Glad your problem is sorted, i will close this thread now :thumb:
Posts by Prophet
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After defeating the real Grooveshark the RIAA is now determined to do the same to a copycat site that claims to be its reincarnation. However, new court documents reveal that the lawsuit may be the start of a broader anti-piracy strategy, with popular Internet services such as CloudFlare and LeaseWeb being dragged into the fight.
Earlier this month the long running lawsuit between the RIAA and Grooveshark came to an end.
Facing hundreds of millions in damages, the music streaming service settled the dispute for $50 million while offering an apology for the mistakes that had been made in the past.
The RIAA heralded the outcome as a major victory, but the joy didn’t last long. A few days after Grooveshark shut down unknown persons launched a new music service using the familiar Grooveshark brand.
Recognizing the new Grooveshark.io service as a considerable threat, the RIAA didn’t waste any time taking countermeasures. The group filed a sealed application for temporary restraining and seizure orders, targeting the site’s domain name and hosting services.
The court granted the RIAA’s request earlier this month and this week the documents were unsealed. They reveal how the music group intends to drag both Cloudflare and hosting provider LeaseWeb into the fight.
In his declaration, RIAA’s VP Online Anti-Piracy Mark McDevitt describes the new Grooveshark as a “blatantly illegal” site that hides its true location behind CloudFlare’s service.
“Because of the presence of CloudFlare’s servers, it is impossible to identify the location of the actual server supporting those aspects of the website absent the disclosure of this information by CloudFlare,” McDevitt writes (pdf).
While CloudFlare doesn’t host any of the infringing files, it’s accused of helping Grooveshark to evade detection. The RIAA alerted CloudFlare of this role early May and asked the company to take action, without the desired result.
“In response to this notice, CloudFlare informed the RIAA that it had notified the operator of the Grooveshark.io website of the RIAA’s complaint, but did not discontinue providing its services to the website,” McDevitt writes.
In an email seen by TF, CloudFlare informs the RIAA that it’s merely a pass-through provider, and that they’re not offering any hosting services.
“Please be aware CloudFlare is a network provider offering a reverse proxy, pass-through security service. We are not a hosting provider. CloudFlare does not control the content of our customers,” the company replied.
Even today, the new Grooveshark remains active on the Grooveshark.li domain name, and it’s still hiding behind CloudFlare. The site did lose its original domain name, which Namecheap seized after receiving the court order, but new domains are easily registered.
It’s unclear at this point whether CloudFlare is actively refusing to comply with the restraining order that’s targeted at Grooveshark’s Internet service providers, but the company’s counsel did attend a court hearing yesterday to discuss the matter.
Besides CloudFlare, the RIAA also names web company LeaseWeb, which they suspect of offering hosting services to the new Grooveshark. In its presentations to the court the RIAA lashes out hard against the Dutch company.
“LeaseWeb has a long history of hosting major pirate sites. For example, LeaseWeb once hosted the notorious (and now shuttered) pirate website ‘MegaUpload,’ which was the subject of the largest criminal copyright law enforcement action ever undertaken,” McDevitt writes.
“Other examples of LeaseWeb’s involvement with pirate sites are also well known in the antipiracy community,” he adds, after summing up several other examples.
Neither CloudFlare nor LeaseWeb are named as defendants, but the language used makes clear that the RIAA isn’t happy with how they respond to copyright complaints.
While Grooveshark.li is a relatively small fish, the case may set a crucial precedent for future anti-piracy efforts. With relative ease the Court has issued temporary restraining and seizure orders. If these hold up, more sites may be targeted in a similar fashion.
This outlook may also be the reason for CloudFlare to have their say in the matter. As a service provider to some of the largest piracy havens, including The Pirate Bay, there’s a lot at stake.
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The High Court has granted an application by The Publishers Association to have several major 'pirate' eBook sites blocked at the ISP level. The action, a first for book publishers, requires BT, Virgin Media, Sky, TalkTalk and EE to block sites including Ebookee, LibGen and Freshwap within 10 days.
stopstopRather than tackling unauthorized sites with direct legal action, major entertainment industry companies are increasingly attempting to disrupt ‘pirate’ operations with broader strokes.
One of the favored tools is site blocking, a technique that has gathered considerable momentum in Europe and the UK in particular. More than 120 domains are currently blocked by the country’s major ISPs, largely thanks to action taken by the movie and music industries plus soccer body The Premier League.
This week the pool of organizations to succeed in site-blocking legal action deepened with the addition of The Publishers Association (PA). The group, which has more than 100 members with combined revenues of £4.7 billion, went to the High Court to demand the blocking of several eBook focused download sites.
They are: Ebookee, LibGen, Freshwap, AvaxHome, Bookfi, Bookre and Freebookspot.
According to the PA its investigations found that over 80% of the material made available by the sites infringes copyright. In total the sites are said to offer in excess of 10 million titles.
In response the PA and its members claim to have sent close to one million takedown notices directly to the sites and requested that Google remove 1.75 million related URLs from its search results.
In common with all previous similar actions initiated by the MPAA and BPI, The Publishers Association (with support from the Association of American Publishers) sued the UK’s leading ISPs – BT, Virgin Media, Sky, TalkTalk and EE – under Section 97A of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Presenting a case which demonstrated mass infringement on the eBook sites in question alongside evidence that the major ISPs have “actual knowledge” that their subscribers are infringing copyright, the PA argued that the sites should be blocked without further delay.
