Children and students of all kinds are some of the most valuable assets to society. After all, they’re literally the future of the planet. As a result, hundreds of groups around the world dedicate themselves to protecting their interests, from general welfare and healthcare to Internet safety.

One of the groups dedicated to the latter is the Internet Keep Safe Coalition (iKeepSafe), an alliance of policy leaders, educators, law enforcement and technology experts.

iKeepSafe has launched a new initiative in partnership with pro-copyright/anti-piracy group Creative Future called the Contribute to Creativity Challenge.

“We know that when students are given the opportunity to be creative, they not only learn to make conscious choices about sharing their creative work, but they also understand the value of respecting the rights of other creators,” iKeepSafe says.

The challenge is a competition which requires students to submit electronic projects that center around the importance of behaving well online, such as respecting copyright and related rights.

“To participate, each entrant will need to submit an electronic project educating others about the importance of being an ethical, responsible online digital citizen,” iKeepSafe notes.

“The submissions will be judged according to the judging rubric and the winning entries will each receive a $75 Amazon gift card for books or classroom supplies.”

For those submitting entries the exercise of considering what makes a good digital citizen should be an enlightening one. Indeed, the creative process itself should also be enjoyable and educational, further sweetened by the prospect of a few bucks should the entry be a winner.

But for those young creators getting involved, there’s another equally valuable lesson to be learned from this exercise, even at the tender age of 12.

It’s quite likely that some participating students will be considering getting involved in the business of content creation, whether that’s in the music, movie, TV, or publishing sectors. With that in mind, they should consider the terms and conditions of any contracts entered into. This competition is a great place to start.

The Contribute to Creativity Challenge has five pages of T&Cs (pdf). They include rules that submitted content cannot infringe other people’s intellectual property rights or condone any illegal activities, which is fair enough.

However, since this is all about being creative and respecting creators’ rights, we took a look at what rights these young creators will have over their content after it’s submitted to the competition and what uses it will be put to thereafter.

“By entering the Competition, each Entrant hereby grants to Promoter and their assigns, licensees and designees a non-exclusive, irrevocable, perpetual license to use, copy, publish, and publicly display the Entry and all elements of the Entry (including, but not limited to, the Entrant’s name, city and country, biographical information, statements, voice, photograph and other likeness (unless prohibited by law)) in whole or in part,” the conditions read.

Of course, some kind of license is required if the competition operators are to be able to do anything with the entries. However, it also means that whether the entrant likes it or not (or even understands the legal jargon), their submitted work can be published along with their photographs until the end of time by iKeepSafe, “in any and all media either now known or not currently known, in perpetuity throughout the universe for all purposes.”

In perpetuity. Universe. All purposes. And, just to be clear, “without notification and without compensation of any kind to Entrant or any third party.” (emphasis ours)

Of course, there will be many students who will relish the thought of their projects gaining some publicity since that could really help their profile. However, it seems likely from the conditions of the competition that what iKeepSafe really wants is free material for upcoming campaigns.

“The Promoter shall have the right, without limitation, to reproduce, alter, amend, edit, publish, modify, crop and use each Entry in connection with commercials, advertisements and promotions related to the Promoter, the sale of Promoter’s products, the Competition and any other competition sponsored by Promoter, in any and all media, now or hereafter known, including but not limited to, all forms of television distribution, theatrical advertisements, radio, the Internet, newspapers, magazines and billboards,” the conditions read.

The eagle-eyed will have noticed that student entrants grant iKeepSafe a non-exclusive license, which usually means that they are also free to exploit their works themselves, a luxury that an exclusive license does not offer. While that’s a good thing, a subsequent clause could conceivably muddy the waters.

“Entrant agrees not to release any publicity or other materials on their own or through someone else regarding his or her participation in the Competition without the prior consent of the Promoter, which it may withhold in its sole discretion,” it reads.

Just to be absolutely clear, there’s no suggestion that iKeepSafe are leading students down a dark path here, since their overall goal of promoting ethical behavior online is a noble one. That being said, would it really hurt to properly compensate student creators featured in subsequent campaigns that will largely exist to help businesses?

After all, the message here is about being ethical, and with Creative Future on board – which represents rightsholders worth billions of dollars – there’s more than a little bit of cash lying around to properly compensate these young creators.

Perhaps the key lesson for students and other creators to be aware of at this early stage is that some companies and organizations will be prepared to exploit their creative work while giving little or indeed absolutely nothing back.

Today it’s a harmless school project competition entry on ethics, but in a few years time it could be something worth millions, ask George Michael.

Finally, if being ethical and responsible really is the goal, perhaps students and competition operators alike should consider a much less restrictive Creative Commons license.

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

Founded in 2006 by Rick Falkvinge, the Pirate party movement has scored some significant victories over the years.

The greatest success is the continuing presence in the European Parliament, but in Iceland the local Pirate Party is writing history as well.

