Having existed in the file-sharing space for at least a decade, copyright trolling is not a new phenomenon. As regularly reported though, it’s generally BitTorrent users that are targeted.

The IP addresses of torrent users are easily extracted from file-sharing swarms and through a subpoena to their Internet service providers, trolls can unmask sharers’ true identities. That being said, other methods have also been employed.

Earlier this year users of adult torrent site Empornium began receiving cash settlement demands from porn outfit TaylorMadeClips (TMC) but none appeared to have been tracked down by regular means. Empornium later revealed that a moderator account had been compromised and personal details of sharers leaked.

Subsequently, the co-owner of TMC admitted in public that information on alleged pirates had been purchased.

“We paid for a couple email addresses and sent a couple uploaders emails asking that they remove the torrents,” he explained.

“When that didn’t work they offered a list of people who had downloaded our content and I eventually paid for the information on people who had downloaded AND seeded the torrents because we have never had our lawyer contact downloaders, just uploaders.”

Given the way that situation played out, chins will now be scratched in response to the news that users of Pornhub are currently receiving similar threats from TMC.

A tip passed to TorrentFreak by troll monitoring site DieTrollDie indicates that several people who allegedly uploaded TaylorMadeClips content to Pornhub are now receiving demands to settle with the company for thousands of dollars.

“It has come to our client’s attention that you have distributed our client’s videos without authorization and in violation of our client’s rights,” the correspondence from TMC lawyer Mark Borghese begins.

“In particular, you have shared [..] our client’s videos on Pornhub under the username [redacted]. Each illegal distribution made of those videos constitutes a separate act of copyright infringement directly attributable to you.”

After threats to “forensically examine every single hard drive and other electronic storage device” in alleged infringers’ homes, Borghese provides “one last attempt” to settle. Unsurprisingly demands go up to several thousand dollars.

Considering the less than ethical Empornium case and the fact that Pornhub users’ details (IP addresses and emails) aren’t public on the site, TorrentFreak contacted Borghese asking him how he and TMC managed to track down the true identities of the Pornhub users.

Did Pornhub hand over the details to his lawfirm after legal action? Did the Pornhub users’ Internet service providers provide him with their real-life identities? Were alleged pirates’ identities obtained by other less conventional means?

Borghese did not respond to our requests for comment. We also contacted Pornhub who were equally silent.

Unfortunately that leaves only speculation, but nevertheless the situation provides food for thought. While obtaining information from services like Pornhub and ISPs might be the conventional route for trolls, if done properly it’s usually expensive.

Borghese previously told TF that TMC like to keep costs down. So, given TMC’s track record, taking a short-cut or two doesn’t seem out of the question.

What we do know is that these cases have common denominators, including that some targets bought their content directly from TMC. Watermarking of purchases might have been possible, but sources familiar with the situation suggest this is unlikely.

Additionally, some alleged infringers received notification from Pornhub that there had been complaints filed against their uploaded content. After the videos were deleted, some accounts were subsequently shut down by Pornhub, sometimes within days of a letter arriving from TMC’s lawyer.

Of course, it’s also possible (and likely) that more basic detection methods were used.

In all cases that we know of thus far, alleged pirates were contacted via direct email only (not via ISP), which is relatively unusual for trolls. However, some people have a habit of employing the same usernames and email addresses across several sites and as we’ve seen in the past, those can prove extremely revealing.

It’s impossible to say with any certainty if TMC intends to carry through with their threats to chase those who don’t settle, but a public confession by one of TMC’s co-owners earlier this year in the wake of the Empornium incident might shine a little light.

“If you haven’t acted on the letter then nothing else will happen since we don’t follow up except for in the most extreme cases where there is malicious intent or the pure volume of files being pirated by one person is too large,” he wrote.

In any event, the case detailed above shows that some trolls are comfortable in tracking down pirates, not just on BitTorrent, but wherever they roam – and by any means possible.

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

In its quest to stamp out piracy, the MPAA continues to evolve its anti-piracy strategies and tools.

It’s no secret that the movie industry group often hires outsiders to track down pirates, but it’s now also recruiting fresh blood to bring some of this technology in-house.

The MPAA currently has several open positions including one for a Software Programmer. This is an interesting job application as it reveals a bit more about what the MPAA is up to behind the scenes.

The person hired for the programmer job will work under the supervision of Vice President of Internet Content Protection and will be tasked with developing monitoring tools and investigating piracy trends.

Among other things, the MPAA is looking for candidates who can create tools to automatically gather large amounts of data. This could be related to the sending of DMCA notices, for example, which the MPAA hasn’t done much of recently.

“They will develop and use automated tools for gathering large amounts of data from online websites and resources, and generate meaningful statistics to help guide and bolster enforcement actions,” the application reads.

The key responsibilities also reveal other anti-piracy tasks, such as forensic analysis of websites, monitoring and reporting infringements, and gathering intelligence on pirate sites.

