The European Union Intellectual Property Office ( EUIPO ) regularly conducts studies to see how piracy develops over time.

These studies help the public to understand local piracy trends and can be used as input for future policy decisions.

Last month, for example, EUIPO research showed that EU citizens increasingly pay to access content legally. However, a group of stubborn pirates , who often pay for legal content too, remains.

This week, EUIPO released another in-depth piracy report titled “Online Copyright Infringement in the European Union.” The research is a follow-up to a report published last year which found that access to pirated content across Europe dropped by more than 15 percent.

Last year’s study revealed some broader effects as well. For example, it found that people from lower-income countries tend to pirate more and that awareness of legal options doesn’t always decrease piracy.

Most Popular Pirated Titles

The new research is partly based on the same data, which was purchased from the piracy tracking firm MUSO. Instead of looking at the broader piracy effect, this time the research zooms in on the most pirated movies, TV-shows, and artists.

These data are estimated from public BitTorrent tracker data which were extrapolated to other piracy services, such as streaming and direct download sites. While this method is far from exact, it should give a good indication of the broader piracy demand.

The 123-page report is in large part made up of tables with the most pirated titles in the EU as a whole and in individual member states. It’s based on data that covers only part of 2018, which means that it’s limited in scope and a bit dated. Still, it’s worth scanning over the results.

Justice League, Walking Dead, and Ed Sheeran

With over 42 million estimated downloads, Justice League was the most downloaded movie in the EU. The Walking Dead was the most pirated TV-show, with over 435 million downloads, and with nearly 7.5 million downloads, Ed Sheeran was the most pirated musician.

The most popular titles and artists show a lot of overlap between EU countries. That said, there are some local outliers as well.

Local Favorites

For example, the Norwegian metal band Immortal tops the music piracy chart in Norway, and the Swedish metal band HammerFall takes the top spot in Sweden. In Spain, American singer Luis Fonsi is pirated more than any other artist, and in Germany Bob Dylan managed to beat Ed Sheeran by a few thousand downloads.

There are similar outliers for movies and TV-shows. For example, The Mummy was disproportionately popular in Spain, taking the top spot in the film category. In the TV category, South Park does surprisingly well in Finland, beating all other shows.

These local trends are intriguing, but they don’t necessarily lead to broader conclusions. However, a more analytical approach shows that there is something to learn.

Film Piracy Findings

The findings show that there isn’t that much difference in film tastes between various countries. There is a lot of overlap between the 30 most pirated films per country and for the EU as a whole. Also, piracy is mostly affecting newer and commercially successful mainstream films.

This leads to the perhaps obvious conclusion that commercial success is linked to piracy. In other words, when more people see a movie in the theater, it’s pirated more frequently as well.

“This analysis shows that commercial success is associated with higher levels of piracy: when the number of tickets sold increases by 10 %, the number of illegal downloads increases by 3.7 %,” the findings read.

The second film piracy effect is more intriguing. Films from Canada, Australia, China, Finland, Germany, India and Russia take a bigger share of the total pirate downloads, compared to the total box office numbers.

“Piracy of films from these seven countries represents 2.8 % of film piracy and 1.8 % of admissions in EU cinemas. Although the total cumulated piracy of the last group is low, they suffer a relatively higher piracy rate than the more widely distributed films.”

This can be partially explained due to the fact that these films are not always available legally due to limited availability in movie theaters. Piracy is then a convenient alternative.

TV and Music Piracy

TV-shows are by far the most popular content on pirate sites. Obviously, more recent TV-shows are pirated more frequently but the link with legal consumption is less clear than with music and films.

While there’s a bit more variety in taste between EU countries, on average, 19 of the 30 most popular series are also on the EU’s top 30 list.

Local differences are most apparent when it comes to music, as our examples earlier already illustrated. On average, 16 of the most popular artists in a country also appear in the EU’s top 30.

In terms of volume, music is the least popular category of the three. The most popular artist, Ed Sheeran, was downloaded 7.5 million times while The Walking Dead topped 435 million downloads.

In addition, it appears that piracy preferences are lagging behind actual sales a little.

“In music, there is also a relationship between commercial success and piracy, although with a delay: many of the best-selling musicians of 2017 were the most pirated artists in 2018,” the report reads.

Conclusions and Future Research

The EUIPO study concludes that piracy seems to be driven by demand. Consumers want to watch the content that’s most appealing to them, legally or illegally. When it becomes harder to access something through legal channels, piracy tends to increase.

“These results underscore the importance of legal accessibility as one of the ways in which consumption of pirated content can be reduced,” the report concludes.

With the constantly evolving media landscape, EUIPO’s Audiovisual Observatory plans to follow up the current findings with more in-depth research. This includes the effects of movies that skip cinema releases and are made available on-demand immediately, by Netflix and Amazon for example.

And with Warner Bros’ recent decision to premiere all 2021 movie titles on HBO Max and in cinema simultaneously, another area of research just popped up.

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A copy of the “Online Copyright Infringement in the European union title-level study: Film, Music and TV”, is available here

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

With more than 35 million students, 57,000 instructors, and 400 million courses available, Udemy is a huge player in the online learning space.

Accessing the company’s content obviously comes at a price too so when online learning group ShareLearn spotted an opportunity for students to access thousands of Udemy courses legally and for free, they decided to share the information with the world.