After consideration, yesterday the High Court handed down its ruling in favor of the publishers. The outcome was never really in question – UK ISPs have long since given up defending these cases.
“We are very pleased that the High Court has granted this order and, in doing so, recognizes the damage being inflicted on UK publishers and authors by these infringing websites,” says Richard Mollet, Chief Executive of The PA.
“A third of publisher revenues now come from digital sales but unfortunately this rise in the digital market has brought with it a growth in online infringement. Our members need to be able to protect their authors’ works from such illegal activity; writers need to be paid and publishers need to be able to continue to innovate and invest in new talent and material.”
The ISPs listed in the injunction now have 10 days in which to implement a blockade.
High Court injunctions represent a new anti-piracy tool for The Publishers Association. In addition to its regular takedown work with search engines such as Google, The PA is also involved in City of London Police’s Operation Creative, run out of the Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit (PIPCU). Last year PIPCU acted on The PA’s behalf by taking down a domain operated by eBook site OnRead.
The full list of sites to be blocked in the UK is now as follows:
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New: Ebookee, LibGen, Freshwap, AvaxHome, Bookfi, Bookre and Freebookspot.
Previously blocked: popcorntime.io, flixtor.me, popcorn-time.se, isoplex.isohunt.to, watchonlineseries.eu, axxomovies.org, afdah.com and g2g.fm, Bursalagu, Fullsongs, Mega-Search, Mp3 Monkey, Mp3.li, Mp3Bear, MP3Boo, Mp3Clan, Mp3Olimp, MP3s.pl, Mp3soup, Mp3Truck, Musicaddict, My Free MP3, Plixid, RnBXclusive, STAFA Band, watchseries.lt, Stream TV, Watchseries-online, Cucirca, Movie25, watchseries.to, Iwannawatch, Warez BB, Ice Films, Tehparadox, Heroturko, Scene Source,, Rapid Moviez, Iwatchonline, Los Movies, Isohunt, Torrentz.pro, Torrentbutler, IP Torrents, Sumotorrent, Torrent Day, Torrenting, BitSoup, TorrentBytes, Seventorrents, Torrents.fm, Yourbittorrent, Tor Movies , Demonoid, torrent.cd, Vertor, Rar BG, bittorrent.am, btdigg.org, btloft.com, bts.to, limetorrents.com, nowtorrents.com, picktorrent.com, seedpeer.me, torlock.com, torrentbit.net, torrentdb.li, torrentdownload.ws, torrentexpress.net, torrentfunk.com, torrentproject.com, torrentroom.com, torrents.net, torrentus.eu, torrentz.cd, torrentzap.com, vitorrent.org.Megashare, Viooz, Watch32, Zmovie, Solarmovie, Tubeplus, Primewire, Vodly, Watchfreemovies, Project-Free TV, Yify-Torrents, 1337x, Bitsnoop, Extratorrent, Monova, Torrentcrazy, Torrentdownloads, Torrentreactor, Torrentz, Ambp3, Beemp3, Bomb-mp3, Eemp3world, Filecrop, Filestube, Mp3juices, Mp3lemon, Mp3raid, Mp3skull, Newalbumreleases, Rapidlibrary, EZTV, FirstRowSports, Download4all, Movie2K, KickAssTorrents, Fenopy, H33T and The Pirate Bay.
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Sling TV has launched its Android TV application for Google’s Nexus Player, available for immediate download in the Google Play Store.
New customers can purchase a Nexus Player at a 50% discount when they pre-pay for three months of Sling TV. Alternatively, customers can choose to sample Sling TV on their Nexus Player for seven days at no cost.
With this release, Nexus Player and other devices on the Android TV platform expand Sling TV’s device portfolio by joining Roku, Roku TV, Amazon Fire TV, Amazon Fire TV Stick, Xbox One, Android and iOS devices, Macs and PCs. Sling TV said it continues to be available across more platforms than any competitive offering.
“We’re committed to making Sling TV available on the most popular devices consumers use to stream live and on-demand entertainment,” said Roger Lynch, CEO of Sling TV.
“Today, we again bolstered our device footprint by expanding to Nexus Player’s Android TV platform, and we expect this partnership to deliver additional convenience for both new and existing Sling TV customers
Source : http://www.businesswire.com/ne…TV-Including#.VWVkUVVViko
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H33T.to, one of the most popular public torrent sites on the Internet, disappeared in recent days with only an ominous Cloudflare warning left behind. Prompted by lots of email requests about the site's status, TF decided to hunt the missing site down. It took a while, but for the patient the site can be found.
People being unable to access a particular torrent site is perhaps the most common complaint in the file-sharing world today, and that should come as little surprise considering the elements at play.
While citizens of the U.S. largely enjoy unfettered access to any site, file-sharers in Europe have to deal with website blocking on a grand scale. Add domain seizures, pressure on webhosts and sundry raids that effect everyone into the mix, it’s perhaps surprising just how well sites are coping.
One site with a checkered recent uptime history is H33T. At times one of the world’s Top 10 torrent sites, H33T has fought through some very public spats with copyright holders and has been blocked in the UK since 2013 after music industry group BPI obtained a High Court order against the country’s six ISPs.
