There have been a number of so-called “camming” cases in the UK in recent years with the MPAA-affiliated Federation Against Copyright Theft keen to stamp out the practice.

Punishments can be severe. Fast and Furious 6 ‘cammer’ Philip Danks was sentenced to 33 months in prison last year for recording, uploading and selling physical copies of the popular movie. But prosecutions can be complex and sometimes things can backfire in the biggest possible way.

Earlier this month, Birmingham student Ciprian Florea went on trial accused of attempting to ‘cam’ the space blockbuster Gravity. The case was special in a number of ways, not least that this was the first time that an individual had been accused of going equipped to capture a movie in full 3D.

According to the prosecution, Florea attended a Cineworld cinema in the city during November 2013 equipped with a home-made recording rig consisting of a pair of high-def cameras fashioned together in a device held on the man’s chest.

Florea, a student of film technology at Birmingham City University, is said to have hired the cameras the day before his arrest. These had been placed in a custom-made box in order to record the left and right eye as required for 3D imaging.

But before he had even entered the screening the student was spotted by a security guard who confiscated the device and called the police.

Florea said he had no intention to record the movie and only had the device to record his friends. He attended the screening without the device.

In the light of the fact that the UK has no specific “anti-camming” legislation and no copyright works were ever recorded, the prosecution accused the student of possessing a 3D camera with intent to commit fraud, i.e the recording and subsequent distribution of the movie.

The Judge didn’t buy it.

“I am sure everything was done with the best of motives. However I have real concern as to whether this prosecution should have been brought at all,” said Mr Recorder Nolan QC.

“It ought to have been absolutely clear there was no legal basis for it,” he added.

The Judge added that there was nothing to suggest that Florea had intended to commercially exploit any copy. Going further, he noted that even if a copy had been made and posted online, the offense may have been a breach of copyright but would not have amounted to fraud.

This may well present a problem for similar future prosecutions. With no uploading to the Internet and no evidence to support that was the intent, it appears claims of copyright infringement and/or fraud are effectively ruled out. In a case like this, where the movie hadn’t even been recorded, it’s not difficult to see why the case fell apart.

Nevertheless, the Federation Against Copyright Theft, who supported the prosecution, told TorrentFreak that the student’s behavior suggested he intended to break the law.

“The circumstances of Mr Florea’s actions in entering a cinema with equipment constructed to capture a 3D film provided strong evidence that he intended to commit a criminal offense,” FACT said.

“FACT supported the prosecution brought against him by the police and the Crown Prosecution Service on the basis of the serious damage caused to the film industry by those who illegally record films in cinemas. We are disappointed with the verdict, but respect the decision of the court.”

In comments to the Birmingham Mail after the verdict, Florea said he was glad the whole thing was over.

“I am relieved. It has taken a year and to be honest it has been a big pain in my life,” the student said.

“Although I won the case it has really been hard for me in my third year of my course. It was the first test of my final year’s project. I was just taking film of friends at the cinema.”

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

Due to a recent change to Canada’s copyright law, ISPs are now required to forward copyright infringement notices to their customers.

As a result, tens of thousands of Internet subscribers have received warnings in their mailboxes over the past days, with some asking for cash settlements.

The so-called notice-and-notice system aims to reduce local piracy rates, but it appears that not all Canadians are ready to give up their habits.

Instead, many file-sharers are taking measures to hide their IP-addresses and bypass the monitoring companies copyright holders have hired. By using VPN services or BitTorrent proxies their sharing activities can no longer be linked to their ISP account, effectively evading the notice system.

Data from Google trends reveals that interest in anonymizing services has spiked with searches for “VPN” nearly doubling in recent weeks. This effect, shown in the graph below, is limited to Canada and likely a direct result of the new law.

“VPN” searches in Canada

The effects are clearly noticeable at VPN providers as well, in both traffic and sales. TorGuard, a VPN and BitTorrent proxy provider saw the number of Canadian visitors and subscribers double this year.

“Since the start of 2015 TorGuard has seen a drastic jump in Canadian traffic and subscribers. At the time of this writing our Canadian sales are up roughly 100% and this trend appears to be increasing,” TorGuard’s Ben Van der Pelt tells us.

TorGuard traffic from Canada

Another VPN provider that preferred to remain anonymous, confirmed the traffic increase and sent us a graph of a similar spike.

Aside from steering people towards anonymizing tools Canada’s notice-and-notice scheme also piqued the interest of the Government. The abuse of these notices in particular.

Another consequence of the new law is that Canadian VPN providers have to warn pirating users as well. For most services this is impossible, as they don’t keep any IP-address logs, adding further insecurity to the local market.

For now, none of the VPN providers we spoke with plan to start logging but if they are forced to do so the preference is to move their businesses outside Canada.

From the above it’s clear that the new notice-and-notice system is certainly having an impact, but how many file-sharers stop pirating and how many choose to hide instead is anyone’s guess at this point.

One thing’s for certain though, VPN services are certainly becoming a more mainstream option.

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

Half a decade ago the Irish Recorded Music Association (IRMA) ended its legal action against local ISP Eircom when the ISP agreed to implement a new anti-piracy policy against its own subscribers.

The agreement saw IRMA-affiliated labels including Sony, Universal and Warner tracking Eircom subscribers online. Eircom then forwarded warning notices to customers found to be sharing content without permission and agreed to disconnect those who were caught three times.

In a follow-up move IRMA tried to force another ISP, UPC, to implement the same measures. UPC fought back and a 2010 High Court ruling went in the ISP’s favor.

However, a 2012 change in the law emboldened IRMA to have a second bite and now the music group’s case is being heard by the Commercial Court. As before, IRMA wants an injunction issued against UPC forcing it to implement a “three strikes” or similar regime against its customers.

