Copyright holders all over the world believe that search engines play a crucial role in the piracy ecosystem. They argue that when seeking out content, people often use sites like Google, which can lead them to infringing material on pirate sites.

Entertainment companies can address the problem by sending takedown notices, but they insist that’s a very inefficient process. Pirate content is way too visible in search results, they argue, particularly when it appears in the first few pages of results.

With most countries continuing to grapple with the issue, it now appears that Russia intends to legislate against it. This week, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev submitted a draft bill to parliament that will force search engines to remove specified pirate sites from their results.

Developed by the Ministry of Communications, the bill will compel search companies such as Google and local giant Yandex to deindex sites that have failed to respond to takedown requests on several occasions, perhaps as little as twice.

One such example is huge torrent site RuTracker, which was blocked by local ISPs following an order from the Moscow City Court. RuTracker was effectively told to remove around 320,000 torrents to avoid a ban but chose not to do so after running a poll among its users. Under current legislation, RuTracker is now blocked for life, and if the new law is passed, all of its pages will disappear from search engines.

The draft bill also targets counter-measures employed by sites attempting to circumvent ISP blockades.

Often, when one domain is blocked, sites will buy new domains in an effort to keep going. Others will use proxy sites and even full-scale mirrors to stay one step ahead of the court. The bill refers to all of these options as “derivative sites” and will allow for them to be blocked without further court process.

The bill was approved during a government meeting on February 17 and will now pass through its various parliamentary stages before becoming law.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

The Oscars is the most watched awards show of the year, closely followed by hundreds of millions of movie fans around the world.

This week Hollywood’s finest are gathering at the red carpet once again. While they associate the celebration with eternal fame and recognition, for online pirates it’s a highly anticipated event as well.

Traditionally, Oscar winners tend to do very well in pirate circles, so we decided to take a look at the availability of this year’s contenders through unauthorized channels.

Relying on data from Oscar piracy watcher Andy Baio, we see that all nominated^* films are now available on pirate sites, most in decent quality too. There’s only one film that hasn’t been released as a screener, Blu-Ray or other high-quality rip, and that’s “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.”

Ironically, the Star Wars movie was one of the most anticipated releases during the screener season and despite various teases and rumored leaks, it hasn’t come out yet. Instead, Star Wars pirates have had to settle for a HDTS copy.

Another issue that deserves a closer look is the availability of leaked screener copies.

For well over a decade, pirated screeners of the latest movies have started to leak online around December. Ironically, many of these titles leaked from DVD screener copies which were sent out to reviewers, including Academy members who vote for the Oscars.

This year, however, “screener season” started out a bit different than before. Previously, the first leaked screeners always came out before December 16th but this time it remained quiet.

When Christmas came there were still no leaked screeners, and it took until early January before the ball started rolling.

The silence was broken with a release of the Denzel Washington movie Fences and soon after more and more screeners appeared online. While some feared that screener season would never be the same again, at the end of the road it turned out to be a relatively regular year.

With just a few hours to go before the awards ceremony, a total of 14 screeners of nominated films have leaked online, which is comparable to previous years.

Screener leaks of Oscar nominees

The chart above shows an overview of the screener leaks per year. These are only for movies that eventually received an Academy Awards nomination^*, so the total number will be even higher.

Finally, it’s worth noting that despite the widespread availability of pirate copies, screener leaks appear to be under a bit of pressure. Like previous years, most of the leaked screeners have been released by Hive-CM8.

This means that one group has to carry a pretty heavy burden. If they stop doing what they do, the screener supply could be severely limited.

That said, the focus on screeners might be a bit overstated. Except for a few prominent leaks, the interest in screener copies is not significantly higher than the average HDrip or Blu-Ray release, which are still widely available.

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_{Foreign film and documentary categories are not included}

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

HBO’s daughter company in Latin America, HBO LA, is not happy with the rampant piracy that’s taking place in the Caribbean.

Earlier this month the company submitted its latest 301 ‘watch list’ submission to the U.S. Government, urging the authorities to take appropriate action.

HBO is steadily expanding its services to the Caribbean and Central American regions. However, their efforts to roll out legitimate services are frustrated by local pirates. These aren’t just individual pirates, large cable operators are in on it too.

“…a lack of enforcement by Caribbean and Central American governments is allowing local cable operators to build substantial enterprise value by increasing their subscriber base through offering pirated content,” HBO LA writes (pdf).

The same goes for hotels, which treat their visitors to prime HBO programming without paying a proper license.

“In addition to piracy by large cable providers, non-U.S. owned hotel chains on a variety of islands are known to pirate content exclusively licensed to HBO LA by using their own onsite facilities or obtaining service from cable operators who pirate,” HBO LA informs the government.

Piracy by cable operators and hotels is not new. HBO has reported these issues to the authorities before, but thus far little has changed. In the meantime, however, the company has started to notice another worrying trend.

Online piracy has started to become more prevalent, with many stores now selling IPTV boxes and other devices that allow users to access HBO content without permission.