Recently H33T disappeared again but with no comment from anyone running the site (if anyone is, day to day), millions of the site’s users were left wondering what the following message from Cloudflare means for the future.
“You’ve requested a page on a website (h33t.to) that is on the CloudFlare network. CloudFlare is currently not routing the requested domain (h33t.to). There are two potential causes of this,” Cloudflare explains.
From the above it’s clear that Cloudflare isn’t currently a helpful service for those trying to access the site. The big question, however, is whether H33T is functioning somewhere and Cloudflare is the issue, or whether it’s gone altogether. Time to bypass Cloudflare to find out.
A few minutes of detective work turn up two potential direct IP addresses for H33T, one registered to a Canadian datacenter and the other located in the tiny 115-island country of Seychelles. At first, both appear useless, with the Canadian IP doing nothing and the Seychelles IP directing straight back to Google.
However, by adding the latter IP to the Windows hosts file and then accessing H33T.to in the usual way……
….H33T magically springs to life.
Perhaps surprisingly the site seems entirely operational, with torrents uploaded as recently as today. Exactly what the problem is remains unclear, but serious issues with Cloudflare that have persisted for many days seem to be the culprit.
Why these haven’t been fixed is a question likely to go unanswered. The site’s once-popular Facebook page hasn’t been updated since October 2014 and still lists the long-defunct URL H33T.com as the site’s main domain.
In the meantime and not withstanding hosts edits, proxies such as this one are keeping the site alive. Only time will tell if Cloudflare will re-enable the site – the company does not discuss individual cases.
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A federal court in Oregon has signed off on a highly peculiar judgment against a Dallas Buyers Club pirate. Citing "financial hardship," the woman doesn't have to pay the $7,500 in costs and fees as long as she promises not to download any infringing material in the future, and removes any and all BitTorrent clients.
The makers of Dallas Buyers Club have sued thousands of BitTorrent users over the past year.
Many of these cases end up being settled for an undisclosed amount. This is usually a figure around $3,500, which is what the company offers in their settlement proposals. However, there are exceptions to this rule with damages and costs in some cases hitting $14,000.
This week we stumbled upon a new consent judgment between Oregon resident Krystal Krause and the movie studio. In this case the Magistrate Judge signed off on an order that requires the defendant to pay $7,500.
Interestingly, however, the woman doesn’t have to pay anything as long as she promises not to pirate any movies in the future. According to the judgment the filmmakers offer this leniency due to the “financial hardship” and “extenuating circumstances.”
“In recognition of the financial hardship and extenuating circumstances in this case, plaintiff agrees that though the below Money Judgment shall be entered and enforceable, plaintiff will not execute or enforce the Money Judgment so long as the defendant complies with the below Permanent Injunction…,” the consent order reads.
The court documents do not explain what the extenuating circumstances are, but it suggests that money isn’t the only issue.
Looking more closely at the permanent injunction it appears that there are more reasons why the order is unusual.
In addition to barring any future infringements, Krause can’t use BitTorrent for legal purposes either. In fact, she has to remove all BitTorrent and P2P software she has installed.
“Krystal Krause is hereby directed to immediately delete […] any and all BitTorrent clients on any computer(s) she owns or controls together with all other software used to obtain media through the Internet by BitTorrent peer-to-peer transfer or exchange,” it reads (pdf).
For Krause it may be a small sacrifice to make, especially when it saves $7,500 in costs. That said, it’s still highly unusual to order someone to remove software that by itself isn’t infringing at all.
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The court order to transfer ownership of two Pirate Bay-related domains to the Swedish state will not be a straightforward process. Site co-founder Fredrik Neij, a party in the two-year long case, has just announced he will appeal the ruling. Neij isn't interested in the domains though, he has much more serious things to consider.
Last week a two year old case launched by the Swedish state concerning a pair of key Pirate Bay domains came to an end.
While the prosecution failed in its quest to hold the Swedish .SE registry responsible for infringements carried out by The Pirate Bay and its users, it did convince the Stockholm District Court to put ThePirateBay.se and PirateBay.se out of action.
Even though the domains were held in a third-party’s name, the Court found that Pirate Bay co-founder Fredrik Neij owned and operated them. On that basis they were ordered to be placed under the future control of the Swedish state, never to be used again.
“Fredrik Neij has participated in the [copyright infringement] crimes that have been identified and he is the actual holder of the domain names. It is therefore no obstacle to confiscate domain names from him,” the Court said.
The parties were given until June 9, 2015, to appeal but less than a week later we now know that The Pirate Bay’s most recognizable domains will remain operational for at least a little while longer.
Through his lawyer Jonas Nilsson, this morning Fredrik Neij confirmed that he will appeal the confiscation order handed down May 19 by the District Court. But while some might presume that getting the domains handed back is a key aim of Neij, that is not the case. He is actually more interested in challenging the Court’s reasoning.
“The district court makes an erroneous assessment of how to look at a domain name. We believe it is an address assignment, not an estate,” Nilsson says.
“The prosecution has alleged two things. One is that crimes have been committed via The Pirate Bay. Fredrik Neij really has no views on this. The second is that he is involved in The Pirate Bay operation.”
It was the assertion that the domains were controlled by Neij and used to infringe copyright that appeared to make it a straightforward decision for the Court to order their forfeiture. But for Neij, however, that has the potential to develop into a more serious matter.
