With millions of regular users per day, The Pirate Bay is arguably the most visited torrent site on the web.

TPB officially operates from the domain thepiratebay.org which has been in use for more than seventeen years now.

Just in case something happens to the original domain, the site also owns several alternatives. Until recently, this included prominent domains such as Piratebay.org and Thepiratebay.com.

Piratebay.org Sold For $50,000

These backup domains have been linked to the official Pirate Bay team for years. However, this summer the owner ‘forgot’ to renew them. As a result, they ended up at auctions where Piratebay.org sold for $50,000 and Thepiratebay.com brought in $35,150.

This money didn’t go to The Pirate Bay team, obviously, but to the professional ‘drop catch‘ service Dropcatch.com, which scooped them up.

These types of sales are not unusual. There’s a whole industry of traders who buy high traffic domains, which are usually monetized through ad feeds. This is exactly what happened to Thepiratebay.com.

That said, the $50,000 price tag of Piratebay.org was higher than usual. According to a domain expert who participated in the bidding, it’s not worth that much for regular brokers. That begged the question, who bought it, and what are the plans?

Pirate Bay Pictures

A few days after the sale the buyer appeared to uncover the ‘masterplan’. The domain was put up for sale again by an unknown entity called “PirateBay Pictures” who said they are crowdfunding a new film; The Torrent Man .

We were highlyy skeptical of this claim and asked the domain owner some questions, which remain unanswered today. As it turns out, the skepticism was warranted as the “Torrent Man” pitch disappeared recently. Instead, Piratebay.org now redirects to a TPB proxy.

A quick look at the Whois data shows that the domain wasn’t sold again, which makes sense, as the $2 million asking price was a bit high.

Recoup The Investment

It seems more likely that the whole “Torrent Man” announcement was simply a trick to generate more press attention, which we hinted at before. More backlinks raise the value of a domain name after all.

It’s possible that the redirect, which currently points to pirate-bay-proxy.org, will change again in the future. The goal will likely remain the same though, recoup the $50,000 investment.

At the time of writing, pirate-bay-proxy.org displays prominent popups for NordVPN. Those can be easily closed, after which it operates as a regular proxy, which loads another proxy (tpb.party) through an iframe.

The pirate-bay-proxy.org homepage itself is littered with keywords that are meant to draw search engine traffic. This also reveals that the person operating it isn’t really in tune with the true Pirate Bay attitude, as the page ends with the following statement…

“ Copyright ©2020 Pirate Bay .”

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Lawsuits against alleged movie pirates are nothing new. We have reported on many dozens over the years.

More recently, Hawaii-based attorney Kerry Culpepper added a new element to these cases when he singled out YTS users .

The lawyer was able to do this because YTS handed over database information as part of a private settlement. A rather concerning development, which caused quite a stir among torrent users and site owners.

This tactic is interesting from a few perspectives. For one, the database information is additional evidence and provides valuable information such as email addresses. In addition, calling a torrent site by name may deter some people from using it in the future. It’s a win-win.

Lawsuit Against Alleged RARBG Users

That last argument may be why a new lawsuit, filed on behalf of the makers of the films Rambo V: Last Blood and Ava, singles out the torrent site RARBG.

In a complaint filed at a federal court in Hawaii, the movie companies accuse 16 “John Doe” defendants who are only known by their IP-addresses. These people were tracked by the company Maverickeye, which provides evidence for many related cases.

In this case, the IP-addresses are linked to torrents for the movies ‘Ava’ and ‘Rambo V,’ which are shared on many pirate sites. However, the movie companies specifically call out RARBG.

“Upon information and belief, each of the Defendants registered for an account on the movie piracy website ‘RARBG’ using an email address or installed a BitTorrent Client application on their device that retrieved torrent files from the movie piracy website ‘RARBG’,” they write.

What Evidence is There?

The RARBG mention is unusual because there’s no evidence to back up the claim that the defendants actually used this site. RARBG didn’t share any user data, as opposed to YTS.

The only link to RARBG we can spot is that the torrents “Ava.2020.WEBDL.x264-FGT” and “Rambo.Last.Blood.2019.1080p.KORSUB.HDRip.x264.AAC2.0-STUTTERSHIT” are shared on the popular torrent site. That said, the same files, linking to the same swarms, are available elsewhere too.

Nonetheless, RARBG is prominently mentioned throughout the complaint. The “notorious” pirate site “promotes and distributes” pirated content, the companies say.

“As shown in the screenshot below, the movie piracy website ‘RARBG’ promotes and distributes the infringing torrent file ‘Ava.2020.WEBDL.x264-FGT’ which Defendants downloaded and used to display, reproduce and distribute the Work Ava.”

Whether the defendants used RARBG or another site doesn’t change the copyright infringement allegations. These are totally independent of the site from which the torrents were downloaded.