“In the past year, HBO LA continued to see a significant increase in the problem of online piracy of its service throughout all of HBO LA’s territory,” HBO LA writes.

“In the Caribbean, several brick-and-mortar stores customarily sell Roku or generic Android set-top devices (like the Mag250, Avov, and the MXIII) preinstalled with an unlicensed streaming service and offering a few hundred channels of content, including content for which HBO LA holds exclusive license in the territory.”

A Facebook ad highlighted by HBO LA

The company lists various examples of stores that offer these kinds of products including the Gizmos and Gadgets Electronics store in Guyana. This store sells Roku devices with an unlicensed streaming service called “ROKU TV” pre-installed.

By selling “pirate” subscriptions to thousands of customers the company is making over a million dollars per year, HBO estimates. And more recently the same store started to sell a subscription-less service as well.

“Additionally, Gizmos and Gadgets Electronics has recently started offering a second integrated hardware and service device known as the Gizmo TV BOX, which offers over 200 channels with no monthly fee,” HBO LA writes.

This is just one example of the many that are listed by the Latin American daughter of HBO.

The cable provider says it’s already taken various steps to stop the different types of infringements but hopes that U.S. authorities will help out where local governments fail. Towards the end of their submission, HBO LA encourages the United States Trade Representative to apply appropriate pressure and threats, to turn the tide.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

^{If you enjoy this episode, consider becoming a patron and getting involved with the show. Check out Steal This Show’s Patreon campaign: support us and get all kinds of fantastic benefits!}

This episode features the CEO of Storj.io, Shawn Wilkinson to discuss how BitTorrent-like swarms could be the future of online file storage.

In addition to beating services like Dropbox and Google Drive on price, Storj has built-in encryption that makes it impossible to snoop on files – plus its decentralized infrastructure makes it next to impossible to censor them or take them down.

Sound familiar?

Previous episodes on Zeronet, Yours Network, and the Distributed Library of Alexandria have proved that there’s a new groundswell of interest in peer-to-peer content services that put control of content back in the hands of users. Storj is already available in beta form and ready to test out today. Could this be technology that kills Big Content’s surveillance-ridden cloud? Tune in and find out!

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Steal This Show aims to release bi-weekly episodes featuring insiders discussing copyright and file-sharing news. It complements our regular reporting by adding more room for opinion, commentary, and analysis.

The guests for our news discussions will vary, and we’ll aim to introduce voices from different backgrounds and persuasions. In addition to news, STS will also produce features interviewing some of the great innovators and minds.

Host: Jamie King

Guest: Shawn Wilkinson

Produced by Jamie King
Edited & Mixed by Riley Byrne
Original Music by David Triana
Web Production by Siraje Amarniss

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

Last year, mass ‘copyright-trolling’ hit Sweden for the first time. An organization calling itself Spridningskollen (Distribution Check) claimed its new initiative would save the entertainment industries and educate the masses.

Predictably there was a huge backlash, both among the public and in the media, something which eventually led the group to discontinue its operations in the country. Now, however, a new wave of trolling is about to hit the country.

Swedish publication Breakit.se reports that a major new offensive is about to begin, with a Danish law firm Njord and movie company Zentropa at the helm.

The companies are targeting the subscribers of several ISPs, including Telia, Tele2 and Bredbandsbolaget, the provider that will shortly begin blocking The Pirate Bay. It’s not clear how many people will be targeted but Breakit says that many thousands of IP addresses cover 42 pages of court documents.

Bredbandsbolaget confirmed that a court order exists and it will be forced to hand over the personal details of its subscribers.

“The first time we received such a request, we appealed because we do not think that the privacy-related sacrifice is proportionate to the crimes that were allegedly committed. Unfortunately we lost and must now follow the court order,” a spokesperson said.

It appears the trolls are taking extreme measures to ensure that ISPs comply. Some Swedish ISPs have a policy of deleting IP address logs but earlier this week a court ordered Telia to preserve data or face a $22,000 fine.

Jeppe Brogaard Clausen of the Njord lawfirm says that after identifying the subscribers he wants to “enter into non-aggressive dialogue” with them. But while this might sound like a friendly approach, the ultimate aim will be to extract money. It’s also worth considering who is behind this operation.

The BitTorrent tracking in the case was carried out by MaverickEye, a German-based company that continually turns up in similar cases all over Europe and the United States. The company and its operator Patrick Achache are part of the notorious Guardaley trolling operation.

Also of interest is the involvement of UK-based Copyright Management Services Ltd, whose sole director is none other than Patrick Achache himself. The company is based at the same London address as fellow copyright trolling partner Hatton and Berkeley, which previously sent cash settlement demands to Internet users in the UK.

In addition to two Zentropa titles, the movies involved in the Swedish action are CELL, IT, London Has Fallen, Mechanic: Resurrection, Criminal and September of Shiraz. All have featured in previous Guardaley cases in the United States.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.