Category: I read it on the grapevine…

It’s been a turbulent week in the UK with regard to anti-piracy initiatives.

It began with Internet provider Sky blocking access to Pirate Bay proxies, then the UK police sent out letters to torrent site owners threatening them with a 10 year prison sentence. This was followed by a backroom discussion between the Government, rightsholders and Google who explored options to de-list infringing sites.

On a smaller scale police and rightsholders carried out actions as well. Cooperating with the anti-piracy group FACT, local police visited the home of a local Pirate Bay proxy operator. While we’ve reported on similar actions against torrent site owners in the past, to our knowledge this is the first time that a proxy has been targeted.

After The Pirate Bay was blocked in the UK last year hundreds of proxies were launched, which are nothing more than a front for the regular Pirate Bay site. Running a proxy requires relatively few resources and one can be put online in a matter of minutes. But despite the easy setup they can also have serious consequences.

TorrentFreak talked to Tom, the operator of the PirateSniper proxy, who says he was visited by the police and anti-piracy group FACT for the second time recently, strengthening a message they delivered earlier.

“Two weeks ago I received a second knock on the door with the police standing on my doorstep. They had another letter and a further warning, ‘demanding’ that I shutdown PirateSniper.net before they take ‘criminal’ action against me,” Tom told TorrentFreak.

Tom was baffled by the surprise visit, to say the least. His proxy site has been active for a few months but has never been advertised and receives virtually no traffic. In addition, the site is not listed in Google’s search results.

“I cannot understand why I am a target. Yes, PirateSniper was recently removed from Google’s indexing list, but I can’t conceive the idea of police at my doorstep. Why?” Tom says.

In a pattern that fits with previous door knockings, the police were mainly there to assist FACT, who did most of the talking. According to Tom, FACT handed over some paperwork along with a warning that he could end up in jail if he continued operating the proxy.

“The police didn’t say much at all, they only asked me to confirm my identity then handed the conversation to a representative of the Federation Against Copyright Theft. It all happened quite suddenly and this time they were a little more aggressive than the first time they came.”

“They threatened me by saying things like ‘You could be sentenced to jail for a minimum of 4 years for the distribution of copyrighted material’. This time they were on a very personal level, not bothering with minor manners and such and just shoving information down my throat without any explanation whatsoever.”

Without receiving an ultimatum, Tom says he was asked to shut down the proxy, or else. The PirateSniper operator has contacted a solicitor and is prepared for the worst. However, the site will remain online for the time being.

“No, this is my stand, we have to show companies that we will not get bullied into doing their bidding. Censorship is like a cancer, we must kill it before it spreads,” Tom says.

Source: Police Visit Pirate Bay Proxy Owner’s Home Demanding a Shutdown

It’s been a turbulent week in the UK with regard to anti-piracy initiatives.

It began with Internet provider Sky blocking access to Pirate Bay proxies, then the UK police sent out letters to torrent site owners threatening them with a 10 year prison sentence. This was followed by a backroom discussion between the Government, rightsholders and Google who explored options to de-list infringing sites.

On a smaller scale police and rightsholders carried out actions as well. Cooperating with the anti-piracy group FACT, local police visited the home of a local Pirate Bay proxy operator. While we’ve reported on similar actions against torrent site owners in the past, to our knowledge this is the first time that a proxy has been targeted.

After The Pirate Bay was blocked in the UK last year hundreds of proxies were launched, which are nothing more than a front for the regular Pirate Bay site. Running a proxy requires relatively few resources and one can be put online in a matter of minutes. But despite the easy setup they can also have serious consequences.

TorrentFreak talked to Tom, the operator of the PirateSniper proxy, who says he was visited by the police and anti-piracy group FACT for the second time recently, strengthening a message they delivered earlier.

“Two weeks ago I received a second knock on the door with the police standing on my doorstep. They had another letter and a further warning, ‘demanding’ that I shutdown PirateSniper.net before they take ‘criminal’ action against me,” Tom told TorrentFreak.

Tom was baffled by the surprise visit, to say the least. His proxy site has been active for a few months but has never been advertised and receives virtually no traffic. In addition, the site is not listed in Google’s search results.

“I cannot understand why I am a target. Yes, PirateSniper was recently removed from Google’s indexing list, but I can’t conceive the idea of police at my doorstep. Why?” Tom says.