In 2009 the Stockholm District Court banned Fredrik Neij and co-founder Gottfrid Svartholm from having anything to do with the site, even though both were living outside Sweden (even the EU) by that time. Nevertheless, the court attached a 500,000 kronor ($59,500) penalty to any breach.
With Neij set to be released from prison next week after serving his Pirate Bay sentence, one has to wonder if the District Court’s determination will negatively affect that in some way. As reported here in December 2014, a leaked MPAA email predicted continued trouble.
“Neij is facing a 10 month prison sentence in Sweden for his conviction in the Pirate Bay case. Neij may also face new charges for his continuing role in the operation of TPB and two additional charges for computer hacking,” the email read.
Either way, Neij has unfinished business in Sweden and with his history of moving to far-off lands to avoid justice, it wouldn’t be a surprise if the prosecution argued for his continued detention.
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A long-running criminal case against a private torrent site and its hosting provider has come to an end. After more than three and a half years, the site admin was found guilty of copyright infringement but allowed to keep site donations. The site's webhost, who refused to take down the site without a court order, was completely acquitted.
pirate bay flagFollowing a complaint from Swedish anti-piracy group Antipiratbyrån, in November 2011 police carried out raids in two locations against private torrent site TTi, aka The Internationals.
In one location police targeted site owner Joel Larsson. In another, Patrik Lagerman, boss of web-hosting firm PatrikWeb, the company providing hosting for the torrent site.
The case against Larsson centered around the unlawful distribution of copyrighted video content by his site’s users. Lagerman was accused of aiding that infringement after he refused to take the site down following a request (not backed by a court order) from Antipiratbyrån.
The case dragged on for more than three and a half years but concluded earlier this month. The judgment was handed down yesterday and its one of mixed fortunes.
Larsson previously admitted to being the operator of TTi and also the person who accepted donations from site members, an amount equivalent to around US$12,000. He also insisted that he never controlled the content shared by his site’s users.
In its judgment, however, the court noted that files found on a confiscated PC revealed details of meetings with site staff indicating that Larsson fully understood that the site was involved in the exchange of infringing content.
The Court found Larsson guilty of copyright infringement and sentenced him to 90 hours community service. If prison had been suggested by the prosecutor he would have served three months.
The Court also seized several servers connected with the site but rejected a prosecution claim for the forfeiture of $12,000 in site donations after it was determined Larsson spent the same amount keeping the site running.
For Patrik Lagerman, the site’s host, things went much better. Despite finding that Lagerman had indeed been involved in the site’s operations by providing hosting and infrastructure, he was deemed not negligent for his refusal to take down the site without a court order. He was acquitted on all charges.
Commenting on the judgment, Sara Lindbäck at Rights Alliance told TorrentFreak that getting a conviction was the important thing in this case.
“The person responsible for the illegal service was found guilty. That is the important part in the ruling. The illegal services are causing tremendous damages to the rights holders,” Lindbäck said.
“In this case the person had also received substantial amounts in donations, in other words receiving money for content that somebody else has created.”
Speaking on Lagerman’s acquittal, Lindbäck acknowledged that the situation had been less straightforward.
“Regarding the hosting provider, the court did not find him responsible for copyright infringement. The legal aspects to the responsibility for hosting providers is of course interesting legally. We will now analyze the ruling further and see what consequences it can have in the future.”
Rights Alliance did not reveal whether it intends to appeal, but considering the amount of time already passed since the arrests in 2011, that seems unlikely.
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The Pirate Bay has lost one of its new domain names after an intervention from South Georgia's .GS registry. While the domain suspension wasn't unexpected and the proverbial Hydra has now lost one head, TPB says that it can easily grow some more.
Earlier this week the Stockholm District Court ordered the Pirate Bay’s .SE domains to be handed over to the Swedish state, arguing that they were linked to copyright crimes.
The Pirate Bay was fully prepared for the negative outcome and quickly redirected its visitors to six new domain names.
Since then the site has been accessible through the GS, LA, VG, AM, MN and GD domain names, without even a second of downtime.
Marking the change The Pirate Bay updated its logo to the familiar Hydra logo, linking a TLD to each of the heads. However, we can now reveal that one head has already been chopped off.
The site’s .GS domain name has been suspended by the registry, and ThePirateBay.gs is now listed as “ServerHold” and “Inactive.”
The Pirate Bay informs us that the .GS domain has indeed been lost, which didn’t come as a complete shock. In fact, one of the reasons to move to six domains was to see which ones would hold up.
“We have more domain names behind, if needed. We are stronger than ever and will defend the site to the end,” the TPB team tells us.
At this point it’s unclear for how long the other domain names will remain available. Hoping to find out more, we reached out to the respective registries to discover their policies on domains being operated by The Pirate Bay.
The Mongolian .MN registry informs TF that they will process potential complaints through ICANN’s Dispute Resolution Policy, suggesting that they will not take any voluntary action.
The VG Registry referred us to their terms and conditions, specifically sections 3.4 and 7.2, which allow for an immediate termination or suspension if a domain infringes on the rights of third parties. However, it could not comment on this specific case.
“We will review any complaint and act accordingly. Please understand that we cannot make any predictions based on theoretical options,” a VG Registry spokesperson says.
