announcement, Assistant Attorney General Caldwell said that KickassTorrents helped to distribute over $1 billion in pirated files.
“Vaulin is charged with running today’s most visited illegal file-sharing website, responsible for unlawfully distributing well over $1 billion of copyrighted materials.”
“In an effort to evade law enforcement, Vaulin allegedly relied on servers located in countries around the world and moved his domains due to repeated seizures and civil lawsuits. His arrest in Poland, however, demonstrates again that cybercriminals can run, but they cannot hide from justice.”
KAT’s .com and .tv domains are expected to be seized soon by Verisign. For the main Kat.cr domain and several others, seizure warrants will be sent to the respective authorities under the MLAT treaty.
At the time of writing the main domain name Kat.cr has trouble loading, but various proxies still appear to work. KAT’s status page doesn’t list any issues, but we assume that this will be updated shortly.
TorrentFreak has reached out to the KAT team for a comment on the news and what it means for the site’s future, but we have yet to hear back.
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Just attached the pdf of the criminal complaint, makes very interesting reading
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Thank you as always to Rat for these
Rat's Bouquets E2 SD FTA HD 20.7.2016
Latest Update Of Rat's Bouquets
Few Changes
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Thank you as always to Rat for these
Rat's Bouquets E2 SD FTA HD 15.7.2016
Network Scan
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SKY WINS ‘PIRATE’ DOMAIN NAME DISPUTE, FORGETS TO TAKE IT DOWN
British broadcasting giant Sky has won a WIPO domain name dispute against a pirate site that was streaming their content without permission. WIPO's arbitration commission handed over the skysportslive.tv domain to Sky a few weeks ago. However, even under Sky's ownership it still links to pirated streams.
Pirate sports streaming sites are a thorn in the side of Sky, the UK’s largest pay TV provider.
While it’s an impossible task to shut down these sites all at once, the company recently decided to take action against one that uses the Sky brand to advertise itself.
The site in question, Skysportslive.tv, has been online for several years offering free access to various sporting channels.
Earlier this year Sky ran out of patience. The company filed a complaint against the domain name owner at the World International Property Organization (WIPO), which has an arbitration panel to resolve domain name disputes.
In the complaint, Sky argued that the domain uses their trademark without permission, that the owner had no legitimate interest in the domain, and that the domain was registered in bad faith.
After a careful review, WIPO panelist Evan Brown sided with Sky. The domain name owner, a Pakistan resident, failed to respond but according to Brown there is no indication that the site is destined for legal purposes.
“Respondent is not using and has not used, or made demonstrable preparations to use, the disputed domain name in connection with a bona fide offering of goods or services,” the panelist writes.
Instead, it is apparent that the use of the Sky trademark is intended to confuse visitors into believing that the site is legitimate.
“In this case, it is clear that the purpose of registering the disputed domain name was primarily to rely on the value of the Mark in order to confuse Internet users,” the decision ads.
All in all a good outcome for Sky, which gained control over the domain name several weeks ago as the WHOIS entry clearly shows.
Sky now owns Skysportslive.tv
0b977855a7d.pngHowever, the company appears to have missed the most crucial part of the arbitration process. That is, updating the domain’s old nameservers after it won.
This means that today, even after several weeks have passed, the now Sky-owned domain is still pointing people to pirated streams.
Those who access the domain are forwarded to crichd.in, another pirate streaming site. Crichd.in uses pretty much the same layout as the original site and is operated by the same people.
Question is, can this sports streaming portal still be characterized as a pirate site if Sky is linking to it?
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- Dreambox OS
- Dreambox APi
- Dual Core 10k DMIPS CPU
- MPEG-2 / H.264 Decoder
- H.265 Decoder UHD
- 2GB Ram
- 8GB Flash (MMC)
- Smardcard Reader
- 2x HDMI 2.0
- 3 Zoll Color LCD Display
- S/PDIF digital bitstream out
- 100/1000 Mbit/s compatible Ethernet Interface
- USB 3.0
- SD Cardreader
- Internal 2,5" Harddisk
- Common Interface 2
- EPG Electronic Program Guide
- USB Service Port
- DiSEqC 1.0, 1.1, 1.2, USALS
- Abmessung 230 mm x 187 mm x 60 mm- - - Updated - - -
Kind of wondering what Dreambox O/S is will be ?? some hybrid enigma system perhaps ?