Iceland’s Pirates have a great track record already, with three members in the national Parliament. However, more may join in the future as the party has added many new supporters in recent months.

With elections just a week away the tension is growing. The Pirates have been leading the polls for most of the year and are currently neck-and-neck with the Social Democratic Alliance to become the largest party in the country.

This brings the Pirates in an unusual position where they have to start thinking about possible partners to form a coalition Government, for the first time in history.

TF spoke with Ásta Helgadóttir, Member of Parliament for the Icelandic Pirate Party, who says that the party is ready to bring the change many citizens are longing for.

“Firstly, by adopting a new constitution which has already been voted on in a non-binding referendum,” Helgadóttir says.

“This will change how Iceland functions as a democracy, transitioning into a much more meaningful democracy. The Pirates are focused on decentralization of power, access to information and civil and human rights. The pillars of any meaningful notion of democracy.”

Despite the Pirate name, copyright issues are not central to their plans. That said, they have spoken out against recent web-blocking efforts.

Iceland’s ISPs have been ordered to block access to ‘infringing’ sites such as The Pirate Bay, which the party sees as a step in the wrong direction. The party fears that these censorship efforts will lead to more stringent measures.

“These measures are not a solution and only exacerbate the problem. There needs to be a review of copyright law and how creators are compensated for their work,” Helgadóttir notes, adding that some ISPs are planning to fight the blockades in court.

While the Pirate Party movement has always appealed to the younger generations, in Iceland it receives support across all age groups. One of their main selling points is a broad and clear vision for Iceland that breaks with the current political establishment.

The Pirate Party was in part formed by supporters of the Icelandic Modern Media Initiative, a unanimously adopted parliamentary resolution to create the optimal environment for freedom of information and free expression.

“This work is still under way but something the Pirates want to implement,” Helgadóttir says.

“The resolution brings limited liability for intermediaries, whistleblower protection, enhanced source protection, due process, defamation law reform and data protection, among other things.”

With just a week to go, there’s a realistic chance that the Pirates will book a historic election win, allowing them to govern the country during the years to come.

In that regard, the timing could hardly be any better. With the recent revelations from the Panama Papers scandal and the banking crisis fresh in mind, people are longing for change.

According to Helgadóttir, the party hasn’t set any specific goals in terms of a vote percentage they want to reach. Whatever the outcome, they will to their best to and steer the country in the right direction once again.

“We do not have a specific target in terms of percentages. Our objective is to get the ball rolling on some fundamental issues, whether that happens with 10% of the vote or 40% of the vote is not paramount.”

The parliamentary elections will take place next week, October 29.

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

With the Internet and therefore online piracy having developed into a truly global phenomenon, anti-piracy groups everywhere are expanding their reach.

What was once a semi-isolated affair has become a multi-agency, cross-continent operation, with governments and rights holders alike striving to share information and pool resources.

An event this week illustrated where things are going, with representatives from around the world descending upon Brussels for a meeting hosted by the Motion Picture Association.

The International Roundtable, titled “Combating Internet Piracy: International Practice”, saw government officials from Europe and Russia join representatives from the United States and the UK to discuss cooperation against piracy.

The meeting (Photo via Роскомнадзор)

According to information released by Russian telecoms watchdog Roscomnadzor and translated by the MPA, those gathered agreed that a “lack of intellectual property protection causes significant economic damage to individual rights holders and the global economy.”

Of course, that message certainly isn’t new. Neither are mounting public claims by rights holders that Internet users are being put at risk through their visits to unauthorized sites.

Those assembled agreed that consumers are negatively impacted from enjoying entertainment in a safe environment since pirate sites “are a fertile ground for identity theft, viruses, malware or spyware.”

As mentioned earlier, anti-piracy groups and initiatives of all kinds now understand that collaboration is part of the way forward, whether that’s sharing information or working towards tougher legal frameworks.

“In particular, participants acknowledged the need to strengthen international cooperation in the fight against IPR violations on the Internet and to continue sharing experiences in improving legislation, and law enforcement practice in combating copyright infringement in the digital environment in the EU, Russian Federation, and USA,” a summary of the meeting reads.

Those at the meeting included representatives from the US “six-strikes” Copyright Alert System and the UK’s GetitRight campaign. Details are fairly scarce, but these groups are likely to have shared data on how educational messages affect the behaviors of Internet pirates and how voluntary agreements with industry players such as ISPs can become part of the anti-piracy package.

Another item on the agenda was the role that search engines and user-generated content companies play when it comes to fighting online piracy. While Russia has its own issues with services like Yandex, for the US and Europe the focus is very much on Google and sites such as YouTube.

Service provider liability and related legislative initiatives will continue to be hot topics in the months and years ahead. This is particularly true of the United States, where the safe harbor provisions of the DMCA are under scrutiny alongside a controversial debate on the so-called ‘value gap‘ claimed to be present on YouTube.

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

Website blocking has become one of the favorite anti-piracy tools of the entertainment industries in recent years.

