Posts Tagged ‘anti-piracy’

Together with four other internet providers in the United States, Time Warner Cable is sending copyright alerts to customers who use BitTorrent to pirate movies, TV-shows and music. The goal of the "six strikes" program is to inform subscribers that their connection are being used to infringe copyrights while pointing them towards legal alternatives. However, Time Warner Cable is going one step further by ... Full story

After a mystery disappearance yesterday it has now been confirmed that KickassTorrents' domain name has been seized by the Philippine authorities. The action was taken following a complaint from local record labels who argued that the second largest torrent site on the Internet was causing "irreparable damages" to the music industry. KickassTorrents, however, appears undeterred by the intervention and is continuing business as usual ... Full story

France is seen as the pioneer of so-called "three strikes" anti-piracy legislation, in which repeated file-sharing offenders are disconnected from the Internet. This week, following the issuing of millions of warning notices, the law has finally resulted in the first disconnection. The news comes as somewhat of a surprise since the Hadopi regime is set to be scrapped after doing little to stop online piracy.Source: ... Full story

Several UK Internet providers have quietly added a list of new sites to their secretive anti-piracy blocklists. Following in the footsteps of Sky, the first ISP to initiate a proxy blockade, Virgin, BT and several other providers now restrict access to several torrent site proxies. The surprise isn't really that proxies have been added to the blocklist, but that the music industry and ISPs ... Full story

The UK's aggressive stance towards online piracy was taken to new heights this week through a combination of police threats and backroom deals between industry groups. One of the main targets identified were Pirate Bay proxy sites and TorrentFreak has been informed that the police and FACT recently turned up on the doorstep of one called PirateSniper in the UK. According to a report from ... Full story

Aside from detecting intrusive and harmful software on people's computers, the anti-malware application Malwarebytes is also able to detect which users are running a pirated version. While some software vendors might respond aggressively to unauthorized users, the San Jose company takes a more gently approach in the belief that every user contributes to the success of the software, pirates included. Source: Malwarebytes Detects ... Full story

Customers of ISPs not involved in the so-called 'Six Strikes' anti-piracy scheme in the United States might be under the impression that warning notices are something they can avoid. However, TorrentFreak has learned that Warner Bros. are specifically targeting users of non-participating ISPs not only with warnings, but also with fines to settle the alleged copyright infringements.Source: Warner Bros: We’re Fining File-Sharers Who Use ... Full story

This week two of the largest gaming oriented BitTorrent trackers pulled the plug to prevent legal trouble. GazelleGames shut down permanently while Underground Gamer is leaving the door open for a possible restart. At this point it's unclear which industry group is behind the legal pressure, but it appears to go beyond the occasional DMCA notice. Thousands of members, meanwhile, are looking for alternatives to ... Full story

The UK Minister for Culture plus representatives from the MPAA, BPI, Google and four major ISPs met for a roundtable discussion on the issue of online piracy last month. The minutes of the meeting suggest that not only are the parties keen for site blocking to continue, but are considering whether the same High Court mechanism could be used to provide Google with a legal ... Full story

City of London Police inform TorrentFreak that they have begun targeting sites that provide access to unauthorized content for "criminal gain." The initiative is part of a collaboration with Hollywood studios represented by FACT and the major recording labels of the BPI. In letters being sent out now, police accuse site operators of committing offenses under the Serious Crime Act. The National Fraud Intelligence Bureau ... Full story