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In 2014, the High Court ordered Sky, TalkTalk, BT, Virgin Media and EE to block websites dealing in counterfeit luxury products. The ISPs appealed the case on a number of grounds, including that the court had no power to order the injunctions. That appeal has now failed.
stopstopSite blocking in the UK has become a hot topic after the world’s leading entertainment companies successfully applied for injunctions against many hundreds of ‘pirate’ sites.
In response, Compagnie Financière Richemont S.A., which owns several well-known luxury brands including Cartier and Mont Blanc, decided to get in on the action.
In 2014, Richemont wrote to the UK’s leading ISPs – Sky, TalkTalk, BT, Virgin Media, EE and Telefonica/O2 – with a request to block several sites offering counterfeit products. In common with earlier cases involving The Pirate Bay and KickassTorrents, the ISPs refused and the case went to court.
In October 2014, the High Court ruled in favor of Richemont, stating that counterfeit product sites must be blocked in the same manner as torrent and streaming portals.
Despite this being a trademark case, the judge found that he had jurisdiction to order an injunction and that the ISPs should pay for any blockades to be implemented.
In a statement, a Richemont spokesperson told TorrentFreak that the decision was a positive step. However, the matter was not over. While the ISPs seemed happy to accept the High Court’s decision in respect of ‘pirate’ site blockades, they decided to contest the luxury brand injunction.
In their appeal, the ISPs complained that they are innocent parties and that the Court had no jurisdiction to hand down a blocking order. However, even in the event that it did have jurisdiction, the ISPs said that certain thresholds required for an injunction had not been met.
Continuing, the ISPs said that the judge had failed to apply the correct principles in deciding whether or not to hand down an order, and that the orders made were disproportionate. Finally, the judge should not have ordered the ISPs to foot the bill for blocking the infringing sites.
This week the Court of Appeal handed down its long awaited decision and it’s almost completely good news for the brand owners.
Dismissing the ISPs’ appeal, the Court said that High Court did indeed have the power to issue the blocking injunctions and that all the legal thresholds for doing so had been met.
“Each of the target websites was directed to consumers in the United Kingdom and the operators of those sites were advertising and offering for sale counterfeits of the goods of one of the named claimants,” Justice Briggs wrote.
“The [High Court] judge was entitled to make an order to try to prevent this happening for the third sentence of Article 11 of the Enforcement Directive and Article 8(3) of the Information Society Directive are concerned not only with measures aimed at bringing infringements of intellectual property rights to an end but also with measures aimed at preventing them.”
Interestingly, on the issue of who would pay for the site-blocking to be carried out, the Court of Appeal had some sympathy for the ISPs
“In my judgment the cost burden attributable to the implementation of a particular blocking order should fall upon the rightsholder making the application for it,” Justice Briggs wrote.
“In circumstances where valuable intangible rights of this kind need to be protected from abuse by others, I regard it as a natural incident of a business which consists of, or includes, the exploitation of such rights, to incur cost in their protection, to the extent that it cannot be reimbursed by appropriate orders against wrongdoers.”
But that doesn’t mean that the ISPs are completely off the hook. Justice Briggs said that while the ISPs wouldn’t have to pay the costs associated with implementing a blocking order, they would still have to foot the bill for “designing and installing the software with which to do so whenever ordered.”
Richemont lawyer Simon Baggs welcomed the decision.
“The court has recognized that often the best way for online unlawful activity to be stopped is for intermediaries such as ISPs to cut the Internet lifeblood that the websites need to trade,” Baggs said.
“Site blocking is a developing area in many jurisdictions globally and this judgment should further enable the growth of this important remedy.”
