The newly elected Canadian Government has yet to announce how it will tackle online piracy going forward. However, a new Government document highlights some interesting points.

In a briefing Canadian Heritage officials prepared for minister Mélanie Joly several copyright related topics are discussed. The recent changes proposed by the TPP, for example.

The briefing also identifies three emerging copyright issues and pressures that may need to be addressed during the years to come, as Canadian law professor Michael Geist reveals.

On the top of this list of potential problems is “copyright infringement using VPNs.” While VPNs have plenty legitimate purposes, especially for those concerned about their privacy, pirates also use them to prevent being tracked by monitoring companies.

While the use of VPNs for infringing activities is a concern, Professor Geist believes that targeting these services won’t go down well with privacy advocates.

“Those [infringing] activities raise genuine issues, though the prospect of targeting the technology itself would quickly generate robust opposition from those who rely on VPNs for a myriad of legitimate purposes,” Geist notes.

Slide from the Minister’s briefing

VPNs could also play a major role in a second point being raised, which mentions the hybrid legal and illegal offer of online content. Although it’s not further specified, this may refer to the unauthorized access of streaming services such as Netflix in other countries.

Many Canadians use VPN services to access the U.S. version of Netflix, which has a more appealing content library. This topic was highlighted by Bell Media’s boss earlier this year, who accused her daughter of being a Netflix “thief.”

According to Professor Geist the Government wouldn’t have a very strong case to go after this circumvention behavior, as it will be hard to prove actual losses.

Finally, the brief mentions pirate site blockades by ISPs, something that’s become fairly popular in recent years, especially in Europe. The first signs of Canadian blocking efforts surfaced earlier this year with Quebec’s plans to ban illegal gambling sites.

Whether the three “issues” will become part of new copyright law is unclear. If so, this would be another shift in the wrong direction according to Professor Geist.

“Canadian copyright was already on track for a boisterous debate in the coming years,” he writes.

“If government officials envision adding VPN usage, access to U.S. Netflix, and website blocking to the list of issues, copyright could emerge as one of the government’s most difficult and controversial issues.”

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

For many years Sweden was viewed as a world leader in various file-sharing scenes, not least due to the prominence of The Pirate Bay.

Perhaps inevitably, however, this attracted much unwanted attention from authorities in the United States, who felt that Sweden wasn’t doing enough to combat the problem.

These days the opposite is true. Hardly a month goes by without news of another arrest or court case, and December is no different. This week streaming dropped into focus, with police raiding locations in separate parts of the country.

The targets were the operators of Sweflix, one of the country’s most popular illicit streaming portals and a top 1000 site overall. According to IDG, police raided two homes on Tuesday, one in a city in southern Sweden and another in the Uppsala area.

“We have over time carried out surveillance against those who may be behind Sweflix. Then we received information that led to the crackdown,” said Prosecutor Mats Ljungqvist.

Authorities initially reported taking three people in for questioning. While one was later released, two remained under arrest yesterday. Both are suspected ringleaders of the busy movie and TV streaming site.

“The two that have been detained know each other and one of them has a family relationship with the third,” Ljungqvist added.

As is usually the case, particularly in Sweden where rightsholder anti-piracy groups have a strong presence, the raid was prompted by complaints from local and international entertainment industry groups including Nordic Video and Disney.

Prosecutor Mats Ljungqvist confirmed that some seizures had been made following execution of the warrants but refused to provide details. However, at the time of writing Sweflix remains fully operational, both at Sweflix.net and sweflix.to, an alternative domain that was introduced just a few months ago.

Tackling streaming sites by force is currently one of the few tools available to the authorities. Rightsholders had pinned their hopes on having sites like Pirate Bay and Swefilmer blocked at the ISP level, but a negative decision from the Stockholm District Court last month ruled that out, at least for now.