Tutorial Uploaded to YouTube To Help Students

ShareLearn’s four-minute video, which TorrentFreak was able to review on another platform, begins with a splash screen indicating that by using the techniques shown in the videos, thousands of courses can be accessed by students with the right credentials.

While it does display the Udemy logo, a disclaimer at the start of the video states that the tutorial is “not affiliated with Udemy”.

The purpose of the video was to spread the word that Udemy has a partnership with Gale to provide “more than 6,000 high-quality, on-demand video courses taught by world-class instructors across 75 categories for upskilling in the areas of business, technology, and design.”

As part of this arrangement, free courses are available under some library systems.

The System to Access Courses is Hosted By Gale

The video reveals that if students from certain cities in the United States visit gale.udemy.com , they are presented with a portal that operates in partnership with their libraries, universities, colleges and schools. With the library option selected, a list of participating libraries appears.

In the tutorial video, San Francisco library is used as an example. For authentication purposes, users are required to enter their library account credentials and from there they are passed to Udemy, which requires a Google or Microsoft account to proceed.

The people at ShareLearn showed a screenshot of this page to make their tutorial easier to understand, as we have done with the screenshot of the video below.

Udemy Files Copyright Complaint With YouTube

Given the obviously useful nature of the video, it’s perhaps reasonable to conclude that at least some students would’ve learned something from it. However, not too long after it was uploaded to YouTube, it was targeted by a Udemy copyright complaint which resulted in it being taken down.

“[Udemy] has claimed copyright infringement for use of their logo,” ShareLearn informs TorrentFreak.

“We believe it is covered under fair use and they want to hold us from promoting this option to avoid people from using this library service paid by taxpayers. I have sent them a few emails, but they have given a standard reply that we violated their copyright,” ShareLearn add.

Udemy’s Legal Department Refuses to Reconsider

From correspondence reviewed by TF, ShareLearn told Udemy that they “appreciate what Udemy is doing for society” and were excited to see the Udemy/Gale/libraries partnership, noting that the project seemed like a good use of taxpayers’ money.

“In this video, we have used udemy logo as a reference to udemy, which is covered under fair use. We used screenshots from gale.udemy.com website to help library patterns sign up for your service via public library, which is covered under fair use [sic],” the correspondence reads.

ShareLearn then presented Udemy’s legal team with a list of questions requesting additional information on why the inclusion of screenshots bearing Udemy’s logo can’t be considered fair use. The group also asked where Udemy itself advertises the availability of the free service to students.

In its response, Udemy ignored the questions and reiterated its key objection.

“When material posted on other platforms infringes Udemy’s intellectual property rights, or on the rights of our instructors, we have an obligation to protect those works,” the company said.

“We have reviewed the takedown notice in question, and confirmed the infringement therein. If you have questions about intellectual property matters such as trademark, copyright, fair use, etc. you may wish to consult an attorney. Udemy cannot provide you with any legal advice on these matters.”

ShareLearn Files YouTube Counternotice

ShareLearn has filed a counternotice with YouTube in an effort to have the video restored but at the time of writing, that is still pending and the content remains down. What will happen next is unclear.

The takedown from YouTube was filed under copyright law, clearly referencing Udemy’s “copyrighted logo”. Whether any fair use defense is applicable in this case will be for lawyers to argue over but aside from the 20-second intro page (shown in the screenshot above, which includes a disclaimer), the only use of the Udemy logo thereafter is when screenshots/screen recordings of the Udemy/Gale website/system are displayed.

Given that the idea of the video was to promote Udemy products and services developed alongside Gale and libraries for the benefit of students, the copyright complaint and subsequent removal seem somewhat overzealous, if not counterproductive too.

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

Hacking group Team-Xecuter has long been a thorn in the side of major gaming companies.

The group offers hardware and software solutions that allow people to install and play unofficial games – including pirated copies – on various consoles, including the popular Nintendo Switch.

Team-Xecuter often defended its work by pointing out that their products are not necessarily pirate tools. They are supporters of the ‘right to repair’ movement and back people who want to play homebrew games on their devices for personal use.

The affected game companies disagree, with Nintendo front and center. The Japanese gaming company has been chasing down Team-Xecuter for years and a few months ago the company took several online stores to court for selling Team-Xecuter products .

In October, these enforcement efforts reached a new level when the US Government launched a criminal prosecution of three of the group’s members.

Bowser aka ‘GaryOPA’

One of the defendants is Canadian Gary Bowser. He was arrested in the Dominican Republic in September and was deported to the US soon after. Bowser was allegedly responsible for the development of circumvention devices and maintained regular contact with resellers.

Bowser is perhaps best known through his nickname GaryOPA, the supposed operator and a frequent writer on the website “MaxConsole,” which regularly reviewed Team-Xecuter hardware and other hacking tools.

Flight Risk

In a ‘Zoom’ hearing held last week, a federal court in Seattle reviewed a request for pretrial detention, submitted by the US prosecution. It is not uncommon for criminal defendants to be released on bail pending their trial, but the US argues against this in Bowser’s case, as he’s considered a ‘flight risk.’ The court agrees.

“Defendant poses a risk of nonappearance due to his lack of ties to this district, ties to Canada and the Dominican Republic, ownership of a Canadian passport, history of international travel, unstable living situation, and an uncorroborated personal history,” US Magistrate Judge Michelle Peterson writes.