It won’t be a big surprise if several more Pirate Bay domain names are suspended during the days and weeks to come. That’s a Whac-A-Mole game the site’s operators are all too familiar with now, but one that won’t bring the site to its knees.
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After escaping from the planet Krypton years ago, 24-year-old Kara Zor-El is embracing her superhuman abilities. Better known as Supergirl, her latest adventures were to be showcased in a CBS pilot scheduled to air this coming November. This morning and six months early, the much-anticipated pilot leaked online.
After making an appearance as far back as 1958, Supergirl was intended to be a female counterpart to DC Comics’ Superman who first appeared 20 years earlier. While successful in her own right, she never quite reached the dizzy heights of the Clark Kent-based character.
This yeah, however, the world is braced for the return of Supergirl in a new CBS TV series. Featuring Melissa Benoist (Glee, Homeland, Law and Order) as Kara Zor-El, an alien who has hidden her powers since escaping from Krypton, the show will see her transform into Supergirl and “the superhero she was meant to be.”
After a commitment in September 2014, the series was officially picked up by CBS earlier this month. The pilot was scheduled to debut in November, but those plans have now massively unraveled after the episode leaked online, six months earlier than its planned debut.
Two ‘Scene’ release groups – DiMENSiON and LOL – competed to premiere the title first this morning, with the latter beating the former by around 90 seconds. LOL’s version is a convenient 400mb so likely to become the most sought after copy. On the other hand DiMENSiON’s is more than 15 times the size, but for 1080p connoisseurs it’ll be worth the wait.
Although it’s certainly possible that the pilot contains hidden watermarks, as far as visible identifiers go the 46 minute episode looks very clean. As illustrated by the image below, there are no tell-tale ‘property of’ warnings that are regularly seen on ‘screener’ copies of leaked movies.
The leak of the pilot came as a complete surprise a couple of hours ago so download stats on BitTorrent sites are a currently quite modest 25,000 or so. However, given the anticipated media snowball effect during the day the number of downloads is likely to increase dramatically, probably to more than a million by this time tomorrow.
The Supergirl leak comes just weeks after the first four episodes of the new series of Game of Thrones leaked online. That event triggered a piracy crazy that continues to this day.
Whether more episodes of Supergirl will leak online in the days to come is unknown but in any event it seems likely that CBS will try to stem the current tide. The company is a prolific sender of DMCA takedown notices and regularly sends more than 100,000 each week to Google alone.
Just watching the 1080p at the moment, quality is superb, but the show not really my cup of tea
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It's taken more than two years for Swedish authorities to seize two key Pirate Bay domains but over in the United States the process is dramatically quicker. A TV company has just achieved similar aims against 11 'pirate' streaming domains after being granted a comprehensive ex parte restraining order by a Florida court.
One the biggest piracy-related stories of the year broke this week after Swedish authorities succeeded in their quest to take over two key Pirate Bay domains.
The court order, handed down Tuesday, will see ThePirateBay.se and PirateBay.se fall under the control of the Swedish government, provided no appeal is filed in the coming weeks. It’s been a long and drawn out process but given the site’s history, one with an almost inevitable outcome.
Over in the United States and spurred on by ‘rogue’ sites such as TPB, much attention has been focused on depriving ‘pirate’ sites of their essential infrastructure, domains included. Just last week the MPAA and RIAA appeared before the House Judiciary Committee’s Internet subcommittee complaining that ICANN isn’t doing enough to deal with infringing domains.
Of course, having ICANN quickly suspend domains would be convenient, but entertainment industry groups aren’t completely helpless. In fact, yet another complaint filed in the United States by TV company ABS-CBN shows how easily it is to take control of allegedly infringing domains.
The architect of several recent copyright infringement complaints, in its latest action ABS-CBN requested assistance from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida.
The TV company complained that eleven sites (listed below) have been infringing its rights by offering content without permission. To protect its business moving forward ABS-CBN requested an immediate restraining order and after an ex parte hearing, District Court Judge William P. Dimitrouleas was happy to oblige.
In an order (pdf) handed down May 15 (one day after the complaint was filed) Judge Dimitrouleas acknowledges that the sites unlawfully “advertised, promoted, offered for distribution, distributed or performed” copyrighted works while infringing on ABS-CBN trademarks. He further accepted that the sites were likely to continue their infringement and cause “irreparable injury” to the TV company in the absence of protection by the Court.
Granting a temporary order (which will become preliminary and then permanent in the absence of any defense by the sites in question) the Judge restrained the site operators from further infringing on ABS-CBN copyrights and trademarks. However, it is the domain element that provokes the most interest.
In addition to ordering the sites’ operators not to transfer any domains until the Court advises, Judge Dimitrouleas ordered the registrars of the domains to transfer their certificates to ABS-CBN’s counsel. Registrars must then lock the domains and inform their registrants what has taken place.
Furthermore, the Whois privacy protection services active on the domains and used to conceal registrant identities are ordered to hand over the site operators’ personal details to ABS-CBN so that the TV company is able to send a copy of the restraining order. If no active email address is present in Whois records, ABS-CBN is allowed to contact the defendants via their websites.
Once this stage is complete the domain registrars are ordered to transfer the domains to a new registrar of ABS-CBN’s choosing. However, if the registrars fail to act within 24 hours, the TLD registries (.COM etc) must take overriding action within five days.