In a pattern that fits with previous door knockings, the police were mainly there to assist FACT, who did most of the talking. According to Tom, FACT handed over some paperwork along with a warning that he could end up in jail if he continued operating the proxy.

“The police didn’t say much at all, they only asked me to confirm my identity then handed the conversation to a representative of the Federation Against Copyright Theft. It all happened quite suddenly and this time they were a little more aggressive than the first time they came.”

“They threatened me by saying things like ‘You could be sentenced to jail for a minimum of 4 years for the distribution of copyrighted material’. This time they were on a very personal level, not bothering with minor manners and such and just shoving information down my throat without any explanation whatsoever.”

Without receiving an ultimatum, Tom says he was asked to shut down the proxy, or else. The PirateSniper operator has contacted a solicitor and is prepared for the worst. However, the site will remain online for the time being.

“No, this is my stand, we have to show companies that we will not get bullied into doing their bidding. Censorship is like a cancer, we must kill it before it spreads,” Tom says.

Source: Police Visit Pirate Bay Proxy Owner’s Home Demanding a Shutdown

An anonymous reader writes “The Electronic Frontier Foundation reports that the United Nations has finally come to the realization that there is a direct relationship between government surveillance online and citizens’ freedom of expression. The report (PDF) says, ‘The right to privacy is often understood as an essential requirement for the realization of the right to freedom of expression. Undue interference with individuals’ privacy can both directly and indirectly limit the free development and exchange of ideas. An infringement upon one right can be both the cause and consequence of an infringement upon the other.’ The EFF adds, ‘La Rue’s landmark report could not come at a better time. The explosion of online expression we’ve seen in the past decade is now being followed by an explosion of communications surveillance. For many, the Internet and mobile telephony are no longer platforms where private communication is shielded from governments knowing when, where, and with whom a communication has occurred.'”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader writes “The Electronic Frontier Foundation reports that the United Nations has finally come to the realization that there is a direct relationship between government surveillance online and citizens’ freedom of expression. The report (PDF) says, ‘The right to privacy is often understood as an essential requirement for the realization of the right to freedom of expression. Undue interference with individuals’ privacy can both directly and indirectly limit the free development and exchange of ideas. An infringement upon one right can be both the cause and consequence of an infringement upon the other.’ The EFF adds, ‘La Rue’s landmark report could not come at a better time. The explosion of online expression we’ve seen in the past decade is now being followed by an explosion of communications surveillance. For many, the Internet and mobile telephony are no longer platforms where private communication is shielded from governments knowing when, where, and with whom a communication has occurred.'”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

New submitter Mistakill writes “It seems the case against Kim Dotcom for the NZ Police isn’t going well, with Kim Dotcom scoring another victory in his legal battles. Police have been told they must search everything they seized from Dotcom and hand back what is not relevant to the U.S. extradition claims. Justice Helen Winkelmann told police their complaints about the cost and time of the exercise were effectively their own fault for indiscriminately seizing material in the first place. She wrote, ‘The warrants could not authorize the permanent seizure of hard drives and digital materials against the possibility that they might contain relevant material, with no obligation to check them for relevance. They could not authorize the shipping offshore of those hard drives with no check to see if they contained relevant material. Nor could they authorize keeping the plaintiffs out of their own information, including information irrelevant to the offenses.'”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

New submitter Mistakill writes “It seems the case against Kim Dotcom for the NZ Police isn’t going well, with Kim Dotcom scoring another victory in his legal battles. Police have been told they must search everything they seized from Dotcom and hand back what is not relevant to the U.S. extradition claims. Justice Helen Winkelmann told police their complaints about the cost and time of the exercise were effectively their own fault for indiscriminately seizing material in the first place. She wrote, ‘The warrants could not authorize the permanent seizure of hard drives and digital materials against the possibility that they might contain relevant material, with no obligation to check them for relevance. They could not authorize the shipping offshore of those hard drives with no check to see if they contained relevant material. Nor could they authorize keeping the plaintiffs out of their own information, including information irrelevant to the offenses.'”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Primeira conferência internacional sobre propriedade intelectual trouxe a Lisboa investidores, hackers e criadores para discutir a liberalização da partilha na rede.