“Based on these findings, and for the reasons stated on the record, there does not appear to be any condition or combination of conditions that will reasonably assure the Defendant’s appearance at future court hearings,” she adds.

Bowser was not interviewed by the court, which currently has no information on his family ties, personal history, or employment. That leaves the door open to reopening the detention hearing at a future date, which may change things.

The Other Defendants

There is no update on the other defendants at this point. Based on the information in the court dockets, Yuanning Chen from China is still at large. According to the indictment, Chen managed a manufacturing and distribution company where Team-Xecuter’s hardware was made.

The third defendant, French national Max Louarn, was arrested in Canada where a U.S. extradition request was launched. The US Government sees Louarn, who’s hacking track record goes back to the early nineties, as the leader of Team-Xecuter.

Louarn allegedly made Team-Xecuter’s important business decisions, arranged investors and financing, and oversaw product development and the wholesale distribution chains.

Nintendo Takes Over Domains

The US criminal prosecution is not the only legal pressure on Team-Xecuter. Nintendo has also seen very active on the legal front. One of the stores it sued earlier this year, Axiogame.com, was allegedly operated by Team-Xecuter . That has been shut down through Nintendo’s lawsuit.

The Axiogame.com domain is now owned by Nintendo and over recent days the gaming company took over several other domains of former piracy hack stores, assisted by an updated court order .

Flashcarda.com switched to the new Materpl.com domain and both are owned by Nintendo now. The same is true for Txswitch.com that switched to Stxwitch.com, Usachipss.com that moved to Nerged.com, and several other domains.

Team-Xecuter Continues

Despite the mounting legal pressure, Team-Xecuter is far from defeated. In fact, the site’s main website remains online . The forum remains active as well, with people privately offering help to install or buy mods.

Team-Xecuter’s dedicated page for the SX product line is also still intact. This links to a list of authorized resellers. While many of these stores are offline now, a few are still actively selling.

—

A copy of the detention order issued by US Magistrate Judge Michelle Peterson is available here (pdf) . Nintendo’s filing, pointing out the newly targeted shop domains can be found here (pdf)

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

When the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) was introduced in 1998, file-sharing was a fringe activity, and online streaming a futuristic idea.

The developments over the past two decades have transformed the way people consume media, both legally and illegally.

Calls for DMCA Reform

Despite these drastic changes, the DMCA still dictates how many online services respond to copyright-infringing content. While most service providers are relatively happy with it, copyright holders demand change.

These discussions have been ongoing for a few years now. The US Copyright Office has heard many stakeholders and recently summarized its recommendations in an advisory report, which suggests several ‘tweaks’ to the current law.

In addition to this effort, U.S. Senator Thom Tillis launched a separate DMCA review process through the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Intellectual Property. In several hearings, it heard input from key players including copyright holders, legal experts, service providers, and digital rights groups.

Senator Tillis Questions Stakeholders

As the review process nears its conclusion, Senator Tillis also asked various parties to submit written submissions. These are not posted publicly, as far as we know, but Re:Create published its response and those of several members, including digital rights groups EFF and Public Knowledge.

These submissions provide a clear counterweight to the ‘stricter’ rules and enhanced enforcement options the major copyright holder groups have called for. This includes website blocking and a proposed notice-and-staydown regime.

The site-blocking push came as a surprise as it’s been a no-go topic in the US after the SOPA and PIPA bills were rejected in 2012. Technically speaking, site-blocking injunctions are already possible under the DMCA. However, so-called ‘no fault’ injunctions, issued against ISPs, are not.

Site Blocking Questions

Senator Tillis questions whether the DMCA should be updated to make these site-blocking injunctions more accessible for copyright holders. And if so, if these should be issued by federal courts or a special tribunal.

EFF answered this question negatively, warning against overblocking, which will ultimately chill free speech.

“Injunctions to restrain the forums and conduits of speech are treated with extreme skepticism in the U.S. free speech tradition,” the digitals right group writes, adding that “website blocking is a blunt instrument that inevitably risks over-blocking of lawful and non-infringing speech.”

Site blocking will require technological and organizational censorship systems, much like the ones Chinese companies are required to use. The risk is that once these are in place, more and more content will be censored.

“Once created, the use of these systems is unlikely to be confined to copyright enforcement, nor to U.S. court orders. They risk being used to censor all manner of speech that violates foreign laws or offends powerful interests,” EFF adds.

SOPA/PIPA

EFF also references the SOPA and PIPA bills, which is a common theme in the answers from all opponents including Public Knowledge .

The non-profit organization points out that technology experts warned that site blocking interferes with the domain name system, which carries security and privacy risks. In addition, civil libertarians cautioned that it can be abused to increase censorship.

“SOPA/PIPA was roundly condemned by people from different political backgrounds for a reason, and accomplishing the same objective of site-blocking through injunctions against third parties is subject to the same critiques,” Public Knowledge writes.

These potential threats are not worth the risk, especially because site blocking isn’t effective, the group adds. Targeted sites can simply move to new domains as their servers remain online.

“It is ineffective because it is trivially easy for sites dedicated to infringement to simply switch to alternate domains. It’s misdirected because ISP- and DNS-level blocking fails to actually take sites offline,” Public Knowledge writes.

This sentiment is shared by Re:Create, which stresses that if such a far-reaching measure is ever handed down, it should be done by a jury.