The Court also ordered ABS-CBN’s registrar to redirect any visitors to the domains to a specific URL (http://servingnotice.com/BL4G47/index.html) which is supposed to contain a copy of the order. At the time of writing, however, that URL is non-functional.
Also of interest is how the Court locks down attempts to get the sites running again. In addition to expanding the restraining order to any new domains the site operators may choose to move to, the Court grants ABS-CBN access to Google Webmaster Tools so that the company may “cancel any redirection of the domains that have been entered there by Defendants which redirect traffic to the counterfeit operations to a new domain name or website.”
The domains affected are: freepinoychannel.com, lambingan.to, pinoymovie.to, pinoynetwork.to, pinoytambayan-replay.com, pinoytambayantv.com, tambaytayo.com, tvnijuan.net, phstream.com, streampinoy.info and tambayanatin.com.
Despite the order having been issued last Thursday, at the time of writing all but one of the domains remains operational. Furthermore, and in an interesting twist, pinoymovie.to and pinoynetwork.to have already skipped to fresh domains operated by none other than the Swedish administered .SE registry.
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Google Fiber is forwarding copyright infringement notices to its subscribers including controversial and automated piracy fines. Through these notices, rightsholders demand settlements of up to hundreds of dollars. Google's decision to forward these emails is surprising, as the company generally has a good track record of protecting consumer interests.
Every month Google receives dozens of millions of DMCA takedown requests from copyright holders, most of which are directed at its search engine.
However, with Google Fiber being rolled out in more cities, notices targeting allegedly pirating Internet subscribers are becoming more common as well.
These include regular takedown notices but also the more controversial settlement demands sent by companies such as Rightscorp and CEG TEK.
Instead of merely alerting subscribers that their connections have been used to share copyright infringing material, these notices serve as automated fines, offering subscribers settlements ranging from $20 to $300.
The scheme uses the standard DMCA takedown process which means that the copyright holder doesn’t have to go to court or even know who the recipient is. In fact, the affected subscriber is often not the person who shared the pirated file.
To protect customers against these practices many ISPs including Comcast, Verizon and AT&T have chosen not to forward settlement demands. However, information received by TF shows that Google does take part.
Over the past week we have seen settlement demands from Rightscorp and CEG TEK which were sent to Google Fiber customers. In an email, Google forwards the notice with an additional warning that repeated violations may result in a permanent disconnection.
“Repeated violations of our Terms of Service may result in remedial action being taken against your Google Fiber account, up to and including possible termination of your service,” Google Fiber writes.
Below Google’s message is the notification with the settlement demand, which in this example was sent on behalf of music licensing outfit BMG. In the notice, the subscriber is warned over possible legal action if the dispute is not settled.
“BMG will pursue every available remedy including injunctions and recovery of attorney’s fees, costs and any and all other damages which are incurred by BMG as a result of any action that is commenced against you,” the notice reads.
Facing such threatening language many subscribers are inclined to pay up, which led some to accuse the senders of harassment and abuse. In addition, several legal experts have spoken out against this use of the DMCA takedown process.
Mitch Stoltz, staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) previously told us that Internet providers should carefully review what they’re forwarding to their users. Under U.S. law they are not required to forward DMCA notices and forwarding these automated fines may not be in the best interest of consumers.
“In the U.S., ISPs don’t have any legal obligation to forward infringement notices in their entirety. An ISP that cares about protecting its customers from abuse should strip out demands for money before forwarding infringement notices. Many do this,” Stoltz said.
According to Stoltz these settlement demands are often misleading or inaccurate, suggesting that account holders are responsible for all use of their Internet connections.
“The problem with notices demanding money from ISP subscribers is that they’re often misleading. They often give the impression that the person whose name is on the ISP bill is legally responsible for all infringement that might happen on the Internet connection, which is simply not true,” he notes.
While Google is certainly not the only ISP that forwards these notices it is the biggest name involved. TF asked Google why they have decided to forward the notices in their entirely but unfortunately the company did not respond to our request for comment.
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Isnt this the UK version of Setanta?
I wonder if they are going HD?
No mate, not that UK version of Setanta, different channel
I have read that Setanta HD has an exclusive deal with UPC (ireland cable), so we may not see this on the satellite platform anytime soon
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i dont think iv ever watched that channel
Not my cup of tea either buddy, the pricing seems a little high imo too...
The channel costs £11.99 per month with a 2 month minimum subscription. An £8 connection fee also applies.
Alternatively, you can opt for a 12 month annual season ticket saving you over £50. -
This has been posted on the official Premier Sports website....
We are delighted to confirm a high definition version of the Premier Sports channel will be launching in July of 2015.
The date is yet to be set by SKY and the HD channel will initally be on the SKY platform only.
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A French court has convicted four people accused of card sharing with suspended jail sentences between two and eight months
The people involved were three men aged 38, 46 and 50 year and a woman aged 29, from the cities of Talant, Lille, Pantin and Obernai.
Two people were given suspended jail sentences between two and eight months as well as damages of €94,000 and €29,149. The other two were convicted of suspended jail sentences of two and eight months respectively.
All four were ordered to pay the costs of the procedures, €4,000 and €1,000.
During the past years, Canal+ has obtained ten sentences in France against card sharing pirates and the broadcaster still has 17 investigations in process.