The ISPs still have the possibility of taking their case to the Supreme Court but no announcement has yet been made.
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The UK Government's Digital Economy Bill, which is set to revamp current copyright legislation, has been introduced in Parliament. One of the most controversial changes is the increased maximum sentences for online copyright infringement. Despite public protest, the bill increased the maximum prison term five-fold, from two to ten years.
Last year the UK Government announced a plan to increase the maximum prison sentence for online copyright infringement to ten years.
The current maximum of two years is not enough to deter infringers, lawmakers argued.
The plan followed a recommendation put forward in a study commissioned by the UK Intellectual Property Office (IPO) a few months earlier.
This study concluded that criminal sanctions for online copyright infringement could be increased to bring them into line with related offenses, such as counterfeiting.
Before implementing the changes the Government launched a public consultation, asking for comments and advice from the public. But, even though the vast majority of the responses urged the authorities not to up the prison term, lawmakers decided otherwise.
As a result, a new draft of the Digital Economy bill published this week extends the current prison term from two to ten years. The relevant part amends the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, and simply replaces the word two with ten.
The new bill was unveiled in Parliament yesterday where it passed its first reading. If adopted in its current form, it allows courts to hand out tougher sentences.
The small but impactful change (3)
Copyright holders have lobbied for this update for a long time. According to them, harsher penalties are needed to deter people from committing large-scale copyright infringement, something the Government agrees with.
“The Government believes that a maximum sentence of 10 years allows the courts to apply an appropriate sentence to reflect the scale of the offending,” the Government explained previously, adding that the maximum sentence will only be applied in rare cases.
This means that casual file-sharers are not likely to end up in prison for a decade. However, organized groups that systematically offer pirated files, such as Scene or P2P release groups, are likely to be punished more harshly.
One of the motivations to up the sentence for online piracy is to bring it on par with counterfeiting. Interestingly, however, both were already equal when they were first adopted.
When the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act was first introduced both counterfeiting and piracy carried a maximum sentence of two years. Following industry calls the counterfeiting sentences were increased in 2002, and now the piracy side has followed the same path.
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Thank you as always to Rat for these
Rat's Bouquets E2 SD FTA HD 01.7.2016
Few updates today
CI +1
Lifetime +1
Home & Leisure
Couple of name changes -
The former operators of Swefilmer, Sweden's largest streaming site, have been prosecuted for copyright infringement and money laundering offenses. The men, aged 22 and 25, are accused of facilitating infringement on 1,400 movies and face penalties of $1.7m.
Founded half a decade ago, Swefilmer was Sweden’s most popular unauthorized streaming site.
Offering all the latest movies and TV shows, Swefilmer (and another, Dreamfilm) captured up to 25% of all web TV viewing in Sweden according to a 2015 report.
Last summer, however, the noose began to tighten. In July local man Ola Johansson revealed that he’d been raided by the police under suspicion of being involved in running the site.
Meanwhile, police continued the hunt for the site’s primary operator and in March 2016 it was revealed that a Turkish national had been arrested in Germany on a secret European arrest warrant. The 25-year-old is said to be the person who received donations from users and set up Swefilmer’s deals with advertisers.
Both men have now been prosecuted by Swedish authorities. In an indictment filed in the Varberg District Court, both men are accused of copyright infringement connected to the unlawful distribution of more than 1,400 movies.
Additionally, the 25-year-old stands accused of aggravated money laundering offenses related to his handling of Swefilmer’s finances.
The prosecution says that the site generated more than $1.7m between November 2013 and June 2015. More than $1.5m of that amount came from advertising with user donations contributing around $110,000. The state wants the 25-year-old to forfeit the full amount. A $77,000 car and properties worth $233,000 have already been seized.
While both could be sent to prison, the 22-year-old faces less serious charges and will be expected to pay back around $3,600.
The trial, which is expected to go ahead in just over a week, will be the most significant case against a streaming portal in Sweden to date.