“Website blocking is not only a ​technological nightmare to implement​ (if it can even be implemented), but widely unpopular. Copyright infringement does not rise to the level of relief that should be ordered without a trial by jury under the 7th Amendment protections of the Constitution for copyright infringement,” Re:Create notes.

Notice-and-Staydown Questions

The three groups are clearly against the site blocking proposal and they have similar thoughts on the notice-and-staydown proposal as well.

Senator Tillis asked whether it’s a good idea to ease the burden on copyright holders by requiring service providers to ensure that infringing content stays offline. This is similar to the EU proposal, which opened the door to automated filtering of uploaded content.

This ‘staydown’ requirement would end the current takedown whack-a-mole where copyright holders have to ask services over and over again to remove the same files. However, the three groups warn that this is a horrible idea.

One obvious problem, according to Re:Create, is that automated systems don’t know whether a person has the right to post something. Similarly, it can’t see whether an upload is a fair use.

“Notice-and-staydown by its very nature would presume copyrighted material is automatically infringed, without considering cases where the use of this content is permissible,” Re:Create writes.

The group adds that there are already enough problems with the current takedown system, where fair use or legal content is incorrectly taken down. A staydown requirement would only make this problem worse.

“A notice-and-staydown regime would further impair legal uses and reshape copyright policy and law as it has been understood for centuries – chilling expression and creativity. This is because there is no way to design such a system without filtering technology.”

Copyright Office Rejected Staydown Proposal

Public Knowledge shares this concern and points out that even the Copyright Office advised against implementing such a scheme in its recent recommendations. Instead, the Office advised Congress to evaluate how this will work in the EU.

“Notice-and-staydown is an idea so far removed from feasibility that even the Copyright Office, after years of study, declined to endorse it,” Public Knowledge notes.

“[T]he European Union provides a historically rare opportunity for lawmakers to study, in real time, the effects of such a system on the online ecosystem and its 447 million European users. Attempting to leapfrog this transition before it’s even returned initial results would be policy malpractice.”

The EFF also opposes a staydown requirement. The group highlights that the current system was carefully drafted to balance the interests of copyright holders on the one hand, while preserving free expression and innovation.

Requiring online services to police their users and filter content will lead to overblocking, it warns.

“Conditioning liability limitations on a service provider’s ability to actively police potential infringement would likely lead to over-blocking and/or aggressive filtering of user-generated content. That would make the Internet a much less hospitable place for free speech and innovation,” EFF warns.

Disagreement Remains

The full answers from all three groups, as well as several others, are available on Re:Create’s website . The group encourages all stakeholders to make their responses public, but thus far we haven’t seen any from the major copyright holder groups.

We did spot a copy of the answers from the Artists Rights Alliance which, as expected, supports broad DMCA reform. Ideally, it would like to limit the current safe harbor system and require infringing content to stay offline once it’s reported.

“At a minimum, where an artist does identify unlicensed uses of their music on these new platforms, they should not be further burdened with mapping unfamiliar networks and finding every other instance of such unlicensed use,” ARA writes .

These responses show that Senator Tillis and his colleagues will have a really hard time coming up with a proposal that will keep both sides happy. But after several years of DMCA reviews, that doesn’t really come as a surprise.

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

Anti-piracy group BREIN is at the forefront of the fight against copyright infringement in the Netherlands.

Many of its efforts have been focused on legal action against big targets such as The Pirate Bay and the IPTV market, with the group achieving notable legal precedents along the way.

Now, however, BREIN says it wants to strike at the heart of the sharing landscape by targeting users whose sharing habits play a key role in keeping content alive.

Frequent and Long-Term Infringers on the Radar

From December 15, BREIN says it will begin a long-planned project (‘FLU’ – Frequent and Long-Term Uploaders) to reduce the availability of movies, TV series, books and music on file-sharing networks.

Using specially developed software (AFLU: Analysis Program For Frequent and Long-Term Uploaders), BREIN will search for local BitTorrent users who regularly upload infringing content and/or share it for long periods of time.

The key criteria for receiving a notice is as follows:

– IP address has been observed sharing BREIN member companies’ content
– IP address belongs to a Dutch ISP
– In a four-week period, IP address has been seen at least twice in any relevant swarm, with an interval of at least seven hours

The focus, at least for now, will be on those who distribute multiple infringing uploads of content aimed at the Dutch market. BREIN says that it has a preference for original Dutch content but will also be interested in foreign-made Dutch-subtitled or dubbed content, distributed by users of torrent sites or apps like Popcorn Time, for example.

Casual Downloaders Are Not The Initial Targets

Similar anti-piracy campaigns over the years have sought to sow widespread fear among all file-sharers but BREIN is being very specific about its targets and goals. The project is not about targeting casual sharers but those who play a more important role in the sharing ecosystem.

“This project is not about incidental – so-called ‘hit & run’ downloaders, but about frequent BitTorrent uploaders. Habitual infringers who act not so much as a primary and large-scale source, which have already been and are being successfully enforced, but more as a lubricant, because they perpetuate the exchange of illegal content through their so-called ‘seeding’,” BREIN says.

“Without these types of users, the exchange [of files] will not work.”

With this strategy of going after a relatively small subset of users, BREIN appears to be deploying a tactic that has the potential to starve BitTorrent swarms of the crucial elements they need to survive. These users not only have a tendency to supply upload faster to other users but they also seed for longer, bringing health to swarms.

