During the past several years it’s become extremely common for copyright holders in the adult industry to target users of file-sharing networks in order to threaten them with litigation.

The way these users are contacted has remained constant in the vast majority of cases. Armed with a court order, copyright holders force ISPs to hand over the personal details of subscribers so they can be contacted directly for a cash settlement. However, it doesn’t always work that way.

Since mid 2013, mounting anecdotal evidence and reports have suggested that people uploading and sharing certain niche content may have had their true identities exposed via information they posted on the Internet rather than through John Doe lawsuits filed by a copyright holder.

In particular, users have reported receiving cash demands over niche adult material offered by a company called TaylorMadeClips (NSFW). As noted by DieTrollDie in a 2013 article, settlement demands like this (pdf) from TaylorMade lawfirm Borghese Legal have no official case associated with them.

Now, it could be that TaylorMade watermarks its clips and some of these letters are being sent to those who registered their personal details with the official site and later uploaded content elsewhere. However, private torrent site Empornium, one of the largest adult trackers around, believes it has an alternative explanation.

In a frank email exchange with TorrentFreak and subsequent announcement to its users, the operators of the site reveal that a staff account on its site has been compromised. The site was not hacked in any way but it appears a moderator account login details were obtained and subsequently used to cull private member data from the site.

“It was discovered that the user account of a regular (Mod) rank staff member has been accessed by someone other than the staff member in question. Once this was discovered, immediate steps were taken to prevent further access to sensitive information by this account,” the site said.

“By what we discovered of their activity and reports from users we believe that the unauthorized third party may have been affiliated with TaylorMadeClips and Borghese Legal, LTD. Their intentions appear to be to use information obtained to intimidate users into financial settlements through legal scare tactics. Specifically, users who have downloaded or seeded TaylorMadeClips torrents and are within US jurisdiction appear to be targeted.”

Empornium discovered the breach on Monday and immediately locked down the threat. However, sensitive information had already been obtained.

“The compromised account appears to have been primarily used to obtain the registered e-mail address for these users, and matched to the grabbed / snatched / peers lists of TaylorMadeClips torrents, to determine targets for threatening letters,” they add.

TorrentFreak asked Empornium how they came to the conclusions detailed above, this is what they said.

“We came to the conclusion on who was involved the simple way. We went back through what logs we still had (we keep very limited ones where possible for the simple reason if we are ever compromised we want as little hurtful info around as possible) and what accounts and torrents they pulled up info on,” Empornium told TF.

“Every one was [TaylorMadeClips] content and some of them we already have reports from users that they have received letters to their Empornium registration email address from Borghese Legal specifying those torrents. Many have also received a letter via snail mail. Those reports started around [now 48hrs to 72hrs] ago and alerted us that we may have a problem.”

How the third party (whoever that may turn out to be) obtained the login isn’t clear, but at this stage hacking is being ruled out.

“We know it wasn’t brute forced or similar as failed logins on staff accounts ring all sorts of very loud bells for us. We have had people attempt that attack vector more than once,” the site told TorrentFreak.

At this stage the most likely scenario is that the same user/pass combination could have been used on other sites but a computer compromise might also be possible. In any event, the site has identified the instances of unauthorized access and tracked them down to as-yet undisclosed locations in the United States.

While users of Empornium may be shocked and even disappointed that their information has been accessed in this way, it’s not only unusual but also a credit to the site that they have decided to be so open about the breach. It’s fair to say that many if not most sites would brush this kind of thing under the carpet.

TaylorMadeClips provides no contact information on its site and obscures its WHOIS information so could not immediately be reached for comment. TorrentFreak contacted Borghese Legal but at the time of publication we had not received a response.

Update: Statement from Mark Borghese, Borghese Legal, Ltd.

“My clients handle policing copyright infringement of their videos. My firm only gets involved later if they want to take some type of legal action. These are a small businesses and most of the time they do not want to go through the expense of hiring a lawyer,” Borghese told TF

“The statement from Empornium says that the site was not hacked. Apparently whatever the accused admin[mod] may have done was not done with the approval of the entire Empornium staff. Maybe there is a split among the Empornium admins regarding copyright infringement. It’s a bit of mixed message as the official Empornium statement recommends its users not commit copyright infringement.”