The UK is a leader on this front, with the High Court ordering local ISPs to block access to many popular file-sharing sites.

Over time the number of blocked URLs has expanded to well over 1,000, with popular torrent, streaming, and direct download sites being the main targets.

While research has shown that this approach is somewhat effective, there are plenty of options through which people can circumvent the blockades, including many reverse proxies.

Similarly, pirate sites can simply switch to a new domain name to evade the court orders, and new sites are allowed to flourish in the shadow of those that are no longer available.

This week we decided to take a look at the current pirate site landscape in the UK, with some surprising results.

As it turns out, the list of top ten most-used pirate sites in the UK includes several sites that are on the ISPs blockists. In some cases the sites remain accessible on their original domain names, via the HTTPS URL.

As we’ve highlighted before, not all ISPs are able to block HTTPS traffic, which allows their subscribers to load The Pirate Bay and other blocked sites just fine.

There are also websites that intentionally help visitors to circumvent the blocks by registering new domain names. Unblocked.vip, for example, has cycled through various domain names in order to remain available.

And then there are the newcomers. 123movies.to deserves a mention here as it’s currently the most-used pirate site in the UK. With an Alexa rank of 81, it’s even one of the 100 most-visited sites in the country.

123movies.to

Below we’ve made an overview of the ten most-used pirate sites in the UK. Several of these are on the blocklist, with a current or previous URL. This suggests that the blocking efforts are not as effective as rightsholders would like them to be.

The conclusion is also in line with research from Italy, which suggested that site-blocking can actually be counterproductive. Similarly, a UK report revealed that it significantly boosts traffic to non-blocked websites.

While the entertainment industries still see enough value in website blocking, it’s clear that it’s not the silver bullet that will defeat piracy. And at a rate of £14,000 per site, it comes at a high cost.

—

The label “pirate site” applies to sites that have been classified as such by entertainment industry groups. It’s worth noting that at the time of writing, several of the sites (*) had already started redirecting to new domain names. Putlocker.is is currently down.

Site	Alexa rank	Type	Original site blocked?
torrentfreak.com
123movies.to	81	Streaming	No
Watchseries.ac (*)	126	Streaming	Yes
Unblocked.vip (*)	127	Proxy links	Yes
Putlocker.is (down)	161	Streaming	No
Pirateproxy.red (*)	183	Torrents (proxy)	Yes
Thepiratebay.org	316	Torrents	Yes
Rutracker.org	384	Torrents	No
Vodlocker.com	407	Cyberlocker	No
Zippyshare.com	412	Cyberlocker	No
Yify-torrent.org	431	Torrents	No

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

Assisted by police in France and the Netherlands, the FBI took down the “pirate” Android stores Appbucket, Applanet and SnappzMarket during the summer of 2012.

During the years that followed several people connected to the Android app sites were arrested and indicted, and slowly but surely these cases are now reaching their conclusions.

Two months ago the first sentencing was announced, and it was a big one. SnappzMarket’s ‘PR manager’ Scott Walton was handed a 46-month prison sentence for conspiracy to commit copyright infringement.

Like several others, Walton had pleaded guilty in order to get a reduced sentence. However, not all did. David Lee, a California man linked to Applanet, decided to move to trial instead.

The indictment charged Lee with aiding and abetting criminal copyright infringement (pdf). In addition, he was charged with conspiring to infringe copyrights and violating the DMCA’s anti-circumvention provision.

As the case progressed it became clear that the U.S. Government’s evidence wasn’t as strong as initially thought. Before the trial even started, the prosecution voluntarily dropped the criminal copyright infringement charge.

The “overt” acts that were scrapped due to a lack of evidence are all related to an undercover FBI agent in the Northern District of Georgia, who supposedly downloaded pirated apps from Applanet’s computer servers.

What remained was the conspiracy charge and last week both parties argued their case before the jury. Over the course of several days many witnesses were heard, including FBI agents and co-defendant Gary Sharp, who previously pleaded guilty.

Friday last week the closing arguments were presented after which the jury retreated to deliberate at 10:30 in the morning. At the end of the day, however, they still hadn’t reached a decision so the court decided to continue after the weekend.

On Monday the jury got back together but after having failed to reach a verdict by the end of the day, a mistrial was declared. This means that David Lee has not been found guilty.

Mistrial

TorrentFreak reached out to Lee’s lawyers for more information but they declined to comment.

In the jury instructions the defense hammered on the fact that the government must prove that either the conspiracy or an overt act took place in the District of Georgia, even if the defendant never set foot there.

It could be that the Jury couldn’t reach a unanimous decision on that point or any of the other key issues.

TF also contacted the Department of Justice, who didn’t go into detail either, but informed us that they are still evaluating the outcome. “We are considering our options,” a DoJ spokesperson said.

In theory, the U.S. Government can ask for a retrial, which means that the case has to be tried again. For now, however, David Lee remains out of prison.

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