In a sharing climate that is disproportionately reliant on these types of sharers, with the vast majority of users simply grabbing whatever content they need without hanging around and contributing for too long, BREIN will be hoping to degrade the transitory experience of the masses by removing bandwidth thereby rendering downloading more laborious.

Indeed, BREIN advises that “the more often and longer [users] are in an infringing BitTorrent swarm as an uploader” the more likely they are to become of interest to BREIN. This message, should it gain traction, could be of real benefit to the project.

If BREIN succeeds this could be an interesting experiment, but first of all it needs to tie IP addresses to the key individuals themselves, a practice that is rarely easy or without costs, especially in the Netherlands.

Warning Notices Will Be Sent To More Prolific Sharers

BREIN’s plan is to send “informative warnings” to more prolific sharers for at least six months, targeting up to a maximum of 1,000 IP addresses per month. It hopes to utilize ISPs’ ability to match IP addresses to real-life identities in the hope they will pass notices on.

“We will always ask for the cooperation of the relevant ISPs to forward that e-mail. In case of refusal, we will request (or demand) the corresponding email addresses so that we can send the alerts ourselves,” BREIN says.

The big question is whether the anti-piracy group can rely on traditionally stubborn local ISPs to get involved in the process voluntarily. TorrentFreak approached BREIN for comment on whether any ISPs have already agreed to work on this project but Managing Director Tim Kuik said he prefers for ISPs to individually communicate whether they are willing to cooperate.

From the language used, however, it seems that BREIN could take legal action to compel ISPs to either cooperate or even hand over customer data.

Legal Action Against ISPs That Refuse To Coopeate

BREIN says it has already considered the possibility that some ISPs won’t be willing to cooperate and is prepared for legal action to force compliance.

“BREIN will, in that case, be forced to enforce cooperation through the court. In such a situation, BREIN will most likely be looking for a minimum [data retention] period from six months into enforcement against the uploaders in the target group whose IP addresses are found in the Bittorrent swarms,” BREIN explains.

Indeed, it seems the cooperation of the ISPs might be an important element here, and somewhat of a double-edged sword. On the one hand, ISPs might face a backlash from some customers for cooperating in an anti-piracy scheme. On the other, it appears that if ISPs pass on warnings on BREIN’s behalf, BREIN won’t be seeking to obtain any information that would personally identify those infringers.

“BREIN will only do so if providers do not want to cooperate by forwarding the notifications to the subscribers whose IP numbers were obtained by BREIN in the context of FLU,” the anti-piracy group says.

BREIN says it sought advice from a communications specialist and market research company Kantar when formulating the proposed warnings, something which suggests a persuasive approach over brute force, at least in the first instance.

Campaign Forms Part of a Government-Funded Study

An interesting aspect of BREIN’s campaign is that the associated market research project has received funding from the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science. The first phase, which measured the state of play before the notices, has already been completed.

Additional research will be carried out to assess the effectiveness of the warning notices as time progresses. If a positive effect is observed, the warnings will continue but BREIN warns that if its efforts don’t yield appropriate results, it will consider bringing enforcement measures to the table.

Processing of Personal Data

The documentation provided by BREIN indicates that the anti-piracy group has been extremely thorough in considering privacy concerns. Notably, BREIN says that following consultations with the Dutch Data Protection Authority, it was determined that a license is not required for such collection of data. Nevertheless, BREIN says it will only collect the information it needs, with the rest being discarded.

“The starting point with FLU is proportionality, which means that the personal data that is processed is only that necessary for the specific purpose BREIN wants to achieve with FLU,” BREIN says.

“To detect relevant Dutch IP addresses, BREIN uses special software developed on request. Several samples are taken on various titles every month. Irrelevant addresses are not saved. Data that is not used will be deleted and data that is being used will be deleted as soon as possible after sending the advisory warning.”

Specifically, BREIN will immediately anonymize all foreign IP addresses it obtains although it will do its best to avoid them capturing them in the first place. Dutch IP addresses will be stored for a maximum of six weeks but if those same IP addresses are spotted more than twice in a four-week period, BREIN will retain them for longer to facilitate the notice-sending element of the campaign.

What Happens After the Six-Month Campaign?

BREIN says that the research into the effectiveness of the project will be “highly dependent” on the levels of cooperation it receives from ISPs. Again, it is not yet clear whether any or all have agreed to cooperate. Presuming they do and infringement “significant diminishes”, FLU will be extended for another six months with research carried out to determine effectiveness.

If ISPs do not assist, or compliance with notices does not yield sufficient results, BREIN will then decide whether to move to enforcement.

“At the earliest after this initial six-month period, if necessary BREIN will scale up and take enforcement action against those users whose samples are found three or more times in a BitTorrent swarm. These are users who continue to seed content for a long period of time or who repeatedly download and upload infringing files every month,” BREIN adds.

Finally, BREIN has also laid out criteria for enforcement action, should it be deemed necessary.

– IP address has been observed sharing BREIN member companies’ content
– IP address belongs to a Dutch ISP
– In a four-week period, IP address has been seen at least three or four times in either a) different swarms, b) in the same swarm more than seven hours apart, or c) a combination of these variants.

The documents supporting the scheme can be found here and here (PDF, Dutch)

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

Operating a mixtape site is not without risk. By definition, mixes include multiple sound recordings that are often protected by copyright.