TorrentFreak reached out to the plaintiffs’ attorney who refused to comment on the issue. One possibility we could think of is that the site is mentioned to signal to users that they are vulnerable. But that would equally apply to other sites.

Copyright Infringements and DMCA Violation

Looking at the actual allegations, a familiar theme appears. All 16 ‘Does’ are accused of direct and contributory copyright infringement for allegedly sharing copies of the movie Ava, and one defendant also shared the Rambo film.

In addition, the defendants are further accused of violating the DMCA by altering copyright management information (CMI). In this case, that means distributing the movies with an edited title, which references pirate groups such as “FGT” and “STUTTERSHIT”.

“Defendants knew that neither ‘FGT’ nor ‘STUTTERSH*T’ were the authors of Plaintiffs’ Works,” the complaint reads.

As is common in these types of cases, the movie companies requested a subpoena to compel the ISP, Verizon Wireless, to hand over the personal details of the associated subscribers. If granted, the accused will likely be offered a settlement of a few hundred dollars or more.

Update: RARBG issued the following statement to us: “We do not log ip addresses on downloads or any registered user IP addresses. It is our strong belief that these ip addresses were collected by p2p monitoring on torrent swarms.”

—

A copy of the complaint filed on behalf of Eve Nevada, LLC and Rambo V Productions, Inc, is available here (pdf)

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

After roughly two decades of pirated movies being shared online, movie companies are still trying to find a way to stem the flow.

Despite its aggressive actions elsewhere, most Hollywood studios have largely shied away from targeting individual pirates with lawsuits. The same cannot be said about a relatively small subset of companies, who are very happy to target thousands of them worldwide, demanding cash settlements in lieu of a drawn-out court battle.

LHF Productions, one of the companies behind the blockbuster movie ‘London Has Fallen’ is one such company and over the years has filed lawsuits against alleged pirates in both the United States and Europe. In the former, the company has enjoyed some success but a case that has just gone all the way in the US, without the defendant mounting even a basic defense, hasn’t gone exactly to plan.

Multiple Defendants Targeted in a Utah Court

Early 2017, LHF Productions filed a lawsuit against 30 alleged pirates in a Utah court, claiming they downloaded and shared London Has Fallen using BitTorrent. The case has rolled on for more than three years, with various defendants removed from the action after appearing to reach settlement agreements with LHF.

The details of these settlements are private but one defendant, named as Amanda Steel, hasn’t played ball from the start. Mounting no defense, the alleged pirate could have faced a huge damages award but this week, in an order handed down by District Judge David Nuffer, Steel got off quite lightly.

Plaintiffs Demanded $10,000 in Damages, Judge Says No

After failing to respond to the lawsuit, Steel could’ve been on the hook for $150,000 in statutory damages, in theory at least. In the event, LHF put in a demand for a default judgment of $10,000 as well as a permanent injunction but the Judge wasn’t happy with that lowered figure either.

The judgment reveals that the Judge was satisfied that a default was warranted in this case and accepted the plaintiff’s allegations that the infringement was willful. This meant that Steel was facing a potential damages award of between $750 and $150,000, at the Judge’s discretion.

LHF argued that its $10,000 demand was reasonable and at a level that would deter future infringement. The company also cited five cases from other jurisdictions where that amount was deemed acceptable to the courts.

For example, one case dating back to 2012 saw the defendant hit with $1.5m in damages for pirating 10 movies. However, Judge Nuffer said that in that matter, no findings or conclusions were officially entered on file, other than the allegations and default. Another case two years later, where a default judgment of $10,000 was awarded for infringement of a single movie, was deficient in the same regard.

The Judge went to state that in the cited cases, the courts were willing to grant the requested amount in statutory damages, provided they did not reach the statutory maximum. He concluded that was likely due to the plaintiffs being unchallenged by the defaulted defendants. Describing the cases as lacking in “meaningful analysis”, the Judge concluded that along with several other similar cases between 2012 and 2017, they were “not persuasive.”

Other Courts have Awarded Substantially Less Than $10,000

Outside of the cases cited by LHF, the Judge noted that some courts had developed and applied factors that led to greater consistency in statutory damages awards against defaulted defendants. A Malibu Media case in 2014, for example, awarded $750 on the basis that the plaintiff provided very little factual detail regarding the defendant’s actions. Other cases shared similar traits.

In his decision, Judge Nuffer decided to apply six factors previously outlined in a 2016 case involving Malibu Media; whether the defendant was the original seeder, whether the defendant profited or saved money from the infringement, the plaintiff’s actual losses, whether the damages amount would result in a “windfall” for the plaintiff, the deterrent effect of the damages, and the defendant’s willfulness and intent.

The Judge in this case weighed those same factors and determined that in the absence of evidence to the contrary, the request for $10,000 in statutory damages was over the top.