– Monitor, investigate and report on copyright infringement occurring online via established and emerging content distribution technologies.
– Develop scripts for conducting automated scrapes of online information for intelligence gathering and enforcement purposes.
– Conduct detailed forensic analysis of online content, including reviewing technical infrastructure of online platforms and sites.

Another job opening at the MPAA that’s worth a mention is that of Cisco Network Engineer. This is another tech position and a crucial one as it involves the operation and management of the MPAA’s local network and file-storage services.

With the recent Sony hack in mind, this is quite a sensitive job and the Hollywood group points out that applicants must possess the “highest level of work ethics and integrity” and be able to “maintain confidential information.”

Both positions are still vacant so readers looking for a job at one of the best known anti-piracy firms are welcome to respond.

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

Like many large Internet providers in the United States, Comcast forwards DMCA notices to subscribers who have allegedly downloaded pirated material.

These copyright infringement warnings list the title, IP-address, and other download details. They are also accompanied by a stark warning notifying the subscriber of a possible account termination.

Usually, alleged downloaders only receive one notice per offence, but one Comcast subscriber received a whole stack in the mail this week.

The subscriber in question, who posted his story on Reddit, was sent 44 letters for one and the same torrent. The Spongebob Season 8 torrent was downloaded by his brother and is apparently well tracked.

The notices, which come from by Viacom, all list Spongebob Season 8 as the infringing file name and point to the same torrent. They appear to be quite sloppy as some say “null” under infringing work section.

From the information available it’s unclear what triggered the avalanche of DMCA notices. It could be that the copyright holder sent one for all files in the torrent, or perhaps a port change triggered a new warning.

In any case, it kept Comcast and the post office busy for a while.

As for the repercussions, Comcast informs the subscriber that he may have his account terminated. Since the notices are not part of the Copyright Alert System, this is indeed an option.

“Comcast reminds you that use of the Service in any manner that constitutes an infringement of any copyrighted work is a violation of Comcast’s Acceptable Use Policy and may result in the suspension or termination of your Service account.”

While many users would be concerned about the pile of alleged infringements, this Reddit user isn’t particularly bothered.

“I’m not concerned at all with the actual claims. Comcast doesn’t actually care all that much,” he writes.

“I’m protected by law from the copyright owner themselves, and it’s up to Comcast’s discretion whether they want to do something with your service like suspension or termination, but as long as they have your money, they generally don’t care.”

The above is indeed correct. Comcast would never share any personal details with copyright holders, unless they obtain a valid subpoena. Copyright trolls aside, this rarely ever happens. The same is true for account terminations.

What does happen, is that copyright holders send settlement requests for single torrents with multiple files.

While Comcast doesn’t forward these, we recently saw an example where a single download triggered 106 settlement notices of $300 each. This represents $31,800 in settlement fees for just one torrent.

That’s usually scary enough for people to start panicking.

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

Tens of millions of DMCA-style notices are sent to online services every week complaining about copyright infringement. While most are accurate, some contain errors.

Some take screwing up to a whole new level.

This week anti-piracy group Entura International sent a notice to Vimeo in what first appeared to be an effort to stop piracy of the Columbia movie ‘Pixels’. Not only did it fail to do that in every way possible, it hit a number of indie creators and filmmakers instead.

Founded in November 2004, NeMe describes itself as a non-profit NGO and an ‘Independent Museum of Contemporary Art’.

“Our NGO has just received a DMCA notice for a video we produced in 2006 entitled ‘Pixels’,” the group told Vimeo this week.

“The video was directed by a Cypriot film-maker using his own photos and sounds/music on a shoestring budget and infringes no copyright.”

Sadly for NeMe, however, it has now been resigned to history.

But upsetting the NGO was just the tip of the iceberg. The notice goes on to hit an embarrassing array of entirely non-infringing works.

“Life Buoy is my project for my degree at the National University of Arts from Bucharest,” creator Dragos Bardac explains.

“The film was made in mid 2010 and it is a music video for the song Life buoy by the band The Pixels. I used a mix of stop motion animation techniques in order to tell the story.”

But it doesn’t stop there.

Published on Vimeo in 2011, “Pantone Pixels” is described by creator Rob Penny as a “personal project that took me a very long time”.

Thanks to Entura, however, the image below now greets users of his website.

And it gets worse.

‘Pixels’ is a 2010 award-winning short film created by Patrick Jean. Its tagline “8Bit creatures are invading New York City” only tells half the story of this extremely cool short movie. It’s now wiped out on Vimeo but luckily YouTube still retains copies which together have been viewed millions of times.

Also falling victim is VJLoops.com, a royalty free stock footage & media site. They put up a video on Vimeo titled ‘Love Pixels’ which turned out to be a big mistake. Same goes for a 42 second video concerning this year’s Pixels Festival in Mons, Belgium.

