In the wake of the Megaupload shutdown many file-hosting services reconsidered their options, with some opting to drastically change their business models or even shut down. Whatever the response, the general consensus was to think twice before running a ‘cyberlocker’ in the United States.

Some, however, shrugged off the naysayers and elected to operate from the U.S., putting faith in legislation designed to protect them, such as the DMCA.

One such site, UltraMegabit.com, a file-hosting service operated by former EliteTorrents staff member Rudy Corella, has been doing business there ever since. Just recently it became clear the authorities had been watching the service, but the situation is unlike most other complaints against file-sharing sites.

The problem stems from alleged breaches of Washington State’s Consumer Protection Act, legislation put in place to protect people against fraud and unfair business practices. According to the Attorney General’s Office, UltraMegabit “engaged in a number of deceptive business practices” contrary to the Act.

These allegations admittedly looks pretty serious on first view but drilling down into the details reveals an interesting picture to say the least.

First off, UltraMegaBit (UMB) is owned by a California-based corporation with thousands of customers, but only a few based in Washington State are affected by the allegations. Like many file-hosters of its kind, UMB has both free and premium customers, the latter purchasing monthly or annual subscriptions for unlimited use of the service. It is these subscriptions that form the basis of the complaint.

The Attorney General’s Office (AGO) says that UltraMegaBit failed to “adequately disclose” that these subscriptions renewed without members’ express approval. Countering, UMB say that members receive an email one week before renewal takes place.

Perhaps unsurprisingly the issue of copyright eventually raises its head, although not in the form of any obvious rightsholder complaint.

Like the majority of file-hosting services, YouTube included, users sometimes upload unauthorized content to UMB, meaning that other users of the service gain access to infringing material. For its part, UMB says that it fully complies with the DMCA to remove such content.

However, the AGO says that by failing to inform users that some of the content available from UMB may be copyrighted, UMB had engaged in “deceptive business practices” contrary to the Consumer Protection Act.

Furthermore, the AGO said that by charging a subscription fee to use the service, UMB had been “implicitly leading members to believe” they were accessing content legally, something that was likely to confuse customers and lead them to unwittingly break the law.

“Ultra Mega Corp’s business model was confusing to consumers who are familiar with companies like Netflix or other companies that charge consumers a monthly fee to legally watch TV shows and movies,” said Assistant Attorney General Jake Bernstein.

“The AGO investigation revealed that the most popular files stored on UMB are copyrighted works, such as TV shows and movies, that members can not legally download,” Bernstein added. “UMB members were unknowingly downloading copyrighted content illegally, opening themselves up to potential lawsuits by content owners, as occurred with Napster and the music industry.”

While the AGO says that UMB’s Rudy Corella agreed to pay $20,000 to settle the case, a statement by UMB support staff suggests that the payment was only made to allow the site to move on.

“We are and always have been compliant with DMCA, and our rebilling model will send an email out one week prior to rebilling. As it is now, any member can cancel their rebill at any time. Rather than drag anything on, we as a company felt to just pay them, so they would get off of our back, and not hound any of our various other ventures we are involved in,” UMB said.

As this process has played out, questions were being asked about who filed the original complaints with the AGO. Many accusatory fingers were pointed at Robert King of the StopFileLockers anti-piracy group, who over the course of the past 18 months has endlessly and publicly accused Corella of copyright-infringement “crimes”.

However, UMB staff say that the Attorney General’s Office probably initiated the case on its own as payback for an earlier case that didn’t conclude to its satisfaction.

“One of the [UMB] owners used to have a business which was sued by Washington, and they never collected anything from that owner; once they heard news about his involvement in a new company, they looked for anything they could to threaten us with a lawsuit,” the staff member said.

“I’m sure [there are people] who will try to profit from this news [thinking] they have something or anything to do with it. Fact of the matter is, they don’t.”

TF spoke with Robert King, who would neither confirm nor deny the accusations.

“In regards to this particular case I cannot comment on this as doing so may impede the advancement of other matters,” he said.

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

Late last year Gottfrid Svartholm was extradited to Denmark, where The Pirate Bay founder stands accused of hacking into the mainframe computers of IT company CSC.

After several custody extensions Svartholm appeared in court again this week, and for the first time the hearing was open to the press and “Free Anakata” supporters.

During the court session new evidence was presented which allegedly links Svartholm to the CSC hack. The prosecution said that an encrypted file found on Svartholm’s computer contained the Swede’s personal information as well as documents related to the hacks.

According to the court this evidence warrants another custody extension of four weeks, which means that Svartholm will remain in detention until April 2nd.

“Our suspicion has been confirmed, because the personal data found on Svartholm’s computer comes from the same place where the CSC files were stored. It reinforces our belief that it is obviously not a random person remotely accessed the computer to do all these things,” senior prosecutor Maria Cingari told Politiken in a comment.