Judge Nuffer found that there was no evidence that Steel was an original seeder, no evidence relating to the number of users in the BitTorrent swarm, and no evidence showing how many people downloaded the file from the defendant’s computer. On top, the Judge said it was reasonable to conclude that the only monetary gain made by the defendant was the money saved on renting or buying a copy of the movie and the losses for the plaintiff would’ve been the same amount.

Given the above, $10,000 in damages would result in a windfall for the plaintiffs and at around 25 times the amount it would cost to rent or buy the movie, $750 would act as a deterrent. In respect of the defendant’s intent, LHF provided inadequate evidence.

“Ultimately, considering the relevant factors collectively, along with all the circumstances of this case, an award of the $750 statutory damages against Defendant is just,” the Judge wrote in his order.

“This award adequately serves the compensatory and punitive purposes of statutory damages to sanction Defendant and vindicates the statutory policy of discouraging future infringement. This award is also consistent with the nationwide trend in awarding minimum statutory damages against defaulted defendants.”

While the damages award is indeed relatively low, it is worth pointing out that the defendant is liable to pay LHF’s costs and reasonable attorney’s fees, which are yet to be decided.

The memorandum decision and default judgment can be found here (pdf)

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Prominent tech companies such as Twitter, Facebook and Google, all respond to takedown notices, as they are legally required to do.

Major copyright holder groups believe this is not enough. They have repeatedly called on these platforms to do more to curb online piracy.

This is a controversial issue, as the EU Copyright Directive negotiations highlighted last year. The public at large fears that proactive measures such as automated upload filters will result in overblocking and restrictions of free speech.

The leading Internet companies have been critical of upload filters as well but they are not against further action. Earlier this year industry group EDiMA , which represents Twitter, Facebook, Google, TikTok, Mozilla, and others, proposed a landmark Online Responsibility framework.

Tackling Piracy With Proactive Algorithms

With this framework, the tech giants propose to use algorithms to tackle illegal content including piracy, beyond what’s currently required by law. The word ‘filter’ isn’t mentioned specifically, but that’s pretty much what you get when using algorithms proactively.

The proposed framework refers to ‘illegal’ content and avoids the term copyright, but we have confirmed that anti-piracy measures are certainly covered.

“The Online Responsibility Framework would facilitate proactive action by service providers against any and all illegal content, including copyrighted content,” Siada El Ramly, Director General of EDiMA tells TorrentFreak.

This week, EDiMA released a new paper as part of the plan. The group highlights that its members want to do more to tackle illegal content but stress that this is tricky under current EU law.

“Online service providers want to do more to voluntarily and proactively remove illegal content from their services, and society wants the same. However, there are important barriers under the current regime which prevent them from doing so.”

Existing EU law requires online service providers to remove illegal content if they have actual knowledge of its presence. They are, however, not obliged to find and police all illegal content uploaded by users, which helps to prevent overblocking that can harm free speech.

While the tech companies generally value free speech, this ‘protection’ of user rights now finds itself in the way. It makes it harder for online services to proactively remove pirated content, which they are eager to do.

Safeguard Paves Way For Proactive Measures

EDiMA, therefore, calls for a new legal safeguard that allows tech companies to use proactive measures, such as upload filters, without the risk of being held liable for having ‘actual knowledge’ of illegal content.

“The association is calling for the introduction of a legal safeguard which would allow companies to take proactive actions to remove illegal content and activity from their services, without the risk of additional liability for those attempts to tackle illegal content,” the group says.

“Current EU rules lack this crucial provision, which has a chilling effect on service providers who want to do more to tackle illegal activity online.”

Actual Knowledge

The term ‘actual knowledge’ is key here. The tech companies want to use algorithms to detect and remove illegal material, but they don’t want this to constitute having ‘actual knowledge,’ which means that they can be held liable afterward.

In the US this is not an issue because of the “good samaritan” principle and EDiMA now calls for a liability safeguard in the EU as well.

“The Framework and the legal safeguards would complement the existing copyright directive by facilitating service providers making ‘best efforts’ to ensure that copyrighted material, for which no license was agreed, would not be available on their service,” El Ramly tells us.

“It would remove the disincentive that exists for service providers to find and remove this material, and instead encourage it.”

Automated Filters Are (not) a Problem

EDiMA positions its framework as a great solution for all involved, including users, but the tone of their message is completely different from what we’ve seen in the past.

Just a few months ago, many of the same companies that are part of EDiMA warned against the EU Copyright Directive as algorithms and upload filters may harm free speech .

The EU proposal, however, makes clear that companies such as Google, Facebook, Twitter, and TikTok see proactive algorithmic actions – which can be translated to automated filters – as a good solution.