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

The .SE registry targeted in the prosecutor’s case does not want to take this action. They look at it as removing a street address on the basis that a crime was committed there.

But they’re all making it so simple. The fact is that, even though I despise the current version of The Pirate Bay, nothing illegal happens there. And actually, no such case has even been tried as the case against me and the others a few years back was about a totally different version of TPB.

The technology back then was different and the verdicts handed down referenced the fact that three separate parts of the system were in play in order to breach copyright. First the search engine (which is still there), then a tracking system (which was removed many years ago) and a database of .torrent files (which was removed years ago too).

This means that TPB today is in a totally different technical state than it was in the previous (and also very corrupt) court case. It also means that there’s no relevant court case to reference today, the system just looks the same to the users – and the prosecution and judges might have a hard time to understand that.

Essentially today’s TPB is similar to any other search engine. The court case in Sweden could just as well talk about Google.se as a domain name instead, since they also link to material that might breach copyright. But, actually, Google show you parts of that content, not just metadata about it.

Obviously this would be considered a ludicrous case and would be thrown out, but everything regarding TPB scared the shit out of the Swedish government because of pressure from the United States of America. Just look at how the first raid happened.

But the biggest threat against the Internet is that the state is going after the .SE registry and not the “perp” itself. It means that no one can come and defend TPB’s case in a court of law and point out the flaws in the prosecutor’s thinking. The .SE registry has no interest (and should not have any either) in going into details about the actions of their customers.

The points I’ve mentioned here, and the fact that, at least during my time, most material on TPB was not violating copyright, will not be mentioned in this court case, because the people who should have a right to defend themselves are not invited to the case. Where’s the democracy in that?

These court cases where the real defendants are not invited have only happened a few times in The Pirate Bay’s history as I can recall – in China, Denmark and Saudi Arabia. All world-renowned champions of free speech and democracy.

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

Founded in 2002, Swiss-based RapidShare was one of the first and most popular one-click file-hosting services on the Internet.

Like most sites of this nature, RapidShare was frequently used by people to share copyright-infringing material. It was a relationship that got the company into trouble on various occasions.

RapidShare fought many legal battles with entertainment companies seeking to hold the company liable for the actions of its users, and to top it off the site was called out by the U.S. Government as a “notorious market.”

Hoping to clear up its image the company made tremendous efforts to cooperate with copyright holders and limit copyright infringements. Among other things, the company adopted one of the most restrictive sharing policies while (re)branding itself as a personal cloud storage service.

The anti-piracy measures seemed to work, but as a result RapidShare’s visitor numbers plunged. The dwindling revenues eventually cost most of RapidShare’s employees their jobs.

Today marks the beginning of the final chapter in RapidShare’s controversial history. The company just announced that it will shut down at the end of March and is recommending that users store their files elsewhere.

“Kindly note that RapidShare will stop the active service on March 31st, 2015. Extensions of STANDARD PLUS and PREMIUM will be possible until February 28th, 2015,” RapidShare writes on its homepage.

“We strongly recommend all customers to secure their data. After March 31st, 2015 all accounts will no longer be accessible and will be deleted automatically,” the company adds.

TF asked the company for further details on the planned shutdown but we have yet to hear back. The most likely explanation is that RapidShare can’t sustain its business with the smaller number of users it has today.

The demise of RapidShare marks the end of an era. Half a decade ago RapidShare was listed among the 50 most-visited sites on the Internet, with hundreds of millions of page-views per month, but in a just a few weeks it will be gone.

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

While it is technically possible to operate without one, domain names are considered vital for any mainstream website. Domains give a web service an identity and make them easy to find.

This is exactly what authorities in Sweden are now trying to deny The Pirate Bay.

Prosecutor Fredrik Ingblad, the man behind the now-famous operation to take the site down in December, is now spearheading the drive to shut down The Pirate Bay’s access to a pair of key domains. ThePirateBay.se and PirateBay.se are Ingblad’s targets, the former being the only domain currently being used by the site.

