The Popcorn Time phenomenon is one of the biggest piracy stories of the year thus far.

The software became an instant hit by offering BitTorrent-powered streaming in an easy-to-use Netflix-style interface.

While the original app was shut down by the developers after a few weeks, the project was quickly picked up by others. This resulted in several popular forks that have gained millions of users in recent months.

Today one of the most popular Popcorn Time forks releases a highly anticipated feature. The developers inform TorrentFreak that the latest version now has Airplay support, making it possible to stream movies directly to Apple TVs and other supported devices.

Ironically, Airplay support is currently limited to the Windows release, but a Mac version is due early next week and the Linux release will follow shortly after.

The latest feature follows the addition of Chromecast support a few weeks ago, but this is by no means the last planned development.

Popcorn Time adds Airplay support

Looking ahead the developers hope to bring the Popcorn Time experience to as many operating systems and devices as possible.

“Our ultimate goal is to bring Popcorn Time to every platform, operating system and device that can play videos, so Airplay is one particle of a huge revolution we’re making to the torrents and movies world online,” the time4popcorn.eu team told us.

“This is only the beginning… You know us, we have many more surprises coming your way,” they add.

One of the “surprises” is a native iOS app. Although it probably won’t be featured in Apple’s App Store anytime soon, Popcorn Time will be available on jailbroken iPhones and iPads in the near future.

“Support for iOS devices will be ready in August. It’s already working in our development environment and it’s looking beautiful,” the team notes.

Popcorn Time’s popularity hasn’t gone unnoticed by Hollywood. A few weeks ago the MPAA pushed back and managed to get two popular forks removed from Github claiming that the apps are hurting the major movie studios.

While this was a setback, it doesn’t seem to have hindered development much. Both Popcorn Time forks are still around and new features are being rolled out faster than ever.

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

February last year, the MPAA, RIAA and five major U.S. Internet providers started sending copyright alerts to customers who pirate movies, TV-shows and music.

Through a series of warnings suspected pirates are informed that their connections are being used to share copyrighted material without permission, and told where they can find legal alternatives.

These efforts are part of the Copyright Alert System which is headed by the Center for Copyright Information (CCI). The goal of this voluntary partnership is to educate the public and point alleged pirates to legal alternatives.

While it’s known that the costs of the program are split between the copyright holders and Internet providers, CCI has been reluctant to share any financial details. Luckily the IRS provides some insight on this front.

TorrentFreak obtained the most recent tax filing of the six-strikes outfit which covers the company’s operations between July 1, 2012 and June 30, 2013. The document reveals that the program cost nearly $3 million during that period.

To put this figure in perspective, the CCI previously reported that 1.3 million notices were sent out during the first 10 months. This means that the cost per notice translates to roughly $2, which is rather high.

Center for Copyright Information’s Form 990

Looking at how the money is spent we see that the only paid employee, CCI Executive Director Jill Lesser, received $320,000 in compensation. Another $350,000 went to Lesser’s consulting firm, JAL Consulting, which was hired as an independent contractor.

The RIAA’s former lobbying firm Stroz Friedberg received $420,000 for the independent expert analysis of the evidence gathering technology behind the project. After we uncovered the RIAA ties CCI later hired a second independent expert, but the results of this do-over have yet to be published.

The largest independent contractor is the Glover Park Group, who handle CCI’s communication. They received more than $680,000 over the reported period. American Arbitration, who handle the appeals of people who claim to be wrongly accused, was paid $245,000 for its services.

It’s worth noting that the costs for the Internet providers are higher than the amount they pay to the CCI. The ISPs also spend money on the technical setup that’s required to handle the Copyright Alerts as well as extra customer support.

It will be interesting to see how these costs develop over the years. CCI previously announced that more Copyright Alerts would be sent out this year, so it’s expected that the average of $2 per warning will eventually reduce.

Whether the copyright holders will ever be able to recoup their investments remains to be seen.

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

Kino.to, one of Germany’s largest illegal streaming portals, was shut down during 2011 following the largest law enforcement action against of its type in Europe. But even with the site long gone the disruption it caused is about to affect The Pirate Bay and two other major sites.

