In July, news broke that following a serious error at a BBC office in Miami, the scripts and video to the brand new series of Doctor Who had accidentally been made available online.

While the BBC closed down the security breach, it didn’t do so quickly enough. The scripts were made available on file-sharing networks first and they were soon followed by the leak of the first episode.

Destined for Marcelo Camargo of Marc Drei Productions, a Brazil-based production company known for its subtitling work, the unfinished ‘workprint’ release wasn’t to be the last. Less than a week ago the first full copies of the second episode “Into The Dalek” started doing the rounds, prompting concerns of whether the leaks would stop there or continue.

That question now seems to have been answered. A 1020Mb file currently being made available via The Pirate Bay is the third episode in the new series. The file follows the naming convention of the previous two leaks suggesting that the video comes from the same source.

Rumored to be titled “Robots of Sherwood”, the episode confirms details revealed in the leaked scripts and sees Doctor Who venturing back in time for a memorable meeting with Robin Hood.

As can be seen from the screenshot, the episode is presented in monochrome and is heavily watermarked. Special effects and other elements of final polish also appear to be absent.

The question now falls to whether the remaining three episodes of six will also leak to mainstream file-sharing networks such as BitTorrent. There are reports of episodes four, five and six appearing on the eD2K network (sometimes known as eDonkey) but thus far there are no confirmed full downloads.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

This week we have four newcomers in our chart.

Maleficent is the most downloaded movie this week.

The data for our weekly download chart is estimated by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only. All the movies in the list are BD/DVDrips unless stated otherwise.

RSS feed for the weekly movie download chart.

Ranking	(last week)	Movie	IMDb Rating / Trailer
torrentfreak.com
1	(…)	Maleficent	7.4 / trailer
2	(1)	Captain America: The Winter Soldier	8.1 / trailer
3	(2)	Divergent	7.2 / trailer
4	(…)	X-Men: Days of Future Past (HDrip/TS)	8.4 / trailer
5	(4)	22 Jump Street (TS)	7.8 / trailer
6	(3)	The Amazing Spider-Man 2	7.4 / trailer
7	(…)	Brick Mansions	5.8 / trailer
8	(6)	The Expendables 3 (DVDscr)	?.? / trailer
9	(…)	Godzilla (Webrip)	7.1 / trailer
10	(5)	Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (TS)	8.3 / trailer

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

The governments around the world are reacting the exact same way today as they did when the printing press arrived 500 years ago. There isn’t really anything new under the sun.

Then, as now, they were used to telling people what was true and what wasn’t, telling whatever story that fit whatever it was they wanted to do.

“Cannabis is dangerous. Tobacco is not harmful at all. Oh, and there are weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.”

When police troops in Ferguson launched tear gas grenades at a television team from Al-Jazeera, that is a symptom of the exact same thing as web censorship: governments are losing control of the story. Governments can no longer invent whatever truth that fits what they want to happen. Police firing at press is actually something very rare – even in the worst of war zones, it’s a rare occurrence that press teams are deliberately targeted, and yet, this was precisely what happened in Ferguson, USA.

The reason is the exact same as for web censorship and mass surveillance:

The governments and the people working for them are attacking anybody who exposes what they do, using whatever power they have to do so.

Tear gas grenades against a TV crew may have been both overviolent and counterproductive, but it’s still the same thing. It’s exactly what happened when the printing press arrived, and the penalties for using a printing press – thereby circumventing the truthtellers of that time – gradually increased to the death penalty (France, 1535).

Not even the death penalty worked to deter people from using the printing press to tell their version of events to the world, which more often than not contradicted the official version. The cat was out of the bag. As it is now. Governments and police still don’t understand that everybody is a broadcaster – attacking a TV crew was futile in the first place.

During the initial, hopeful months of the Arab Spring, a lot of photos circulated of young people gathering for protests. What was interesting about the photos were that they were taken with mobile phones, but also that they showed a lot of other people at the protest taking photos of the same crowd at the same time with their own mobile phone. Thus, the photos of the ongoing revolution contained instructions in themselves for how to perpetuate the revolution – take pictures of crowds defying the edicts and dictums.

This is why it’s so puzzling that the police even bother to give special treatment to people from television stations and newspapers. Strictly speaking, they’re not necessary to get the story out anymore, even if they still have some follower advantage for the most part.

“Police are being transformed from protecting the public into protecting government from the public”, as @directorblue just tweeted. That could be said about pretty much anything concerning the net, too — from oppressive applications of copyright monopoly law to strangling net innovations or giving telcos monopolies that prevent the net’s utility.

The attacks on the public by police troops in Ferguson, attacks from the copyright industry against those who want a free net, and web censorship by governments are all different sides of the same story. And all of this has happened before. Last time this happened, it took 200 years of civil war to settle the dust and agree that the printing press may have been a nice invention after all.

Can we please not repeat that mistake?

About The Author

Rick Falkvinge is a regular columnist on TorrentFreak, sharing his thoughts every other week. He is the founder of the Swedish and first Pirate Party, a whisky aficionado, and a low-altitude motorcycle pilot. His blog at falkvinge.net focuses on information policy.

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Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Removing content from the Internet has become big business in recent years, with rightsholders from all over the globe seeking to limit access to infringing content.

As the world’s leading search engine, Google receives millions of DMCA-style notices every week. Its internal systems, both automated and human-reviewed, then attempt to assess the validity of the notices before removing URLs from its indexes.