Popular hip-hop mixtape site and app Spinrilla , which has millions of users, is well aware of these risks. In 2017, the company was sued by several record labels, backed by the RIAA, that accused the company of massive copyright infringement.

“Spinrilla specializes in ripping off music creators by offering thousands of unlicensed sound recordings for free,” the RIAA commented at the time.

Spinrilla Fights Piracy Accusations

The hip-hop site countered the allegations by pointing out that it installed an RIAA-approved anti-piracy filter and actively worked with major record labels to promote their tracks . In addition, Spinrilla stressed that the DMCA’s safe harbor protects the company.

As the case progressed both parties filed motions for summary judgment. The music companies requested rulings to establish, before trial, that Spinrilla is liable for direct copyright infringement and that the DMCA safe harbor doesn’t apply.

Spinrilla countered this with cross-motions, filed under seal, in which they argued the opposite.

Court: Spinrilla is Liable

This week, US District Court Judge Amy Totenberg ruled on the requests. The 47-page order is good news for the music companies, as the court agrees that Spinrilla is liable for direct copyright infringement.

In her ruling, Judge Totenberg writes that Spinrilla admitted that 4,082 copyrighted sound recordings were streamed at least once through its website or app. The mixtape service failed, however, to offer a usable counterargument to this claim.

Spinrilla’s legal team brought up several cases in the company’s defense, but these all deal with uploading and downloading of infringing content, not streaming. Also, the cited cases are not about infringements of the public performance right, contrary to the present lawsuit.

Streaming vs. Downloading

This is a problem because the record labels highlighted cases where courts held that streaming can be a direct infringement of exclusive performance rights, even when the streaming occurs at the request of the user. That’s what happened at Spinrilla.

“Here, Plaintiffs do not rely solely on uploads and downloads of their music to and from Spinrilla. Defendants have created an interactive internet player that streams copyrighted content directly from its website and mobile app,” Judge Totenberg writes.

As a result, Spinrilla is held liable for directly infringing the copyrights of the 4,082 sound recordings that were listed in the complaint.

“Defendants have infringed Plaintiffs’ exclusive right ‘to perform’ their copyrighted sound recordings ‘publicly by means of a digital audio transmission.’ Therefore, Plaintiffs are entitled to summary judgment on their claim of direct infringement of the 4,082 works in suit.”

With the maximum statutory damages of $150,000 per work, this opens the door to an astronomical award of more than $600 million dollars. And that’s not the end of the bad news for Spinrilla.

Limited Safe Harbor

The court also ruled that the mixtape service is not eligible for a DMCA safe harbor defense before July 2017. While the site and app have accepted takedown notices for many years, they didn’t register a DMCA agent with the Copyright Office, which is a requirement.

Spinrilla first registered a DMCA agent in 2017, five months after the lawsuit started. In addition, it didn’t have a repeat infringer policy before July that year, another requirement for safe harbor protection.

“Consequently, the undisputed facts demonstrate that Defendants did not satisfy all of the required elements to be eligible for safe harbor defense until July 29, 2017, which is when they first designated an agent with the U.S. Copyright Office and had adopted a repeat infringer policy,” Judge Totenberg writes.

This means that Spinrilla can only invoke the safe harbor defense for infringement that occurred after that date.

The record labels asked the court to go even further, arguing that Spinrilla’s repeat infringer policy wasn’t “reasonably implemented,” because not all repeat infringers were terminated. However, the court rejected this, as the 4,082 sound recordings didn’t include any tracks that were uploaded by known repeat infringers.

Record Labels are Happy

Overall, however, the record labels are very pleased with this significant win. With streaming becoming the norm today, this case is crucial.

“We are gratified by the court’s decision, which sends a message that online streaming providers cannot hide behind the actions of their users to avoid their own liability for copyright infringement that occurs through their systems,” Kenneth Doroshow, RIAA Chief Legal Officer says.

“The court got it exactly right on several key points of copyright law in the digital streaming context, and we hope that it serves as a lodestar for other courts and service providers alike.”

The RIAA, which represents the major record labels, is also happy that the ruling confirms that mistakes can be just as infringing as posting full sound recordings.

While the ruling is an early win for the music companies, the case isn’t over just yet. There are still matters that have to be decided at trial, including the scale of the damages, if these are awarded. Alternatively, the parties can try to resolve the matter through a mediation process.

At the same time, Spinrilla is also involved in a legal battle with the RIAA directly. The mixtape site sued the industry group earlier this year, accusing it of sending false DMCA takedown notices . That case remains pending.

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A copy of the order issued yesterday by US District Court Judge Amy Totenberg is available here (pdf)

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

Over the past several years, independent photographers have filed more than a thousand lawsuits against companies that allegedly used their work without permission.

The majority of these cases, with prominent targets such as Yahoo.com, Verizon.com, MSN.com, MTV.com, Gawker.com, are handled by attorney Richard Liebowitz.

When we first spotted this emerging trend in 2016 , Liebowitz told us that he was helping independent photographers to protect their rights. All too often, companies would take their work without paying, he said.

Liebowitz’ Repeated Misconduct

While that argument still holds true in many cases, the attorney himself has trouble sticking to the rules as well. In his relatively short career, courts have reprimanded and sanctioned him for various types of misconduct.

This summer, for example, in the Usherson v. Bandshell case, a New York federal court ordered the lawyer to pay over $100,000 in sanctions for violating several court orders and repeatedly lying under oath. This included a false claim that the photo’s copyright was registered when the case was filed.