Originally filed at the District Court of Stockholm back in 2013, the motion targets Punkt SE, the organization responsible for Sweden’s top level .SE domain. Ingblad’s assertion is that since The Pirate Bay is acting illegally, domain names are necessarily part of that site’s ‘crimes’ and should be tackled like any other part of its infrastructure.

“A domain name is an aid for a site. When a site is used for criminal activities a domain is aiding crime,” Ingblad said.

While actions against domain names aren’t unprecedented in Sweden, this case is unique. Punkt SE (also referred to as the Internet Infrastructure Foundation) informs TorrentFreak that while two earlier actions targeted the owners of Swedish domain names, this is the first time that the prosecutor has targeted the .SE / IIS registrar directly.

“There have been two legal cases regarding forfeiture of domain names from the domain name holder (ikonm.se and [torrent site] xnt.nu). In the Pirate bay case the prosecutor wants to forfeit the domain names directly from .SE,” Punkt SE’s Maria Ekelund told TF.

Also of interest is Inglblad’s demands for the domains should he prevail. The prosecutor says that Punkt SE should at the least be forbidden from allowing anyone to register the domains in future or, preferably, they should be placed under control of the Swedish government.

“It is not our intention to impose any monitoring responsibility on Punkt SE. The best outcome is that the state takes over the domain,” Ingblad told DN.se.

At this point it’s worth noting how far removed Punkt SE are from any online infringement. In the original Pirate Bay criminal trial the site’s former operators were found guilty of assisting in copyright infringements carried out by the site’s users. In the current case Punkt SE are being accused of assisting people who were previously found guilty of assisting other people to commit copyright infringement.

Punkt SE CEO Danny Aerts previously noted that the case is unique.

“In the eyes of the prosecutor, .SE’s catalogue function has become some form of accomplice to criminal activity, a perspective that is unique in Europe as far as I know,” Aerts said.

“There are no previous cases of states suing a registry for abetting criminal activity or breaching copyright law.”

Frederick Ingblad agrees that the case is complicated.

“It is about fundamental rights versus the need to prevent crime online. It’s a balancing act, and ultimately it’s for the legislature to decide.”

A few moments ago Punkt SE told us that the case will be heard at the end of April, two years since its original filing in 2013.

“The serving of all the counterparties has taken a long time,” Maria Ekelund concludes.

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

Acting on a lead from the entertainment industry, the U.S. Government shut down Megaupload early 2012.

Since then the case hasn’t progressed much. Kim Dotcom’s extradition hearing has been delayed time and time again, while most of the recent court proceedings have dealt with how the seized assets should be handled.

However, during the weeks to come the case is likely to heat up again as U.S. authorities have just arrested Andrus Nomm, one of the indicted Megaupload defendants.

The 36-year-old programmer had been living in the Netherlands awaiting his extradition hearing, but was arrested in Alexandria, Virginia yesterday.

The unusual arrest after more than three years could suggest that Nomm made a deal to testify against Dotcom and his former colleagues.

That suspicion is confirmed by Megaupload lawyer Ira Rothken, who told the NZHerald that Nomm “either agreed to come to the US or is involved in some sort of deal.”

Nomm’s arrest warrant, filed yesterday

In the indictment Nomm is described as a software programmer and Head of the Development of Megaupload’s Software Division. In 2010 he received $100,000 for his work at the now defunct file-hosting service.

Nomm is also accused of watching at least one copy of a pirated TV-show.

“On or about December 5, 2008, NOMM sent VAN DER KOLK an e-mail, which included a screenshot of NOMM’s account using Megavideo.com to watch an infringing episode of the copyrighted television show Chuck,” the indictment reads.

Megaupload lawyer Ira Rothken believes that U.S. authorities might have taken of Nomm. As an Estonian citizen living in a foreign country he was vulnerable, and running out of funds.

“Unless the DOJ is taking advantage of him and his weak financial condition, which is possible, it is hard to fathom which copyrighted works they think Mr. Nomm criminally infringed,” Rothken tells TF.

If Mr. Nomm testifies truthfully including things like the Megaupload copyright neutral cloud technology and robust takedown policies it will likely help the defense,” he adds.

The U.S. authorities have yet to comment on the arrest and the possibility of a plea deal.

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