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Thank you as always to Rat for these
Rat's Bouquets E2 SD FTA HD 25.6.2016
Network Scan
GINXeSportsTV
Enjoy! -
Proposed legislative changes that will increase law enforcement’s ability to hack into computers are under attack by a broad coalition. Google, EFF, Demand Progress and FightForTheFuture are joined by TOR, Private Internet Access and other VPN services seeking to block changes to Rule 41.
rule41Back in April the U.S. Supreme Court approved a rule change that will allow law enforcement to obtain a warrant to hack into computers and even phones anywhere in the world.
The changes affect Rule 41 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure which determines how the government investigates criminal complaints.
The changes will allow a judge to grant permission to law enforcement agencies enabling them to hack computers anywhere, provided the location of the target computer has been hidden by technical means. That means that users of TOR, VPNs, and proxies etc could all become vulnerable, regardless of why they are using such tools. But it doesn’t stop there.
“It might also extend to people who deny access to location data for smartphone apps because they don’t feel like sharing their location with ad networks,” the EFF previously warned.
“It could even include individuals who change the country setting in an online service, like folks who change the country settings of their Twitter profile in order to read uncensored Tweets.”
Also of concern is the second part of the proposal which would allow judges to issue a search warrant authorizing the hacking or seizing of computers that might be acting as part of a botnet. That means you, if your computer happens to have been infected with a botnet trojan.
Importantly, Congress didn’t vote through the changes to Rule 41, judicial approval was obtained by the Department of Justice instead. This means that unless Congress passes new legislation to block the changes, time will run out December 1, 2016.
With this deadline looming, a fresh push is underway to try and block what many see as a serious danger to computer users’ security worldwide. To that end a broad coalition of 50 organizations including public interest groups, privacy tool providers, and Internet companies have written to Congress opposing the changes.
In their letter, Google, EFF, Demand Progress, FightForTheFuture, TOR, VPN providers Private Internet Access, Golden Frog and Hide My Ass, plus many others, urge Congress to “consider and debate” the implications of the new rule.
“The changes to Rule 41 give federal magistrate judges across the United States new authority to issue warrants for hacking and surveillance in cases where a computer’s location is unknown,” the letter reads.
“This would invite law enforcement to seek warrants authorizing them to hack thousands of computers at once — which it is hard to imagine would not be in direct violation of the Fourth Amendment.”
Noting that the changes would allow for the hacking of innocent computer users, the coalition describes the proposal as dangerously broad.
“It fails to provide appropriate guidelines for safeguarding privacy and security, and it circumvents the legislative process that would provide Congress and the public the critically necessary opportunity to evaluate these issues,” they continue.
But perhaps most importantly, the proposed changes will undermine the security of those who need it most – those who have taken legitimate steps to protect their privacy with anonymizing tools such as VPNs and TOR.
“There are countless reasons people may want to use technology to shield their privacy. From journalists communicating with sources to victims of domestic violence seeking information on legal services, people worldwide depend on privacy tools for privacy, personal safety, and data security,” the letter reads.
“Many businesses even require their employees to use virtual private networks for security, especially during travel. Such tools should be actively promoted as a way to safeguard privacy, not discouraged.”
Finally, the groups encourage Congress to take action.
“The Stopping Mass Hacking Act offers a simple solution: it rejects the changes to Rule 41. Passing this bill by December 1 will ensure that Congress has time to fully consider the issue of government hacking before this practice becomes widespread. We urge you to support this bill and to reject the changes to Rule 41,” their letter concludes.
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Okay Codar thanks for that, my next question is would BT give me a Static I.P.
Many thanks.
According to this article no
https://www.broadbandchoices.c…/bt/bt-broadband-fixed-ip
however it is from 2014 so things may have changed, BT love money so may offer it as a extra perhaps
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Now that the European Championships are well underway, UEFA and its partners have started cracking down on the many unauthorized streams that are being broadcasted online. Despite their efforts, it seems to be a game that they can't possibly win.
With a daily audience of tens of millions of people, the 2016 UEFA Euro Cup in France is one of the largest sporting events of the year.