What these notices all have in common is that they refer to infringements that have already taken place, since that’s the nature of a takedown. However, a notice that recently appeared in Google’s Transparency Report reveals that for at least one organization, looking into the future is now also on the agenda.

The notice was sent by an anti-piracy company working on behalf of World Wrestling Entertainment, or WWE as it’s more commonly known. The notice aimed to tackle piracy of a WWE Event titled Money In The Bank 2014, which took place on June 29, 2014. However, the notice was sent to Google two days before, on June 27.

“The following links infringe on WWE’s copyrighted Pay Per View event Money In The Bank 2014, set to air this Sunday, June 29, by one or more of the following means,” the notice begins.

WWE then sets out three potential infringements.

“Providing a link to a free (pirated) stream of this event” is misleading since it’s impossible to link to an event that hasn’t aired yet. Conceivably an advance static link could have been setup to air the event come June 29, but on June 27 the event had definitely not aired, hence no piracy.

“Providing a promise of DIRECT free streaming of this event on the identified site” seems no different from the allegation made above. It’s certainly possible that some of the sites promised to illegally stream the event, but at the date of the notice that would have been impossible.

The fact that WWE resorted to telling Google that the event’s predictions show was the source material being infringed upon shows that no actual live event infringements had yet taken place.

The final claim – “Using copyrighted images, logos and celebrity photos to promote the site” – is one that carries far more weight than the two key instances of infringement alleged above. Some of the sites listed did use WWE artwork to promote their upcoming streams, but there were some notable omissions, not least the homepage of Justin.tv. Google refused to comply in this and three other instances.

The notice from WWE, which can be viewed here, illustrates the problems faced by companies airing live events. While outfits such as WWE often know where streams and links to streams will appear once an event goes live, taking them down quickly once it actually begins may not always go as smoothly as they would like.

While attempts at a pro-active DMCA-style notice like this might work on a small scale, it’s not difficult to imagine the chaos that would ensue if all rightsholders tried to have unauthorized content removed before it even appeared online.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Unlike those in the US, Internet providers in the UK are not obliged to forward copyright infringement notices to their subscribers. This means that local Internet users are spared the typical warnings that are so common elsewhere.

Despite the lacking legal requirements, some anti-piracy groups do send copyright infringement notices to UK ISPs. In most cases these are ignored by the providers, but last week TalkTalk forwarded a notice to one of its resellers.

In the email the ISP asks Opal Solutions to forward the notice in question to one of its subscribers who allegedly shared a pirated copy of “Godzilla”. In addition the reseller was urged to take “preventive” measures, but what these should be is left open.

“Please see below copyright infringement email regarding an IP address of one of your clients, Please inform your client and take necessary preventative measures,” TalkTalk wrote.

At the bottom of this article is a copy of the original copyright infringement notice TalkTalk forwarded. It is a typical DMCA style notice sent by IP Echelon on behalf of Warner Bros.

IP Echelon didn’t make any effort to customize the notice for the UK audience. The email specifically references US copyright law, which doesn’t apply to the reseller or TalkTalk.

What’s most noteworthy, though, is that TalkTalk has decided to pass on this notice. The ISP is not known to forward these notices to its own subscribers, yet they appear to be urging a reseller to go beyond what’s required by law.

The forwarded email is most likely an attempt to avoid any type of liability. The question that remains is this: if TalkTalk do this with resellers does this mean they will start warning their subscribers as well?

Earlier this year the news broke that TalkTalk and other UK providers will voluntarily start sending infringement notices under the VCAP program. While VCAP isn’t going into effect before the summer of 2015, TalkTalk’s forwarded infringement notice could suggest that they might do something sooner.

Below is a full copy of the copyright infringement notice.

—-

We are writing this message on behalf of Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc..

We have received information that an individual has utilized the
below-referenced IP address at the noted date and time to offer
downloads of copyrighted material.

The title in question is: Godzilla

The distribution of unauthorized copies of copyrighted television
programs constitutes copyright infringement under the Copyright Act,
Title 17 United States Code Section 106(3). This conduct may also
violate the laws of other countries, international law, and/or treaty
obligations.

Since you own this IP address
we request that you immediately do the following:

1) Contact the subscriber who has engaged in the conduct described
above and take steps to prevent the subscriber from further downloading
or uploading Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. content without authorization; and

2) Take appropriate action against the account holder under your Abuse
Policy/Terms of Service Agreement.

On behalf of Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc., owner of the exclusive rights
in the copyrighted material at issue in this notice, we hereby state that
we have a good faith belief that use of the material in the manner
complained of is not authorized by Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.,
its respective agents, or the law.

Also, we hereby state, under penalty of perjury, that we are authorized
to act on behalf of the owner of the exclusive rights being infringed
as set forth in this notification.

We appreciate your assistance and thank you for your cooperation in this
matter. Your prompt response is requested.

Any further enquiries can be directed to copyright@ip-echelon.com
Please include this message with your enquiry to ensure a swift response.

Respectfully,

Adrian Leatherland
CEO
IP-Echelon
Email: copyright@ip-echelon.com
Address: 6715 Hollywood Blvd, Los Angeles, 90028, United States

- ————- Infringement Details ———————————-
Title: Godzilla
Timestamp: 2014-08-13T14:06:26Z
IP Address:
Port: 60261
Type: BitTorrent
Torrent Hash: c5cdf551eea353484657d45dbe93f688575a1e31
Filename: Godzilla.2014.WEBRiP.XviD-VAiN
Filesize: 2485 MB
- ———————————————————————

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.