In a detailed order, the court further concluded that, given the attorney’s “deplorable record,” steps should be taken to suspend the attorney’s ability to file new cases. As such, the matter was referred to the court’s Grievance Committee.

Suspended from Practicing Law

The Grievance Committee evaluated the findings recently and concluded that Liebowitz will be suspended from practicing law in the district until further order.

“After careful deliberation, the Committee is unanimously of the view that the Charges are strongly supported by the record. What is more, the Committee is unanimously of the view that interim disciplinary measures against Respondent must be put in place immediately,” the Committee writes.

The order, issued last week, notes that the measure is appropriate to protect the public from future violations. Given the attorney’s track record, this is a real threat.

“The record in this case — which includes Respondent’s repeated disregard for orders from this Court and his unwillingness to change despite 19 formal sanctions and scores of other admonishments and warnings from judges across the country — leads the Committee to the view that recurrence is highly likely.”

The suspension is temporary, as the court still has to finalize the full proceeding. For the time being, however, Liebowitz will have to halt all his legal activities in the district.

Further Sanctions?

Meanwhile, the various missteps continue to pile on. In addition to the $100,000 sanction in the Usherson v. Bandshell case a few weeks ago, the attorney was also instructed to send a copy of the scathing order to all of his clients. However, that didn’t happen.

In September he informed the court that he had failed to inform some clients right away. A month later, it became clear that he failed to do so in 113 cases, which is far from a minor oversight.

Yesterday, District Court Judge Jesse Furman wrote that this additional failure to comply with the court’s order is a strong argument to impose further sanctions.

“Had Mr. Liebowitz failed to file the Opinion and Order in a handful of cases, the failure to comply might have been understandable and excusable. But the failure to file it in 113 cases is astonishing and suggests contumaciousness, an egregiously disorganized case management system, or both.”

Nothing to Deter

Interestingly, however, the Court chose not to add any sanctions. While that may sound positive for the lawyer, the reasoning behind it is quite grim. Mr. Liebowitz may be a lost cause, Judge Furman suggests.

“[T]he ultimate purpose of sanctions is deterrence and, as Mr. Liebowitz’s extraordinary record of both sanctions and noncompliance with court orders demonstrates, it is far from clear that there is any additional sanction that would serve to deter him.”

In addition, there is no new misconduct to ‘deter’ at the movement, as the attorney is suspended from practicing law in the district now.

“Thus, for the time being, there will be nothing to deter when it comes to Mr. Liebowitz,” Judge Furman concludes.

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A copy of the order issued by District Court Judge Jesse Furman, which includes a copy of the Grievance Committee’s decision, is available here (pdf) . Photo credit: Liebowitz image by” King of Hearts ” (CC BY-SA 4.0)

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

According to the music industry, the main threat to artists and labels from a piracy perspective is the availability of stream-ripping platforms and tools. On the other hand, however, a much more traditional threat also remains an issue.

Recording labels have long lamented the fact that insiders and other people with access to new music have made it available to others in advance of commercial release. Whether those are promo copies, so-called ‘dubplates’ in the vinyl scene, or even CDs liberated from the packing department of a manufacturing facility, early leaks can cause headaches – especially when they make it online.

Of course, leaks appearing online has been the standard for two decades already. The availability of music releases on streaming platforms simultaneously across borders has helped dampen the problem but it still hasn’t eradicated it. In fact, some sites specialize in ensuring content gets online as quickly as possible.

Kingdom Leaks – Leaking Music For Seven Years

While there is no shortage of music leaking sites, Kingdom Leaks (in one form or another) has been around for roughly seven years. That’s quite a feat considering the content on offer. And, despite operating in a niche, the site still manages to pull in an estimated two million visits per month, with many users looking to grab music as far in advance of release as possible.

While this particular party was enjoyed by fans while it lasted, it’s clear that Kingdom Leaks will soon be pulling down the shutters for the last time.

“It is with a heavy heart and great sorrow that today I announce the shutdown of Kingdom Leaks. This was not a decision made lightly or abruptly, nor was this choice made because of legal pressure, a data breach, or anything of that nature,” site operator Lord Kingdom says in a final statement.

“The simple but unfortunate reason is this: mR12 and I have decided to move on, and there is no safe way to hand over the website to another party out of concern for the safety of everyone involved since the site’s inception 7 years ago.”

Shutting Down For Personal Reasons, Jan 1, 2021

While many site operators can run on to ripe old ages without a hitch, Lord Kingdom says he has other ‘real-life’ matters on the agenda that require him to move on, with Kingdom Leaks (KL) firmly behind him.

“With a baby on the way and getting married next year, this is something that I need to put in the past, officially,” he writes.

“This reality has left us at the following decision: we will be permanently shutting down our servers on January 1st, 2021. All user and site data, including that which is stored on PassTheLeaks, will be permanently deleted.”

Those familiar with the site will recognize PassTheLeaks as one of the domains offered as an option for people trying to download music from KL, which is presented via related service Filecrypt. The news that all of this content is set to be deleted will come as a disappointment to users but according to Lord Kingdom, the topic won’t be revisited and the decision to close “is final”.

Not Everyone is Disappointed That Kingdown Leaks is Closing

For many years, copyright holders and their anti-piracy partners have been working hard to have content uploaded by Kingdom Leaks delisted from Google. It will come as no surprise that the BPI takes the lead in the sheer volume of content targeted, closely followed by French music group SCPP and international music organization IFPI.