The prosecution believes that Svartholm was operating under the alias ‘My Evil Twin’ while his 20-year-old co-defendant used the handle ‘Advanced Persistent Terrorist Threat.’

Gottfrid’s lawyer Luise Høj

Svartholm’s lawyer Luise Høj, who posed with a “Free Anakata” poster outside court, points out that the evidence in the encrypted container is not new. The container also holds documents from the Nordea hack and was previously used in the Swedish trial.

“The same material was used in the Swedish case. In the encrypted container are CSC documents, Nordea material and personal information about my client. It is evidence that the Swedish High Court has considered and which they believed affected the case,” Høj said.

In the Swedish case the Pirate Bay founder was acquitted of hacking Nordea because it could not be proven that Svartholm carried out the hacks himself. Svartholm later pointed this out in an open letter to the Danish authorities last year, but his extradition went ahead nonetheless.

Svartholm’s lawyer hopes to use the same “remote access” argument in Denmark, but thus far the authorities aren’t being cooperative.

“We have asked for investigative measures that can help to make it probable that my client’s computer has been accessed remotely, but so far, police have not been willing to comply,” Høj said.

It is expected that the defense will get the opportunity to law out their argument in detail at a later stage. Svartholm is expected to remain in prison until then. The trial is currently scheduled to start on September 2nd.

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

During the first few months of each year, infamous Dutch anti-piracy group BREIN details its successes of the previous 12 months.

In its new report published this week, BREIN presents a laundry list of site and service shutdowns, payment processor and advertising disruptions, plus the results of takedown campaigns directed at companies such as Google. Most of BREIN’s annual declarations contain large-scale claims and the report for 2014 continues that tradition.

Strategy

“Briefly, BREIN’s enforcement strategy is aimed at forcing illegal sites or online services into copyright compliance and fulfilling their duty of care. If not, the sites’ hosting providers could identify them or take them offline, or if that offers no solace, providers can block access to them,” BREIN explains.

In addition to identifying individuals behind sites, BREIN says it also targets their payment providers, advertisers and their intermediaries. The group also issues takedown requests, including many thousands sent to Google.

Site takedown results

In common with all previous years, BREIN has some big claims on this front. Cyberlocker linking sites were hardest hit in 2013, with BREIN claiming shutdown of 280 sites in total. The names of the sites remain a mystery, a policy maintained by BREIN throughout many years’ reports.

Moving up to the sources rather than sites that merely link to them, BREIN says it closed down 10 actual file-hosting sites. In the streaming and Usenet realms the group claims the scalps of 66 and 38 sites respectively. Again, no details are provided.

Of course, most readers will be interested in BREIN’s claims of successes against BitTorrent sites and as usual they are pretty lofty. The Hollywood-affiliated group says that it closed 118 torrent sites in 2013. Their names are…..unknown.

The big feather-in-the-cap for BREIN in 2012 was of course the blocking of The Pirate Bay, but there was less to celebrate on that front in 2013. As previously reported, all that came tumbling down in recent weeks when The Court of The Hague decided to lift the ban and restore access for Dutch citizens.

Nevertheless, in this week’s report BREIN is still claiming successes in upholding the ban throughout 2013, with claims that it took down an astonishing 206 proxy sites setup to circumvent the blockade of The Pirate Bay. Whether those sites remain down today is largely moot, as Dutch citizens can now access The Pirate Bay directly pending a Supreme Court ruling.

Advertisers, payment processors and takedown notices

A developing anti-piracy strategy is to try and cut sites off from their income. To this end BREIN says it deals with advertisers on the one hand and payment processors on the other.

The group reports that in 41 cases payment processors divulged “identifying information” and discontinued service to sites. In another 100 cases advertisers reportedly offered a commitment not to advertise on sites offering content without permission.

In common with many other anti-piracy groups, BREIN is now sending plenty of takedown requests to both sites and search engines. A total of 2.3 million URL takedown notices were sent to Google last year, making an average of around 44,000 per week. According to Google’s Transparency Report, most related to file-host search engine FilesTube, followed by now-defunct torrent site isoHunt.

Conclusion

There can be little doubt that in recent years BREIN has proven to be a major thorn in the side of many hundreds of mostly small, Netherlands-based file-sharing sites. However, while it seems unlikely that BREIN would be outwardly untruthful in its annual statements, the anti-piracy outfit provides zero evidence in support of its claims. Pirate Bay aside, not a single site is mentioned by name, even though the claim is that more than 700 (sites and proxies) were taken down in 2013.

Effective? The rightsholders paying them must think so.