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

When it’s released on December 15, Star Wars: The Force Awakens is likely to become one of the most popular sci-fi films of all time. Even for non-fans, the anticipation can be felt around the entire web.

No surprise then that Disney and Lucasfilm, the two main companies behind the behemoth, are gearing up for an aggressive anti-piracy campaign should, heaven forbid, the movie leak onto the Internet.

While that is completely understandable, over the past 48 hours the companies have been taking action to aggressively protect their rights in a way that is probably not supported by the law.

The problems began earlier this week when fansite Star Wars Action News posted an update to its Facebook page. An excited Justin revealed that he’d just purchased an action figure of ‘Rey‘ from America’s favorite store.

“Have we known this figure was coming? I just found her at Walmart – no other new figures,” he reported.

Crucially, Justin also posted up a couple of pictures of the boxed figure, which he had legally purchased – not stolen – from the store. However, it didn’t remain up for long.

“These pictures were removed from the post,” Justin wrote in an update. “Facebook notified us they deleted the photos after someone reported them for copyright infringement.”

But this is the Internet and things travel – quickly. Jeremy Conrad at Star Wars Unity subsequently reposted the pictures and he too felt the heat, in a much bigger way.

“This morning I woke up to numerous DMCA takedown notices on the @starwarsunity Twitter account, the Facebook account, the Google+ Page, and my personal Twitter for posting the image of an action figure that was legally purchased at Walmart,” Conrad explains.

“My webhost also received a takedown email from them with a threat of a lawsuit of the image wasn’t removed.”

A lawsuit. For displaying an entirely legal photograph. The copyright to which is presumably owned by Justin at Star Wars Action News. But it didn’t stop there.

Acting on behalf of Lucasfilms, anti-piracy outfit Irdeto has been hitting Twitter, not only filing DMCA notices (below, edited) against people who posted the image, but those who dared to RE-TWEET those tweets.

DMCA Takedown Notice

Copyright owner: Lucasfilm Ltd. LLC.
Name: David Gamble
Company: Irdeto
Job title: Operations Manager
Email address: iiprod_ops@irdeto.com

Description of original work: Star Wars: The Force Awakens – Rey (Resistance Outfit) Figurine

Links to original work: n/a

Reported Tweet URL: https://twitter.com/supersorrell/status/674483899871928321

Description of infringement: A screen shot of an unreleased figurine for Star Wars: Force Awakens

Description of infringement: A screen shot of an unreleased figurine for Star Wars: Force Awakens

While taking down an image that they don’t own the copyrights to is certainly taking things too far, Lucasfilm appear to have their reasons for doing so.

We’re not Star Wars experts here at TF but from what we understand there is an item printed on the Rey toy packaging that fans of the series will not want to see. That’s why we’re not publishing that picture in all its glory.

That being said, this story would not be complete without referencing the image that has caused all the fuss. With a double-helping of SPOILER WARNINGS and a DON’T BLAME US on top, those who wish to see the image can do so here.

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

Earlier this year the company behind the movie Dallas Buyers Club was granted permission to obtain the personal details of 4,726 Australia-based BitTorrent users alleged to have shared the movie online without permission.

However, DBC’s reputation for so-called “speculative invoicing” had traveled quickly, leading Justice Nye Perram to express concerns over the company’s plans for Australia. And after learning that DBC wanted to interrogate alleged infringers with the aim of extracting large payments from them, the Judge began narrowing the company’s options.

Justice Perram told DBC that it could claim for the price of the film and a proportion of the amount spent on tracking down an alleged infringer, but no more. On top, he ordered the film outfit to pay a AUS$600,000 bond before any subscriber information could be released.

In response, DBC tried a new direction. It asked for the personal details of 10% of the original 4,726 subscribers as a test run of sorts. In return, it asked for the bond to be reduced from AUS$600,000 to AUS$60,000.

Previously Justice Perram had rejected the company’s punitive compensation formula, ruling that DBC could only ask for the cost of the movie (perhaps AUS$20) and the costs it had incurred obtaining their identities from ISPs.