Keeping User Rights in Mind

EDiMA’s proposal does keep the rights of users in mind as well. It stresses that its proposed framework still prohibits the requirement for a general monitoring obligation. In addition, people should have the right to appeal removals of their content.

This appeals process should be transparent. Users have the right to know why something was removed and additional human reviews may be required. Also, while an appeal is pending, it should be possible to reinstate flagged material.

“These specific safeguards will ensure that users have a meaningful way to get an explanation as to why their content was removed and to contest removals should they wish to do so,” the proposal reads.

“They will also ensure that service providers have clear and proactive policies in place when it comes to which content is allowed on their services, while fostering transparent dialogue with their users.”

Easing into The Copyright Directive?

All in all, it is safe to say that the major tech companies do see a future for automated filters. Perhaps this shouldn’t come as a surprise, as companies already widely use these today, including YouTube’s Content-ID system.

It appears that with EDiMA’s Online Responsibility Framework and the extra “safeguards” the tech companies try to pave the way for a smooth implementation of the EU Copyright Directive, on their terms.

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Back in 2018, streaming search engine Alluc announced that it would be closing down .

Considering the site’s length of service, an impressive 13 years, a sizeable gap was left in the market for some kind of replacement.

While there are plenty of indexing sites around, dedicated search engines have proven less easy to find in the current climate.

The Rise of the Ololo Streaming Video Search Engine

On April 1, 2018, a new streaming video search engine appeared. Named Ololo and located at Ololo.to, the site gave users the ability to search for the latest movies and TV shows.

By crawling some of the largest video hosting platforms on the planet, including the now-defunct Openload, Streamango, Rapidvideo and Verystream, for example, the site became a hit with users.

“With ololo you can search hundreds of websites at one place and you can also use ololo as an alluc alternative. Help us spread the word and tell your friends who are looking for alluc alternatives,” the site previously announced.

One Year Ago: Ololo Takes a Big Hit

Exactly a year ago, the unlicensed video streaming market received a huge blow when Openload, a massive file-hosting platform generating more traffic than legal services such as Hulu or HBO Go, was suddenly shut down along with stablemates Streamango, Streamcherry, and Verystream.

All had been shuttered after coming under pressure from global anti-piracy coalition Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment, which required their operators to pay a “significant” damages award. The action had a serious knock-on effect for Ololo too, which previously crawled the platforms looking for content.

“Goodbye openload, streamango, verystream. This is gonna hurt us for a long time,” the site reported at the time.

Recovering and Moving On – For a While

During the months to follow, Ololo added support for even more sites including Viduplayer.com, mystream.to, upstream.to, videobin.co, prostream.to, onlystream.tv, and many more. As recently as May this year, Ololo began offering support for other platforms including streamtape.com and oogly.io.

As a result and from a standing start a little over two years earlier, the site was generating significant traffic, pulling in an estimated two million visitors per month**, many of whom commented on the quality of the platform and the results produced. However, trouble lay ahead.

At some point, the site’s Twitter account was suspended for violating the platform’s rules. The nature of the violation isn’t known but the account, which was supposed to be used to notify users of outages, would’ve come in handy.

Without warning from the site’s operator/s, Ololo suddenly went down in the past few days leaving the following message: “ololo says goodbye! The ololo search engine has been discontinued.”

While many of the site’s users felt the closure was a complete surprise, recent history reveals that the search engine had some problems. It isn’t clear whether these were the direct cause of the site shutting down but in the scheme of things, it’s likely they played a part.

Pressure from Hollywood – Blocking

Earlier this month we reported how group of major Hollywood studios, Netflix, and other movie companies had obtained a new pirate site-blocking injunction in Australia.

The injunction targeted 78 domains, requiring that the majority of ISPs in Australia block them moving forward. On the list was Ololo, with the applicants in the case stating that the search engine’s “primary purpose or effect” was to infringe or facilitate the infringement of copyright.

While a blocking order in Australia wouldn’t have affected the site’s traffic too much, another more significant event was on the horizon. After successfully shuttering Openload and colleagues a year ago, the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment (ACE) was on the heels of Ololo too.

Pressure from Dozens of Companies – DMCA Subpoena

This month, ACE obtained a DMCA subpoena compelling the Tonic domain registry, the operator of Ololo’s .to domain, to hand over information on many sites, including Ololo.

As a result, Tonic was ordered to disclose the identities, including names, physical addresses, IP addresses, telephone numbers, e-mail addresses, payment information, account updates and account histories of the people operating the sites, Ololo.to included.

Again, it is not clear whether the blocking, subpoena, or the prospect of being unmasked caused the shutdown of Ololo but the timing of the site’s closure raises plenty of questions. However, with the platform now consigned to history, perhaps it will be allowed to just fade away.