Source : http://www.broadbandtvnews.com…ates-convicted-in-france/
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Netflix is seriously considering adding support for P2P-powered video streaming using "state of the art" technology. Perhaps partly inspired by Popcorn Time, the video giant is inviting applications from individuals with BitTorrent experience to fill the post of Senior Software Engineer and help finalize and implement the ambitious project.
With roughly 60 million subscribers globally, Netflix is a giant in the world of online video entertainment.
The service moves massive amounts of data and is credited with consuming a third of all Internet traffic in North America during peak hours.
Netlix’s data use is quite costly for the company and also results in network congestion and stream buffering at times. However, thanks to P2P-powered streaming these problems may soon be a thing of the past.
In a job posting late April, Netflix says it is looking to expand its team with the addition of a Senior Software Engineer. While that’s nothing new, the description reveals information on the company’s P2P-streaming plans.
“Our team is evaluating up-and-coming content distribution technologies, and we are seeking a highly talented senior engineer to grow the knowledge base in the area of peer-to-peer technologies and lead the technology design and prototyping effort,” the application reads.
The software engineer will be tasked with guiding the project from start to finish. This includes the design and architecture phase, implementation, testing, the internal release and final evaluation.
“This is a great opportunity to enhance your full-stack development skills, and simultaneously grow your knowledge of the state of the art in peer-to-peer content distribution and network optimization techniques,” Netflix writes.
A few weeks ago Netflix told its shareholders that it sees the BitTorrent-powered piracy app Popcorn Time as a serious threat. However, the job application makes it clear that BitTorrent can be used for legal distribution as well.
Among the qualification requirements Netflix lists experience with BitTorrent and other P2P-protocols. Having contributed to the open source torrent streaming tool WebTorrent or a similar project is listed as a preferred job qualification.
In other words, existing Popcorn Time developers are well-suited candidates for the position.
– You have experience with peer-to-peer protocols such as the BitTorrent protocol
– You have strong experience in the development of peer-to-peer protocols and software
– You have contributed to a major peer-to-peer open source product such as WebTorrent
– You have strong experience in the development of web-based video applications and tools
Moving to P2P-assisted streaming appears to be a logical step. It will be possible to stream videos in a higher quality than is currently possible. In addition, it will offer a significant cost reduction.
BitTorrent inventor Bram Cohen will be happy to see that Netflix is considering using his technology. He previously said that Netflix’s video quality is really terrible, adding that BitTorrent-powered solutions are far superior.
“The fact is that by using BitTorrent it’s possible to give customers a much better experience with much less cost than has ever been possible before. It’s really not being utilized properly and that’s really unfortunate,” Cohen said.
While the job posting is yet more evidence that Netflix is seriously considering a move to P2P-powered streaming, it’s still unclear whether the new technology will ever see the light of day.
The job posting
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A few hours ago news broke that The Pirate Bay's .SE domain will soon be seized. The prosecution and copyright holders have welcomed the decision, but the Pirate Bay teams seems unimpressed. Shortly after the ruling they set up six new domain names which they will rotate for the time being.
The Pirate Bay has long been associated with Sweden but soon the popular torrent site will stop using a Swedish domain name.
Earlier today the Stockholm District Court ordered the seizure of both thepiratebay.se and piratebay.se, arguing that they were linked to copyright crimes.
Potential appeals aside the domains in question will be handed over to the Swedish Government, but the ruling is unlikely to hamper Pirate Bay’s availability, quite the contrary.
The TPB team informs TF that they have already begun redirecting the .SE address, rotating it to six new domain names.
As of now, the notorious torrent site is available through new GS, LA, VG, AM, MN and GD domain names.
This means that all the effort that went into the lawsuit, as well as at least $40,000 in legal costs, have done very little to stop the site.
“Congratulations to Prosecutor Fredrik Ingblad. Two years hard work to get us to change two little letters at a cost of $20,000 per letter,” the TPB team tells TF in a comment.
“He could have given us $35,000 and we would have left the domain, thus saving the Swedish tax payer $5,000. All he had to do was ask nicely,” they add.
With six new domains one can argue that The Pirate Bay has become even more resilient. There will undoubtedly be attempts to seize or suspend the new domains, but there are also plenty more domains TPB can register.
And so the Whack-a-Mole continues.
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In a decision handed down minutes ago the Stockholm District Court has ordered two key domains owned by The Pirate Bay to be seized. While the ruling means that the site will lose its famous ThePirateBay.se domain, don't expect the site to simply disappear. TPB informs TorrentFreak that they have plenty more domains left in store.
In keeping with a global strategy to disrupt the operations of unauthorized file-sharing sites by attacking their infrastructure, Swedish authorities have been eying two domains operated by the notorious Pirate Bay.
In 2013, Prosecutor Fredrik Ingblad, the man behind the operation that took the site down in December, filed a motion targeting ThePirateBay.se (the site’s main domain) and PirateBay.se (a lesser used alternative).
Filed against Punkt SE, the organization responsible for Sweden’s top level .SE domain, the case reasoned that since The Pirate Bay is an illegal operation, its domains are tools used by the site to infringe copyright. Noting that Punkt SE supplies and controls the domains and is therefore liable for their (mis)use, the domains should be dealt with in the same way that other criminal tools would be, Ingblad argued.
Punkt SE, on the other hand, took the position that holding a registry responsible for infringement has no basis in law. Furthermore, disabling domains is an ineffective way to deal with infringement.