But today DBC were back in court and trying once again to convince the Judge to let them continue pursuing alleged pirates. Presenting a new formula, DBC said it would stop looking at each case individually on its merits and instead present the same settlement offer to all.

Dropping its controversial plan to formulate damages based partly on how many copies of OTHER copyrighted works had been downloaded by each alleged infringer, DBC hung on to its demands that each account holder should pay the cost of the movie. In addition DBC said it would demand a rental charge, a license fee for illegally distributing its copyright work, plus a payment towards its costs.

ITNews reports that DBC’s license calculations were based on a case in which a single unlicensed reprint of a stock photo resulted in a $12,500 damages award. DBC said that its claim was “modest by comparison”.

However, Justice Perram disagreed, describing a figure already presented by DBC in a confidential submission as “not modest”. Furthermore, since DBC had not provided evidence of its licensing arrangements, the Judge could not come to a conclusion on what a reasonable amount might be.

As a result DBC asked for an adjournment so that it could gather and present more evidence, but Justice Perram flat-out refused. Nevertheless, DBC did appear to make some ground today.

Last month the company said it intended to fight for additional damages, despite the Judge indicating that he did not wish to revisit the issue. Today, Justice Perram reluctantly admitted that he may have “misconstrued” the earlier additional damages claim.

“I’ve written four judgments about this case, and I must say, the love is gone … why must I keep deciding this case over and over again?” he said.

All eyes now turn to next week when Perram will decide whether DBC will be allowed to access the details of 10% of the original 4,726 subscribers and if the company will be given permission to appeal the earlier decision to limit claims for damages.

It’s not over yet but DBC still has its eyes glued to the big prize – thousands of dollars in settlements from thousands of Aussie Internet subscribers. And, if they’re successful, more of the same in future.

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

Last October saw the much hyped public release of Aurous, a music player that tapped into a library of pirated music.

The major record labels were not happy with the emergence of the “Popcorn Time for Music” and wasted no time trying to take it down.

Just days after Aurous’ alpha launch, Florida-based developer Andrew Sampson and his company were targeted by the major music labels. The RIAA accused the owners of copyright infringement and demanded millions in damages.

Initially Aurous seemed determined to put up a fight. The court shut down the application through a preliminary injunction but Sampson was convinced that his application was not breaking any laws.

After several scathing replies from the RIAA, who went into full attack mode, things went quiet. Behind the scenes both parties agreed that it was best to settle their dispute which they officially announced a few minutes ago.

In a filing submitted at a Florida federal court both parties agree that Aurous did indeed violate the copyrights of the major labels. They agree to settle the dispute for $3 million, which is described as a reasonable damages award.

The consent judgement

The filing (pdf) also includes a permanent injunction preventing Sampson and Aurous co-founder Danielle Astvatsaturova from committing any infringing actions in the future.

In addition, Aurous agreed to sign over its domain name and all intellectual property to the music labels.

The consent judgment is only part of the full settlement. The RIAA and Aurous signed a separate agreement outside of court. It is not uncommon for the true settlement amount to be much lower than the figure stated in court, as we’ve previously seen in an MPAA case.

Commenting on the announcement, RIAA Chairman & CEO Cary Sherman says the RIAA is happy with the settlement.

“Aurous appropriately agreed to shut down. It was the right thing to do. We hope this sends a strong signal that unlicensed services cannot expect to build unlawful businesses on the backs of music creators,” Sherman says.

Aurous’ creator, meanwhile, accepts his losses but is not done developing just yet. Sampson informs TF that he has moved on to a new project which will see the light of day in the near future.

“It’s still music related, but more centered around live performances. I will be showcasing it soon,” he says.

Taking the past few eventful weeks into account, we assume that his new creation is lawsuit proof. In any case, the RIAA is bound to watch his every step.

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