Update: **A statement sent to TF by Ololo indicates that contrary to SimilarWeb stats, Ololo only received “6,000 to 8,000 visitors daily.” The site supplied additional information as follows;

“We never made a single cent from this website, although there was one popup to cover server costs it was not enough. With such small traffic we had to pay this site from our pockets,” the statement reads.

“With that being said, closing ololo was in our minds many times before. The recent Australian block and now ACE taking actions were the final signals for us to shut down this site for good.

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

The music industry has increased its enforcement actions against stream-ripping tools and services in recent years.

The RIAA and other music groups have filed lawsuits, sent cease and desist orders, and issued numerous DMCA takedown notices.

RIAA Takes Down Youtube-DL

Until recently these efforts were hardly noticed by the public at large but late last week something changed. When the RIAA targeted the very popular open-source tool YouTube-DL, many people responded in anger.

Last Friday the RIAA asked the developer platform GitHub to remove the YouTube-DL code and various forks because it allegedly violates the DMCA’s anti-circumvention provisions.

By enabling the public to download content from YouTube, the tool allegedly bypasses YouTube ‘rolling cipher’ protection. Not just that, the code also included links to copyrighted works to illustrate its use.

Cease and Desist Notices

Following our initial coverage, we learned that the pressure against YouTube-DL had already started weeks earlier in Germany. Law firm Rasch, which works with several major music industry players, sent out cease and desist orders in the hope of taking YouTube-DL offline.

Hosting service Uberspace was one of the recipients. The company hosts the official YouTube-DL site and still does so today. Instead of taking the website down, Uberspace replied to the notice through its own lawyer, who said that the hosting company hasn’t don’t anything wrong.

When the cease and desist notice was filed, yt-dl.org wasn’t even hosting the tool, as all download links pointed to GitHub, the company informs us.

“The software itself wasn’t hosted on our systems anyway so, to be honest, I felt it to be quite ridiculous to involve us in this issue anyway – a lawyer specializing in IT laws should know better,” Jonas from Uberspace says.

Former Maintainer Tageted as Well

The host wasn’t the only entity to be targeted. The German law firm also sent a cease and desist notice to developer Philipp Hagemeister who previously maintained the YouTube-DL repository. He also denies the accusations.

“They did not understand that I was no longer a maintainer, basically alleged that youtube-dl was an illegal enterprise rather than a legit open-source project, and misunderstood a bunch of other technical stuff,” Hagemeister tells TorrentFreak.

Both Uberspace and Hagemeister don’t want to go into too much detail as this is a pending legal issue. However, both defend their actions in relation to YouTube-DL. And they’re not the only ones who were ticked off by the enforcement actions, as we learned this weekend.

Takedown Backfires as Copies are Everywhere

Soon after the RIAA notice took YouTube-DL offline many developers spoke out in protest. They believe that the music industry group went too far and started to republish copies of the code everywhere.

Over the past several days, we have seen hundreds of new forks and copies appear online. These were also posted to GitHub , where YouTube-DL forks remain easy to find and continue to be uploaded.

The code was also posted in some places one wouldn’t expect. For example, there’s still a copy in GitHub’s DMCA notice repository, which some people find quite amusing. And the list of pull requests can be quite entertaining in themselves.

One of the most creative responses we’ve seen was posted to Twitter by @GalacticFurball who encoded YouTube-DL into images that can be easily shared, encouraging others to share these as well.

“I would also suggest that you save and repost the images, as one single source kind of defeats the point. Maybe start a hashtag trend or something. Make songs, and poetry. Get that data out there.”

This triggered even more creativity, with people finding alternative means to share the code online, all to counter the RIAA’s takedown request.

GitHub’s CEO Offers to Help YouTube-DL

Meanwhile, GitHub’s CEO Nat Friedman wasn’t sitting still either. While the Microsoft-owned developer platform had to respond to the takedown notice, Friedman himself actively reached out to YouTube-DL’s developers to help them get their project reinstated.

The CEO joined YouTube-DL’s IRC channel hoping to connect with the owner of the repository so he can help to get it unsuspended.

“GitHub exists to help developers. We never want to interfere with their work. We want to help the youtube-dl maintainers defeat the DMCA claim so that we can restore the repo,” Friedman told TorrentFreak, explaining his actions.

It’s clear that GitHub exists to help developers. That said, for the company’s CEO to jump in and personally help someone to respond to a DMCA claim, is quite unprecedented. As it turns out, the RIAA’s notice ticked off Friedman as well.

“This one annoyed me,” Friedman says.

“Perhaps because of the importance of tools like youtube-dl for archivists, and our related archive program and funding of the Internet Archive: We are thinking about how GitHub can proactively help developers in more DMCA cases going forward, and take a more active role in reforming/repealing 1201.”

GitHub’s CEO suggested that YouTube-DL won’t be reinstated in its original form. But, the software may be able to return without the rolling cipher circumvention code and the examples of how to download copyrighted material.