Primeira conferência internacional sobre propriedade intelectual trouxe a Lisboa investidores, hackers e criadores para discutir a liberalização da partilha na rede.

When Francois Hollande was running for President of France, he said that he would repeal Hadopi, the three strikes law and agency that enforces it, rolling back this effort which the entertainment industry had celebrated (France was the first to propose and implement such a plan). After elected, his culture minister, Aurelie Filippetti made it clear that she was not impressed by Hadopi and ordered a study of the effectiveness of the effort, led by Pierre Lescure — a former entertainment industry executive — to look at possible proposals. His report came out Monday morning and it suggests killing off Hadopi, but is still chock full of other bad ideas. Hadopi the agency would be done away with, but another agency would pick up some of the responsibilities, it’s just that they’d greatly decrease the “punishment” aspect. Rather than losing internet access and having to pay up to €1,500, you’d keep your access and fines would be topped at €60.

But, on top of that, there are other policies that Lescure suggests that seem pretty bad as well, including extending the copyright levy (the “you must be a criminal tax”) to cover smartphones, tablets and any other connected device. He also suggested turning search engines and ad networks into copyright cops, asking them to cut off those deemed to be involved in large scale infringement. We’ve discussed in the past why this is an idea that won’t work and will likely stifle innovation while locking in some of the more dominant players (like Google), but governments do seem to like it.

The report does have a few good things to it: including getting publishers to finally release their content as ebooks, allowing more non-commercial remixing and such. In the end, it’s a mixed bag, or as the French publication Le Point noted: l’Hadopi est morte, vive L’Hadopi (Hadopi is dead, long live Hadopi).

Of course, this is also just a report, with no binding aspect to it. The government may choose to ignore the whole thing or to pick and choose some parts to implement. Either way, it does make the key point that, for all the money the French taxpayers have put towards Hadopi, it’s been a near total waste: “While illicit file sharing has dropped, legal paid services have not benefited as was hoped.” It all goes back to the same point we’ve argued for years. The industry keeps thinking their goal is to get rid of piracy, when we’ve been saying that the real goal is to figure out ways to make more revenue. They — incorrectly — seem to feel that the first leads to the second, even as there is almost no proof to support that conjecture in the long term.

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When Francois Hollande was running for President of France, he said that he would repeal Hadopi, the three strikes law and agency that enforces it, rolling back this effort which the entertainment industry had celebrated (France was the first to propose and implement such a plan). After elected, his culture minister, Aurelie Filippetti made it clear that she was not impressed by Hadopi and ordered a study of the effectiveness of the effort, led by Pierre Lescure — a former entertainment industry executive — to look at possible proposals. His report came out Monday morning and it suggests killing off Hadopi, but is still chock full of other bad ideas. Hadopi the agency would be done away with, but another agency would pick up some of the responsibilities, it’s just that they’d greatly decrease the “punishment” aspect. Rather than losing internet access and having to pay up to €1,500, you’d keep your access and fines would be topped at €60.

But, on top of that, there are other policies that Lescure suggests that seem pretty bad as well, including extending the copyright levy (the “you must be a criminal tax”) to cover smartphones, tablets and any other connected device. He also suggested turning search engines and ad networks into copyright cops, asking them to cut off those deemed to be involved in large scale infringement. We’ve discussed in the past why this is an idea that won’t work and will likely stifle innovation while locking in some of the more dominant players (like Google), but governments do seem to like it.

The report does have a few good things to it: including getting publishers to finally release their content as ebooks, allowing more non-commercial remixing and such. In the end, it’s a mixed bag, or as the French publication Le Point noted: l’Hadopi est morte, vive L’Hadopi (Hadopi is dead, long live Hadopi).

Of course, this is also just a report, with no binding aspect to it. The government may choose to ignore the whole thing or to pick and choose some parts to implement. Either way, it does make the key point that, for all the money the French taxpayers have put towards Hadopi, it’s been a near total waste: “While illicit file sharing has dropped, legal paid services have not benefited as was hoped.” It all goes back to the same point we’ve argued for years. The industry keeps thinking their goal is to get rid of piracy, when we’ve been saying that the real goal is to figure out ways to make more revenue. They — incorrectly — seem to feel that the first leads to the second, even as there is almost no proof to support that conjecture in the long term.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story