_{Photo: Dan Zen}

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

Last week RuPaul, known for his reality TV competition “Drag Race,” leaked several copies of his/her album “Born Naked” on The Pirate Bay.

Unlike other leaks, however, this copy wasn’t exactly what most pirates were looking for.

At first sight the album appears to be full length, and even the start of all tracks seem legit. However, those who continue to listen are in for a surprise.

After the first minute or so the music becomes muffled, just as RuPaul breaks in with a message for the downloader.

“Girl, you done stole my album. Uh Uh, you better don’t hookah, you better get your tail on over to iTunes baby, because I want to get some of that,” is how the first track “Freaky Money” goes after a 30 second intro.

Then RuPaul continues with some random conversation, funny skits, as well as some additional pirate-shaming as you can hear below.

“Freaky Money” pirate edition

It appears that it took quite a bit of effort to put the pirate leak together, as every track contains a unique message. In addition to poking fun at pirates, most of the conversation is about the tracks themselves, or just random thoughts.

With the track “Modern Love” RuPaul starts talking over the music around a minute into the song.

“It’s RuPaul up on WERQ, I’ve decided to change my radio station name to WERQ, ain’t that better? That’s right, you’re listening to WERQ, this is Ru, you’re listening to the BOOT motherfucking LEG of my album.”

“I wasn’t going to cuss, because I thought, oh no, we can’t do that. But hey, this is some motherfucking pirated shit, this is illegal, bitch, you’re illegal, as.. as, you’re the one illegal!”

“Modern Love” pirate edition

On the final track “Born Naked” RuPaul again starts by condemning the person who downloaded the album, then continues to chat about the track and the people who participated in the ‘leak’, which is in effect an extended advert for the album.

“Born Naked” pirate edition

The parts where RuPaul talks over the tracks are actually quite entertaining at times, which makes it pretty unique. The tone isn’t too serious, although the message probably is, which is a good combo.

It definitely beats the decoy files music labels used to upload, which wouldn’t play at all. Instead of frustrating potential consumers, RuPaul is sending a friendly reminder to those who perhaps forgot to pay.

Ironically, those who like RuPaul will have to pay a visit to The Pirate Bay to grab a copy of this collector’s item.

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

For many years Italian authorities have targeted torrent and other file-sharing sites. Complaints from the music and movie industries have sometimes led to raids, but in recent times site blocking has been in vogue.

Sharing giants such as The Pirate Bay, KickassTorrents, isoHunt, 1337x and waves of file-hosting sites have been blocked in previous actions, with 27 targeted in a single sweep during April 2013, the largest ever of its type.

Now authorities are back with a fresh action on a previously unseen scale. The initiative, which targets 46 torrent, streaming and other file-sharing portals, was ordered by the Public Prosecutor of Rome.

Speaking with TorrentFreak, Fulvio Sarzana, a lawyer with the Sarzana and Partners law firm specializing in Internet and copyright disputes, says the operation is the largest ever seen in Italy and will see dozens of sites blocked at the ISP level.

“The domains of sites linking to torrent files, in order to download illegal copies of music and movie, have been seized today as ordered by Preliminary investigation Judge of Rome, at the request of the public prosecutor,” Sarzana explains.

“Both the DNS addresses of the sites and their domain name have been made inaccessible to Italian users by all Italian ISPs, in such a way to deprive users of the possibility to access their files hosted in the sites.”

The blocking will be carried out on the orders of the Guardia di Finanza (GdF), a department under Italy’s Ministry of Economy and Finance tasked with dealing with financial crime, and will cover sites including mondotorrent, dopinatorrent, truepirates, filmxtutti, casacinema, watchfreemovies.ch and universfilms.

Interestingly, Sarzana adds that the case could have a novel twist, in that the police carried out the action on their own initiative.

“At present it seems that the action wasn’t carried out at the request of copyright owners associations,” the lawyer explains.

TF spoke with Enzo Mazzo of music industry group FIMI who confirmed that while there is yet no public announcement on the action, it was indeed carried out by the Fiscal Police from Rome with an order from the Public Prosecutor.

“We obviously appreciate the action carried out by the Fiscal Police following the blocking strategy,” Mazzo said.

This huge sweep is of particular interest when one considers that a controversial new process to more easily block allegedly infringing sites is not yet in force. Dubbed Italy’s ‘SOPA’, the framework – set for April introduction – will see the domains of sites blocked at the ISP level if they fail to remove infringing content in a timely fashion.

Meanwhile, across Europe in Spain, three of the country’s largest sites have bowed to rightsholder pressure and agreed to stop linking to infringing content. According to THR, SeriesYonkis, Peliculas Yonkis and VideoYonkis stopped linking over the weekend as part of negotiations in their legal dispute with Spain’s Anti-Piracy Federation (FAP).

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