RIAA Efforts Backfire

By now it is clear that the RIAA’s takedown notice backfired badly. With the ‘Streisand Effect’ in full swing, there are now probably more copies of YouTube-DL online than there ever were.

However, there is more. Reading between the lines Friedman suggests that the current DMCA rules may be too strong in some cases. For example, tools like YouTube-DL have non-infringing uses, and there can be upsides to circumventing copy protections as well. To archive content, for example.

This issue may eventually become a policy question. Every four years the US Copyright Office grants new exemptions to the DMCA section 1201 anti-circumvention rules, and it wouldn’t surprise if these tools are put on the agenda in the future.

Instead of simply taking down YouTube-DL, the RIAA may have actually poked the bear and increased support for such tools. Not only from developers at home, but also from big players such as GitHub. Putting that cat back in the bag is not going to be easy.

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Last Friday, the RIAA caused outraged on the Internet when it filed a complaint that took down the open source software YouTube-DL from Github.

According to the RIAA, the “clear purpose” of YouTube-DL was to “circumvent the technological protection measures used by authorized streaming services such as YouTube” and “reproduce and distribute music videos and sound recordings owned by our member companies without authorization for such use.”

As the debate and controversy over the complaint rages on, a company based in the US that operates a YouTube-ripping platform has filed a lawsuit alleging that similar complaints, filed by the RIAA with Google, have caused its business great damage.

Complaint States That YouTube-Ripping Platform “Time-Shifts”

Filed by Yout LLC. in a Connecticut court, the complaint alleges that its service allows users to enter a link for a video on sites including YouTube. Its browser-based software then gives users the ability to record the audio of a streamed video and store it locally on their hard drives as an MP3.

“By doing so, the user can thereby listen or view the locally stored content when not connected to the Internet and without the necessity of visiting the website on which the original content resides. In essence, Yout allows a user to time shift content,” the complaint reads.

Yout LLC does not name its service directly in the complaint but the website Yout.com, which lists its address as being in South Windsor, a town in Hartford County, Connecticut, matches the description in the lawsuit.

RIAA Sent “Abusive” DMCA Complaints to Google

Noting that the Yout service never saves users’ time-shited content on its own servers, Yout claims that many users utilize the service for the purpose of recording their own videos. Content creators, on the other hand, encourage their fans to “record and play back their original content” using the platform.

However, starting October 2019, the RIAA reportedly sent at least three notices to Google under 17 U.S.C. § 512(c)(3) , claiming that the Yout platform breached the anti-circumvention provisions of the DMCA.

“To our knowledge, the URLs provide access to a service (and/or software) that circumvents YouTube’s rolling cipher, a technical protection measure, that protects our members’ works on YouTube from unauthorized copying/downloading”, the complaints read.

According to the lawsuit, this caused Google to completely delist Yout’s software platform from its search results, rendering it undiscoverable for “many” Internet users. Yout says that the notices sent by the RIAA on behalf of its members allege circumvention violations, claims that are completely untrue.

“Contrary to Defendants’ allegations, Yout’s software platform is not designed to descramble, decrypt, avoid, bypass, remove, deactivate, or impair the YouTube rolling cypher technology.

“In fact, any digital mechanism in place designed as anti-circumvention technology stops Yout users from recording and saving that protected work, thereby demonstrating Yout’s compliance with any anti-circumvention protections in place,” the complaint adds.

Yout Says That the RIAA’s Claims Damaged Its Reputation

Yout’s lawsuit says that as a service designed to allow users to record publicly available media for personal use, at a time chosen by them and without breaching technical measures, it is entirely legal.

“Such time-shifting purposes, absent specific circumvention of technological copyright protections, cannot be the basis for an alleged violation of 17 U.S.C. § 1201. Yout does not violate 17 U.S.C. § 1201.”

By alleging otherwise, however, the RIAA’s notices caused third parties to believe that Yout is engaged in illegal conduct, something the company vehemently denies. Indeed, Yout states that the RIAA acted with “malice” when sending the notices since the industry group intended to harm the company.

Yout Wants Its Business and Tool Declared Legal By The Court

Reiterating that its platform does not act as an anti-circumvention tool, nor one that was primarily designed for the purposes of circumventing a technological measure effectively controlling a copyrighted work, Yout insists that it complies with “any and all” protections in place.

“Based on the foregoing, Yout requests a judicial determination and declaration that Yout’s software platform does not violate 17 U.S.C. § 1201 . Such a judicial determination and declaration is necessary to protect Yout from the Defendants’ DMCA Notices, which are causing Yout injury by, among other things, damaging its goodwill and disrupting its business,” the company adds.

Yout Demands Compensation For Abuse of the DMCA

Yout states that the RIAA’s complaints to Google were sent in bad faith, for one of two reasons.