While football is considered to be a game of the people, UEFA is carefully controlling who can watch what, when and where.
One of the thorns in the side of the football organization and its rightsholders are unauthorized live streams. These streams have become quite common, and offer people a chance to follow the various matches without having to pay for a subscription.
Over the past week UEFA and its partners have targeted several sites offering such streams. They includes several Google Blogspot blogs that are specifically setup to stream sports events.
TorrentFreak has checked several UEFA notices that were addressed to Blogspot and found that none of the pages were taken down. However, the live feeds on these sites are no longer available, which means that there is no infringing activity either.
This also signals one of the problems sports broadcasters often have to deal with. Due to the live nature of their “works” the actual takedowns have to be pretty much instant. After all, when a match has ended it’s already too late.
Some UEFA Euro Cup rightsholders have tried to address this by sending advance notices to various sites. However, for site owners it is hard to take something down that doesn’t yet exists.
Various torrent sites therefore refused to take pre-preemptive action, and Google hasn’t responded yet to a similar pre-piracy request.
In addition to various specialized live streaming portals, the UEFA Euro Cup and other events are also more frequently shared on social media. Apps such as Periscope make is very easy for people to stream and watch these events and despite the horrible quality, some get hundreds or thousands of views.
UEFA has previously gone after Periscope streams of other events and some recent Euro Cup streams have disappeared as well, suggesting that the football organization is keeping a close eye on these social streams too.
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A man who ran a movie streaming site that generated £300,000 and cost the movie industry millions has failed to have his four-year sentence reduced. Paul Mahoney was told by Northern Ireland's most senior judge that his offending had been persistent and that matters had only been made worse by his ignoring of cease and desist notices.
Acting on intelligence provided by the UK’s Federation Against Copyright Theft, police in Northern Ireland raided a Londonderry home in May 2011.
Police were looking for evidence relating to streaming links site FastPassTV and discussion and linking forum BedroomMedia. FACT believed that the brains behind the operation was local man Paul Mahoney. He was arrested and police seized equipment and cash totaling £83,000.
Like many cases of this type, passage through the legal system was glacial and it took until February 2015 for Mahoney to be charged. At first he pleaded not guilty but that wouldn’t last.
In June 2015 the 30-year-old pleaded guilty to all four charges against him including allowing the public to view copyrighted movies without rightsholder permission, conspiracy, and generating up to £300,000 in advertising revenue.
Prosecutors initially argued that Mahoney had cost the movie industry around £120 million but that was eventually brought down to a large, although more reasonable, £12 million.
In September 2015, Mahoney was found guilty and was sentenced to four years in prison, two of which to be spent on license. However, with such a long sentence it was always likely that Mahoney would appeal the decision. That process is now complete and it’s bad news for the 30-year-old.
Lord Chief Justice Sir Declan Morgan, Northern Ireland’s most senior judge, presided over the appeal. He was unsympathetic to Mahoney’s arguments.
“On any view this was a case of very significant harm,” he said.
An aggravating factor were the actions taken by Mahoney since 2007 to avoid having his sites closed down. Sir Declan noted that cease-and-desist notices issued by FACT were ignored and despite police arresting Mahoney twice, he still continued.
“The website was clearly professionally structured and he retained staff to assist him with this,” the judge said.
“He was the driving force behind the criminal behaviour.”
At his earlier trial, Mahoney’s health issues including partial blindness and reclusive behavior were presented as mitigating factors. He never intended to get rich, his lawyer argued, it was a hobby that got out of control.
“There were no Rolex watches, no Ferraris outside and no evidence of an extravagant lifestyle. This enterprise took on a life of its own and became far more successful than this defendant ever envisaged,” he said.
Dismissing Mahoney’s appeal, the judge found that the mitigating factors had already been taken into consideration when the original sentence was handed down. He also said that Mahoney’s chance for a lighter sentence came and went when he failed to cooperate during initial interview and failed to plead guilty at the earliest opportunity.
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