Last, but certainly not least, Entura rounded off this disaster by taking down the official Pixels movie trailer, even though their very own notice lists their errors clearly.

Of course, in addition to the hassle of having had their content wrongfully taken down, each person subjected to a notice from Entura will have a ‘strike’ placed against their Vimeo account.

“The notice we received says that this is strike 1 which we do not accept for the aforementioned reasons. It also says that for Vimeo to accept to return the video online we have to give our name address and an assortment of statements,” the NeMe project told Vimeo in a response.

“I’d suggest filling a counter notice,” Mark from the company responded. “This is in the hands of our trust and safety team and unfortunately our support team cannot help you with this issue.”

Sorry folks, apparently you’re on your own.

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

After a massive wave of opposition more than three years ago, the Stop Online Piracy Act died and dozens of technology-focused companies and websites breathed a sigh of relief. But despite its demise the memory of SOPA has lived on, particularly in the minds of those who opposed it.

On that front there can be few more notable than the EFF who played an important role in bringing SOPA to its knees. It should therefore come as no surprise that when the EFF spots efforts by corporations to achieve SOPA-like powers through other means, the group quickly tells the world.

This week in a piece titled ‘Movie Studios Seek SOPA Power Through Broad Site-Blocking Order‘, EFF lawyer Mitch Stoltz told the story of how the MPAA aims to wipe a group of websites from the Internet without trial.

[The] studios are asking for one court order to bind every domain name registrar, registry, hosting provider, payment processor, caching service, advertising network, social network, and bulletin board—in short, the entire Internet—to block and filter a site called Movietube,” Stoltz warned.

“If they succeed, the studios could set a dangerous precedent for quick website blocking with little or no court supervision, and with Internet service and infrastructure companies conscripted as enforcers.”

The piece appears to have touched a nerve with elements of the movie industry who have lined up over the past 24 hours to criticize both Stoltz and the EFF. First up, filmmaker and anti-piracy activist Ellen Seidler.

“Stoltz sounded the alarm by dusting off the well-worn SOPA canard and cries of ‘censorship’ and ‘abuse.’ His love of the word ‘abuse’ was so strong, in fact, variations of the term appear 9 times in his piece,” Seidler writes.

“Isn’t it time for those at the EFF and others who yell ‘SOPA’ each time the movie industry takes legal action against online pirates to shut the hell up? What is abusive is the way online piracy (for profit) is allowed to flourish, made sacrosanct by tech apologists.”

Next up to admonish the EFF is filmmaker David Newhoff. Likening the rights group to Monty Python’s ‘Knights Who Say Ni’ and suggesting that at best they maintain a “loose relationship” with reality, Newhoff accuses the EFF of trying to scare the public.

“For instance, in this recent missive, EFFer Mitch Stoltz uses the acronym SOPA seven times in the first four paragraphs, which might lead the reader to think that the subject of the article has something to do with SOPA. Of course, it has nothing to do with SOPA,” Newhoff writes.

“They say SOPA, and hope the peasants cringe,” the filmmaker adds. “Thus, the EFF invests tremendous energy in this strategy, breathlessly warning us about the inevitable doom that will surely follow if, heaven-forbid, the rule of law might apply to trade across our precious tubes.”

Last but certainly not least, Ruth Vitale of anti-piracy group Creative Future weighs in with her take on the EFF piece in her rebuttal titled ‘If You’re Reading This The Internet Ain’t Broke‘.

“I know that ‘stop censorship’ and ‘don’t break the internet’ were effective talking points more than three years ago. That’s the past and a reference to legislative history. I think we’re all a bit wiser now. Can we finally collectively agree that piracy is not free speech?” Vitale writes.

“If we can come to that understanding, I and many in Hollywood would applaud EFF’s efforts to eliminate real censorship all over the world – but EFF’s relentless attacks on efforts by creative industries to protect their work damages its credibility.”

While the EFF and its critics are naturally miles apart on the topic, what’s puzzling here is the apparent unwillingness to grasp what Internet users are driving at when they refer to ‘SOPA-like’ activity.

From the day of its public outing to the day of its demise and beyond, the SOPA acronym has become synonymous with any legislative effort to clamp down on Internet piracy by forcing hosting providers, domain companies, the DNS system, payment processors, advertisers and social networks to become entertainment industry enforcers. It’s an extremely unpopular proposal.

Underlying all of this is the nature of the entities pushing for these powers. One only has to look at the unfolding nightmare that is the MPAA’s assault on Google via Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood to see how far Hollywood is prepared to go to get its way.

“[This kind of power] will be abused, which is why it’s important to stop it from being created in the first place,” the EFF warns.

Call it SOPA-like or call it something else, it’s difficult to argue with that conclusion. But as long as it has a recognizable name, people will understand what’s at stake, and for the EFF and other activists that’s more than half the battle.

SOPA might be dead but its name will live on – and the EFF isn’t likely to shut the hell up anytime soon.

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