In scenario one, the RIAA simply failed to determine via testing whether the Yout platform actually does circumvent technical measures. In scenario two, the industry group knew that Yout did not circumvent technical measures and did not infringe its members’ rights, but sent the DMCA notices to Google anyway.

In either event, the lawsuit alleges that Yout’s business was damaged due to the RIAA’s claims interfering with the relationships between Yout and its customers, partners, and potential users. As a result, compensation is due.

“As the Defendants knowingly misrepresented circumvention of digital copyright mechanisms and infringement of the Defendants’ rights, the Defendants violated 17 U.S.C. § 512(f) ,” the lawsuit reads.

In other words, Yout wants to be compensated for the losses caused when the RIAA reported Yout to Google as an infringing service that should be removed or delisted.

“Yout Does Not Circumvent YouTube’s ‘Rolling Cipher'”

In most if not all similar anti-circumvention notices sent by the RIAA to various platforms, the industry group states that “technological measures” can include YouTube’s “rolling cipher”. In Yout’s complaint, the company categorically denies that it circumvents any such measure.

In fact, Yout says that by respecting the rolling cipher, it not only doesn’t infringe the labels’ rights but actually helps to protect them.

“[B]y respecting anti-circumvention technology in place, Yout facilitates protection of the copyrights of the [RIAA member labels’],” the lawsuit reads.

After repeating several times that Yout acts illegally under the DMCA, the RIAA has tarnished the reputation of Yout, the complaint adds. The industry group knew the notices would be published in public (on the Lumen Database) so as a result, the false statements constitute business disparagement.

For this and general defamation, Yout also demands compensation, punitive damages, and a trial by jury.

The complaint can be found here (pdf)

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Millions of Internet users around the world use a VPN to protect their privacy online.

Another key benefit is that VPNs hide users’ true IP-address, making them more anonymous . This prevents third-party monitoring outfits from carrying out unwanted snooping.

This is one of the reasons why many torrent users have a VPN installed. Instead of displaying their own IP-address in torrent swarms, the VPN IP-address will show up. And when the provider doesn’t keep any logs, that address can’t be traced back to a single user.

Lawsuit Targets Pirating VPN Users

Such a setup seems secure, but it hasn’t prevented the makers of the action movie ‘Angel Has Fallen’ from suing several anonymous VPN users. In a recent lawsuit filed at a federal court in Colorado, the company lists fourteen alleged pirates that used an IP-address of the VPN service Private Internet Access, also known as PIA .

“Upon information and belief, Defendants DOES 3-5, 7-10 and 12-17 registered for paid accounts for Virtual Private Network (‘VPN’) service with the Colorado Internet Service Provider Private Internet Access,” the complaint reads.

The lawsuit in question lists the defendants as Does, which means that their true identities are unknown. However, attorney Kerry Culpepper, who represents Fallen Productions in this matter, hopes to find out more through third-party subpoenas.

Info From YTS User Database

The case relies in part on information from the YTS user database that was shared by the operator of the site earlier this year, as part of a settlement. This includes download details of several users, as well as their IP-addresses and email addresses.

The attorney has requested subpoenas to compel email providers, Internet providers, and Private Internet Access for more personal information. In the past, we have seen that Microsoft and ISPs such as Comcast will hand over what they have, but with a VPN this isn’t as straightforward.

PIA’s Confirmed No-Log Policy

PIA has a so-called ‘no logs’ policy which means that it can’t link a VPN IP-address and a timestamp to a unique user. This policy has been repeatedly tested and confirmed in courts.

Culpepper informs TorrentFreak that he will request a subpoena regardless. He argues that the use of a VPN shows that people were aware of their illegal activity.

“It is relevant because it shows they tried to hide their activities. It shows consciousness of the illegal activities,” Culpepper says, while pointing out an article where PIA warned YTS users that they were at risk.

PIA’s Jurisdiction Angle

In addition, by signing the terms of service, PIA users also subject themselves to the jurisdiction of Courts in Colorado. This is relevant in this case because not all defendants are from the western U.S. state.

“Most importantly, if they signed up for an account with PIA they agreed to jurisdiction in Colorado no matter where they are. Most of the PIA users were not in Colorado,” Culpepper notes.

All defendants are accused of downloading a torrent titled “Angel Has Fallen (2019) [BluRay] [720p] [YTS.LT],” as well as other copyright-infringing content that isn’t specified.

Defendants Still at Risk

According to the complaint all defendants have received at least one DMCA notice. Fifteen of them were also contacted repeatedly on their known email address with cease and desist notices and settlement offers, but these were ignored.

With this lawsuit Fallen Productions hopes to uncover the identities of the people behind these IP- and email addresses.

TorrentFreak contacted PIA for a comment on the lawsuit. The company said that it hasn’t received a subpoena yet and reiterated that it can’t identify individual users.