Just a month before Kino.to was dismantled in June 2011, Austrian ISP ‘UPC’ was served with a preliminary injunction ordering it to block subscriber access to the site. Verein für Anti-Piraterie der österreichischen Film und Videobranche (VAP) – the anti-piracy association of the Austrian film and video industry – had been on the warpath since 2010 and had finally got their way after UPC refused to comply voluntarily.

But would blocking the site be legal? UPC insisted that it couldn’t be held responsible for a site it had nothing to do with. The ISP also maintained that there had been no court ruling determining that UPC customers who accessed Kino.to were breaking the law.

To settle the matter once and for all the Austrian Supreme Court asked the European Court of Justice to clarify whether a company that provides Internet access to people using an illegal website could be required to block that site. On March 27, 2014, the ECJ handed down its decision.

On UPC’s first point the Court said that EU law does not require a specific relationship between the person infringing copyright and the intermediary against whom any injunction had been issued. On the second point the Court said that proof of illegality was not necessary as the law exists not only to bring an end to infringement, but also to prevent it.

The key point of the ruling was that ISPs can indeed be required to block access to infringing sites provided that injunctions are both balanced and proportional. As a result, earlier this month Austria’s Supreme Court found that the blockade against Kino.to, even though the site is long dead, was correctly applied.

On the back of this ruling, this week VAP wrote to several local ISPs, UPC included, demanding a new blockade of three domains – ThePirateBay.se, Movie4K.to and Kinox.to, a site that took over from Kino.to.

“Letters dated yesterday have been sent to four large ISPs containing a request to block a small number of websites,” VAP Managing Director Werner Müller told Future Zone.

On behalf of three local movie companies (Allegro Film, Wega Film and Epo Film) VAP has requested IP address and DNS blocks of the three sites but has given the ISPs very little time in which to carry them out, by this Friday August 1, to be exact.

The Association of Internet Service Providers Austria (ISPA) feels the deadline is far too restrictive.

“The period given to the providers to act is ludicrously short. We see this as very problematic. Extreme pressure is being exerted,” Secretary General Maximilian Schubert said.

“Two working days during the holiday season is just too little. To implement this by Friday we deem too difficult.”

Interestingly, Schubert also sees differences between The Pirate Bay and the pair of streaming portals listed in VAP’s blocking request.

“There is also legal content on The Pirate Bay,” Schubert said.

Discussions between VAP and the ISPs are scheduled for later in the week, so whether the anti-piracy group will get its way immediately will remain to be seen. They’ve waited years already, another few days shouldn’t make much difference.

Update: The ISPs were given two more weeks to block The Pirate Bay.

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

For a year, City of London Police have been working with the music and movie industries on initiatives to cut down on the consumption of pirated content online.

Operation Creative employs a multi-pronged approach, seeking to educate consumers while making life difficult for sites that operate unlicensed services.

Many unauthorized sites generate revenue from advertising, so the Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit (PIPCU) informs potential advertisers on how to keep their promotions away, thus depriving sites of cash. Another key aim is to stop users from getting the impression that pirate sites have “big brand” support when household names are seen advertising.

Today, PIPCU officially announced the launch of another angle to their ad strategy. As reported by TF in April, police are now placing their own ads on pirate sites to warn users that the site they’re using has been reported.

“This new initiative is another step forward for the unit in tackling IP crime and disrupting criminal profits,” said Head of PIPCU, DCI Andy Fyfe.

“Copyright infringing websites are making huge sums of money though advert placement, therefore disrupting advertising on these sites is crucial and this is why it is an integral part of Operation Creative.”

Sample police ad

As shown below, the BBC has published a PIPCU-supplied screenshot of how the ads look on an unauthorized MP3 site known as Full-Albums.net.

In our tests we couldn’t replicate the banners, despite dozens of refreshes, so it’s possible the site took action to remove them. Needless to say, we did see other advertising, and very interesting it was too.

Ironically, by clicking album links on Full-Albums we were presented with ads from BearShare, a music service that struck deals with the RIAA in the last decade. As can be seen from the screenshot below, the service places the major labels’ logos prominently to attract customers, even when accessed from a UK IP address.