According to the Irish Times, Michael McDowell SC representing the labels said that UPC could come up with its own graduated response, whether it be “two strikes” or “five strikes”.

For its part, UPC appears to be more concerned about the cost of operating such a system rather than the actual introduction of one. UPC has provided estimates for doing so but the labels view the amounts involved as excessive.

Surprisingly, Cian Ferriter SC, for UPC, said the ISP has “no difficulty in handing over information” (on pirates) for the labels to pursue but the company has issues with setting up an “entire system” to deal with the problem.

The stance of UPC seems markedly different from its position during February 2014. At the time the company said that subjecting customers to a graduated response scheme would raise a “serious question of freedom of expression and public policy” and would “demand fair and impartial procedures in the appropriate balancing of rights.”

In the event, however, Mr McDowell said that UPC’s offer was not only a new but one that raises concern over privacy and data protection issues.

IRMA chairman Willie Kavanagh previously said that the Eircom three-strikes scheme had been “remarkably effective,” since only 0.2% of warned users have proceeded to the disconnection stage. Perhaps even more remarkable is that even after four years of the program, Eircom hadn’t disconnected a single customer.

“We are continuing to implement the graduated response process,” a spokesman said last March. “We haven’t, as yet, disconnected anyone.”

IRMA is contractually bound by its agreement with Eircom to pursue UPC and/or other ISPs to implement a graduated response scheme, so expect this one to run either until the bitter end – or when UPC cave in. For now the case is scheduled to run for eight days.

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

For years Australian citizens have complained of being treated as second class citizens by content companies who have failed to make content freely available at a fair price. As a result millions of Aussies have turned to file-sharing networks for their media fix.

This has given the country somewhat of a reputation on the world stage, which in turn has put intense pressure on the Australian government to do something to reduce unlawful usage.

After years of negotiations between ISPs and entertainment companies went nowhere, last year the government stepped in. ISPs were warned that if they don’t take voluntarily measures to deter and educate pirating subscribers, the government would force a mechanism upon them by law.

With a desire to avoid that option at all costs, the service providers went away with orders to come up with a solution. Just last month Attorney-General George Brandis and Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull set an April 8 deadline, a tight squeeze considering the years of failed negotiations.

Nevertheless, iiNet, Australia’s second largest ISP, feels that the deadline will be met.

“We will have code; whether or not it gets the rubber stamp remains to be seen,” says iiNet chief regulatory officer Steve Dalby. “Dedicated people are putting in a lot of work drafting documents and putting frameworks together.”

With just 120 days to come up with a solution the government’s deadline is a big ask and Dalby says there are plenty of complications.

“There are issues around privacy, there are issues around appeals. There are issues around costs. There is a lot of work that needs to be done,” he says.

Of course, these are exactly the same issues that caused talks to collapse on a number of occasions in the past. However, in recent months it’s become clear that the government is prepared to accept less stringent measures than the entertainment industries originally wanted. Slowing and disconnecting subscribers is now off the table, for example.

Although there has been no official announcement, it seems likely that the ISPs will offer a notice-and-notice system similar to the one being planned for the UK.

Subscribers will be informed by email that their connections are being used to share content unlawfully and will be politely but firmly asked to stop. An educational program, which advises users where to obtain content legally, is likely to augment the scheme.

Who will pay for all this remains to be seen. ISPs have previously refused to contribute but with the government threatening to impose a code if a suitable one is not presented, compromise could be on the table.

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

Domain blocking is now firmly established as one of the entertainment industries’ go-to methods for reducing online copyright infringement. Its use is widespread around Europe by both the music and movie sector.

In Europe the most important legal decision was announced in March last year when the Court of Justice of the European Union confirmed that EU ISPs can be required to block access to sites engaged in copyright infringement.

Elsewhere, individual countries are making their own decisions on how to move forward. Last July, Singapore legislators approved the Copyright Amendment Bill which allows copyright holders to obtain High Court orders forcing local service providers to block “flagrantly infringing” websites. Now, six months on, entertainment companies are ready to launch their first tests.

IFPI regional director Ang Kwee Tiang confirmed that the music group will initially target three to five “infringing sites” over the next two months.

“We are now actively looking into exercising this in the future,” he said.

The sites to be targeted have not yet been revealed but it’s always been the understanding that The Pirate Bay would be tackled first. The site’s reputation as the “worst-of-the-worst” allows entertainment companies to present a relatively straightforward case to the courts. The rising number of blocking orders already granted elsewhere only add to the mix.

“Now, The Pirate Bay has more than 6 million links. We take the screenshots and we show that these are not licensed. We’re going to show that The Pirate Bay has been blocked in nine or 10 different countries. I think that will be very convincing for our cause,” Ang said.

However, with The Pirate Bay currently down, it’s possible that other targets will have to be selected in the first batch. Ang confirms that evidence is still being collated but he’s confident that a successful blockade will help to reduce piracy.

“I divide (consumers) 80 to 20 – 80 per cent are average consumers, if they cannot get it easily and if a legal site offers it, they may go for the legal site,” he said.

“The committed pirate is like a committed criminal. They will search for ways to circumvent. But once we have the website blocking, then we are free to tackle the 20 per cent.”

The driving force behind the site blocking phenomenon can be found in the entertainment companies of the United States but following the SOPA debacle public discussion to progress site blocking has been fairly muted. That doesn’t mean nothing has been happening, however.

In December it was revealed that behind closed doors the MPAA has been working hard to bring site blocking to the United States. Whether those aims will still be progressed following the somewhat embarrassing leaks will remain to be seen, but it’s likely the movie group won’t be steered off course for long.

Overall, Hollywood definitely sees blocking as an important anti-piracy tool. The practice is endorsed by none other than MPAA chief Chris Dodd and internal MPAA research has found it to be effective.

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