“Private Internet Access has not received a subpoena in regards to this case. Even if we do, our response will be the same as always: PIA does not log VPN user activity,” a PIA spokesperson informed us.

That was also confirmed in more detail earlier this year in our annual VPN overview.

“There are no logs kept for any person or entity to match an IP address and a timestamp to a current or former user of our service,” PIA said at the time .

That said, defendants are still at risk, as their email addresses are known as well. That doesn’t prove anything, as YTS allowed members to sign up with a fake email, but it could lead to people being identified eventually, without PIA’s involvement.

If anything, this case shows that using a VPN only offers limited anonymity. When people use a VPN irregularly and leave other information behind, such as email addresses, they may eventually be exposed anyway.

—

A copy of Fallen Production’s complaint, filed as the US District Court in Colorado, is available here (pdf)

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

In 2018, US broadcaster DISH Network sued pirate IPTV service SET TV for offering many TV channels illegally obtained from DISH’s satellite service.

That lawsuit came to an end in 2018 when SET TV’s operators were ordered by a Florida court to pay $90 million in statutory damages. However, as far as DISH was concerned, there were more loose ends to tie up.

DISH Sues Simply-TV and Goes After a Reseller

Early 2019, DISH filed another lawsuit in Florida, this time targeting individuals and companies behind Simply-TV, a pirate IPTV service that was believed to be connected to SET TV. By August that same year, the lawsuit was over after DISH was awarded $30 million in statutory damages plus an injunction.

As recently reported , DISH still didn’t give up the chase, suing an individual named as Lisa Crawford in a Florida court, claiming she was a reseller of both SET TV and Simply-TV. Several business entities were also named as defendants.

These cases have a tendency to drag on but in this case, the whole thing was settled in a matter of weeks.

Agreed Judgment and Permanent Injunction

On Thursday, DISH filed a notice of dismissal against the business entities named in the original complaint including LC One LLC, LC Pryme Enterprises LLC, LC Pryme Holdings LLC, LC Pryme One Enterprises LLC.

“This Notice of Dismissal is filed pursuant to the Confidential Settlement Agreement reached between DISH and Defendant Lisa Crawford,” the notice reads.

A short time later, DISH filed documents relating to the agreement, establishing several agreed facts and laying out the terms of the settlement.

“Defendant sold device codes and subscriptions to the Unauthorized Streaming Services through various websites including ptiptv.com, GriffTV.com, Lazertvstreams.com and FlixStreams.com. In addition, Defendant advertised the Unauthorized Streaming Services through Facebook and other forms of social media,” the filing reads.

“Defendant participated in the operation of the Unauthorized Streaming Services after the Set TV service was shut down. DISH Programming was redistributed without authorization on the Unauthorized Streaming Services throughout this time period.

“During that time Defendant trafficked in at least 40,000 device codes to the Unauthorized Streaming Services.”

Defendant Agrees to Pay DISH $30 Million in Statutory Damages

According to the agreement, the sale of the 40,000 “device codes” (subscriptions) will cost Crawford a huge amount of money. DISH says that each subscription is worth $750 in statutory damages, meaning that the total amount payable to the company is a cool $30 million. That being said, things could have been very much worse if DISH had pursued the $100,000 per offense/subscription maximum.

In addition to the damages agreement, the parties have also settled on a set of conditions for an injunction, including that Crawford never again gets involved in offering pirated DISH programming to the public. She is also barred from operating the websites ptiptv.com, GriffTV.com, Lazertvstreams.com and FlixStreams.com, which must be transferred to DISH.

Former Customers May Be at Risk

Part of the agreement requires Crawford to hand over pretty much everything associated with her reselling business over to DISH, including all computers, servers, receivers, software, and set-top devices. The agreement also goes much further than that though and may have consequences for Crawford’s former customers.

“Defendant shall transfer to DISH or a designee selected by DISH, within seven (7) days of the date of this Order, all device codes, renewal codes, subscriptions and applications for Defendant’s Pirate Streaming Services, as well as all computers, phones, servers and all social media, financial, online or other accounts associated in any way with Defendant’s Pirate Streaming Services,” the agreement reads.

This includes “books, documents, files, records, or communications whether in hard copy or electronic form, relating in any way to Defendant’s Pirate Streaming Services” plus “the identities of manufacturers, exporters, importers, dealers, or purchasers of such services and devices..”

This is important because DISH has a history of not only shutting down pirate services but also chasing down former subscribers for cash settlements. Whether it will do so in this case is yet to be seen but after shutting down a seller of satellite card-sharing codes a while back, the company has used the data handed over in the matter to pursue many other individuals.

The Agreed Judgment and Permanent Injunction is available here (pdf). It is yet to be signed off by the court but given its nature, that’s likely to be a formality.

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.