TF checked with the BPI on the licensing status of the service in the UK and will update this article when their statement arrives, but as can be seen from this quote from the BearShare site, they claim to be legal.

“Using BearShare is 100% legal. The service employs state of the art filtering technology, and is approved by the major record labels and RIAA. Downloading from BearShare is entirely legal, and will not get you in any kind of trouble whatsoever,” the service says.

If Bearshare is licensed, this raises the possibility that the labels are indirectly financing ads on pirate sites themselves, something they’ll want to quickly remedy.

Ads on other sites

PIPCU, who have partnered with content verification technology provider ‘Project Sunblock’ to place the warning ads, say their banners are “now replacing a wide range of legitimate brand adverts on infringing websites.”

So, determined to find examples of the police advertising, we began moving through sites with the most copyright complaints as per Google’s Transparency Report.

Unfortunately we were unable to view a single PIPCU banner. However, as shown in the screenshot below, we did get some interesting results on MP3Juices, a site for which the BPI has sent 1,206,000+ takedowns to Google.

Skybet is not only a subsidiary of broadcasting giant BSkyB, but the company is also a leading member of the Federation Against Copyright Theft. In turn, FACT is a key Operation Creative partner. While Sky Bet wasn’t the only gambling advertiser on the site, this ad placement means that BSkyB are currently helping to finance the very sites that PIPCU are trying to close down.

There’s absolutely no suggestion that Sky or the major labels via Bearshare are deliberately trying to finance pirate sites, but the above examples show just how difficult it’s going to be to keep major brand’s advertising off these sites, even when they are acutely aware of the problems.

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

A quarter century ago the music industry was confronted with a new threat – cassette tape recorders.

These devices were able to make “near perfect” copies of any audio recording and the RIAA and others feared this would be the end of the recorded music industry.

The record labels took their fears to Congress, which eventually resulted in the Audio Home Recording Act (AHRA) of 1992. Under this law importers and manufacturers have to pay royalties on “digital audio recording devices,” among other things.

The legislation also applies to some newer recording devices common today, which is now causing trouble for Ford and General Motors. Both companies ship cars with the ability to rip CDs onto internal hard drives and according to a coalition of artists and record companies this violates copyright law.

The Alliance of Artists and Recording Companies (AARC), which lists major record labels and 300,000 artists among its members, filed a class action lawsuit on Friday in which they demand millions of dollars in compensation.

TorrentFreak obtained a copy of the complaint (pdf) which states that Ford’s “Jukebox” device and General Motor’s “Hard Drive Device” allow consumers to rip CDs onto an internal hard drive. According to the music group these devices fall under the Audio Home Recording Act and the car companies are therefore required to pay royalties.

Thus far, neither Ford nor General Motors has complied with any requirements of the Act. Both companies have sold cars with these devices for several years on a variety of models including the Lincoln MKS, Ford Taurus, Ford Explorer, Buick LaCrosse, Cadillac SRX, Chevrolet Volt, and GMC Terrain.

In addition to the two car companies, the lawsuit also targets their technology partners Denso and Clarion. Commenting on the dispute the AARC notes that a class action lawsuit was unavoidable.

“Twenty-two years ago, cooperation between music creators and device manufacturers resulted in legislation that led to a digital electronics revolution. But having reaped the benefits of this bargain, Ford, GM, Denso, and Clarion have now decided to ignore their obligations to music creators and declare themselves above the law,” AARC Executive Director Linda Bocchi comments

“While no one likes litigation, Ford, GM, Denso, and Clarion have stonewalled long enough, and we are determined to collect the royalties our members – and all artists and music creators with rights under the AHRA – are owed,” Bocchi adds.

The artists and record labels are looking for both actual and statutory damages, which could amount to hundreds of millions of dollars. In addition, they want to prevent the manufacturers from selling these unauthorized devices in their cars.

The case will prove to be an interesting test of the legality of “recording” devices in car entertainment systems. As is usually true, the law is not as black and white as AARC’s complaint states.

For example, the lawsuit doesn’t mention that the Audio Home Recording Act includes various exemptions for personal use and for recording equipment that’s part of a larger device, such as CD-burners in computers.

It’s now up to the court to decide how cars fit into this picture.

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