After two years preparation the case was heard at the end of April 2015 and just a few minutes ago the decision was handed down.
After a week-long delay the Stockholm District Court ruled that The Pirate Bay will forfeit its Sweden-based domains – ThePirateBay.se and PirateBay.se – after finding that they belong to Pirate Bay co-founder Fredrik Neij.
“The District Court’s conclusion is that the domain names are property that can be forfeited,” the ruling reads.
“Fredrik Neij has participated in the [copyright infringement] crimes that have been identified and he is the actual holder of the domain names. It is therefore no obstacle to confiscate domain names from him. The prosecutor’s primary claim with respect to Fredrik Neij should be upheld and domain names should be confiscated from him in accordance with the Copyright Act.”
While copyright holders will be pleased that two of Pirate Bay’s domains will be put out of action (they will be seized by the Swedish state), the District Court dismissed the prosecution’s case against Punkt.se and awarded the registry close to $40,000 (SEK 332,000) in costs.
“We have received the verdict and are of course glad that the court chose to decide according to our view,” .SE public relations manager Elisabeth Nilsson informs TorrentFreak.
“We think it is good that this issue has been examined. Now we need some time to read through the verdict and do a thorough analysis before we can make any further comments.”
At least for now The Pirate Bay will continue business as usual. An insider informs TF that the site has plenty of other domains in reserve and will make a switch when required.
We have also requested comment from prosecutor Fredrik Ingblad and this article will be updated as soon as further details become available.
Should the parties wish to appeal they must do so no later than June 9, 2015.
Update: Sara Lindbäck of anti-piracy group Rights Alliance informs TF that the decision was expected and will make it harder for pirate sites to operate from Swedish domains.
“Pirate Bay has on a commercial scale committed massive infringements against rights holders. The forfeiture is a clear and positive sign that society does not accept these types of activities,” Lindbäck says.
“[In future] it will become more difficult for illegal players to run their activities under the SE-domain.”
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Popular TV-torrent distribution group EZTV is no more. After losing key domain names and data in a hostile takeover, EZTV founder NovaKing has called it quits. The group's retirement marks the end of an era in which the EZTV brand became synonymous with TV-torrents.
eztv-logo-smallDuring the spring of 2005 several large TV-torrent sites were knocked offline, leaving a gaping void that was soon filled by a new torrent distribution group, EZTV.
For a decade EZTV has been one of the leading TV distribution groups. It turned into one of the most visited torrent sites, but today this run comes to an end.
Facing a hostile takeover the group’s founder and main operator NovaKing has called it quits.
Initially it remained vague how EZTV’s demise came to be, not least because NovaKing could not be reached. However, with help from several EZTV staffers including sladinki007 we can now explain what happened.
The group’s troubles started earlier this year when the .IT registry suspended EZTV’s domain name because of inaccurate Whois information. A few weeks later the .IT registry put the domain back on the market and it was snapped up by scammers.
The people who took over the domain name came in well-prepared. They registered the UK company EZCloud LIMITED, which is the same company name as EZTV used. Initially the takeover wasn’t much of a problem, as EZTV had already moved to a new domain name at EZTV.ch, but things quickly turned from bad to worse.
Using the EZCloud company details and by faking the director’s name, the scammers also managed to take over the EZTV.se domain through the EuroDNS registrar. NovaKing tried to prevent this from happening by alerting the registrar, but according to an EZTV staffer he was told to get a court order if he wanted his domain back.
The .se domain was linked to the mailbox of EZTV founder NovaKing, which allowed them to access the domain registrar account and various other services for which they quickly reset all passwords. As a result, NovaKing was locked out, losing control of virtually all of his domain names.
Initially, there was also the possibility that the servers were compromised as well. This prompted a thorough security audit and a site lockdown last month.
Eventually, even the new EZTV.ch domain fell into the hands of the scammers, completing the hostile takeover.
Sladinki007 says that NovaKing must have been devastated by what happened. A life’s work was completely ruined in a few days and access to personal domain names was gone as well.
While EZTV could technically start over using a new name the group’s founder decided to throw in the towel. Too much had already been lost. The group had always been a “fun” non-profit project, and the recent troubles took the fun away.
The scammers, meanwhile, continue to operate both the .it and .ch domain names and are now distributing their own torrents (sourced elsewhere) with the hijacked EZTV brand. They pretend to be the real deal, sending out misleading and false status updates, but they’re not.
Having control over NovaKing’s email address the scammers even reached out to other torrent site operators, claiming that EZTV was back in business. However, most knew better not to fall for it and have retired official EZTV uploader accounts.
A Pirate Bay moderator informs TF that they have suspended the EZTV user account. Many of the older torrents are still on the site, but TPB has added a warning urging people to stay away from the compromised domain.
Other torrent sites such as KickassTorrents, BT-chat and Rarbg have also disabled or suspended the official EZTV accounts after hearing about the takeover. In addition, KickassTorrents and BT-chat have added the same warning as TPB. This way they hope to keep people away from the compromised EZTV site, which is now serving various ads including pop-unders.
Former EZTV staffers also urge people to stay away from all EZTV sites and to inform others to do the same. The real EZTV is no longer active.
EZTV’s forced retirement marks the and of an era. While there are still plenty of TV-torrents around, the group will be dearly missed by millions.