One of the other anti-piracy companies regularly trying to suppress KL is UK-based anti-piracy company AudioLock . If Kingdom Leaks keeps its word and closes down in just over a month’s time, AudioLock will have less work to do. Speaking with TorrentFreak, however, company founder Ben Rush says that he won’t be sad to see the site go.

“Kingdom Leaks has been around a long time and has a strong user base who are kept updated through various social media feeds of every new release. It covers a lot more rock and metal content than other similar sites and protects links from automated tools that take them down,” Rush says.

AudioLock’s owner says that Kingdom Leaks’ utilization of link encryption (Filecrypt) has meant that the site has been able to keep itself alive, driving its popularity but at the expense of artists who are struggling in the current climate.

“Now without the revenue from live events [due to COVID-19], we are seeing labels seeking to boost existing stream and download revenue by protecting it from piracy. This pressure combined with the site’s popularity will have made it a prime target,” he explains.

Kingdom Leaks Admin Asks Users To Consider Spotify

In what could be an important departing post, Kingdom Leaks admin mR12 (who is also a VIP uploader on The Pirate Bay) has penned an ‘essay’ on why people should be considering Spotify in their music consumption habits moving forward.

“As Kingdom Leaks comes to an unfortunate but inevitable close, you may be considering how your music needs will be sustainably met in the future. Many will understandably and reasonably move to other music blogs, other download sites, and with good cause,” he writes.

“I am not writing to condone these moves; however, I would like to argue, through a serious and practical consideration of the actual need that must be filled, that Spotify is the solution many people are looking for but simply don’t know it or haven’t given it enough consideration.

“I want to show that, yes, Spotify is worth $120 per year, and perhaps more importantly for those of you reading this, that Spotify is compatible with partial music piracy, which I believe is the most optimal and hassle-free solution for the vast majority of people.”

Time will tell how many soon-to-be-former users of KL find his arguments persuasive but Ben Rush is hoping that Kingdom Leaks’ passionate music-fan users will move to legal platforms rather than pirate sites.

“The harsh reality is that if these users want to have releases made by the labels and artists they enjoy, then they need to support them now. Without this support, there will be many labels who will no longer exist, and many artists unable to continue to create music,” he says.

“Show your appreciation and support to the labels and artists that mean so much to you. Secure their future by purchasing directly from the label itself or from legitimate platforms.”

It may have taken seven years but at this point (and if only partially), some kind of consensus appears to have been reached.

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

Nintendo is doing all it can to stop the distribution of piracy enabling hacks and modchips, including SX Core and SX Lite.

Earlier this year, the company sued a group of known ‘offenders’ that sell these tools. After the stores failed to show up in court, Nintendo requested a default judgment and permanent injunction, which was granted soon after .

Injunction ‘Shuts Down’ Modchip Stores

The injunction was a clear victory as it allowed the Japanese gaming giant to shut down several sites, including TXswitch.com, SXflashcard.com and Axiogame.com. These domain names were later transferred to the company as well.

That success wasn’t permanent though. While some stores may have vanished permanently, others have continued under new names. In the case of Txswitch.com that was pretty obvious.

A day after Txswitch.com was pulled offline, the store made a comeback on Stxwitch.com. This site looks nearly identical to the old one and even uses the same logo and code.

GoDaddy Refuses to Take Down New Domain

This type of ‘domain hopping’ is common in pirate circles and Nintendo was somewhat prepared for it. The injunction includes a section which states that “any variant or successor” of the stores is also covered, so Nintendo swiftly asked domain registrar GoDaddy to suspend the new domain as well.

However, GoDaddy refused . Despite the mention that successors are covered, the domain registrar requested a new court order which specifically mentions Stxwitch.com.

To resolve this standoff Nintendo went to court again, requesting clarification, which came this week in the form of a new order, issued by US District Court Judge Thomas Zilly.

STXWITCH.COM Has to Go Offline

“STXWITCH.COM is a ‘variant or successor’ domain name as that term is used in the Judgment,” Judge Zilly writes, stressing that all intermediaries have to cut their ties with the site.

“Defendants and all third parties acting in active concert and participation with Defendants, including registrars, are ENJOINED from supporting or facilitating access to STXWITCH.COM, and are ORDERED to cease to use the domain name STXWITCH.COM and immediately transfer STXWITCH.COM to Nintendo’s control.”

At the time of writing the store is still online, but with this order in hand, that likely won’t be the case for long. However, that doesn’t mean that it can’t reappear under yet another new domain.

All ‘Variants and Successors’ are Covered

If that happens, Nintendo doesn’t have to go to court again, Judge Zilly clarifies. GoDaddy and all other domain registrars, registries, and other intermediaries will have to take action against sites operated by the defendants, no matter what domain they use.

“For avoidance of doubt, the Court’s Judgment applies to all domain names controlled by Defendants through which Defendants engage in the conduct found to be unlawful in this lawsuit, whether or not the exact domain name is explicitly listed in the Judgment,” the order reads.

While this sounds very clear and obvious, it does raise some questions. When is a new domain a ‘variant or successor’?

Questions Remain

In the case of Txswitch the similarities were rather striking, as the same code and design were used. But what if Nintendo ‘suspects’ that the defendants are making a comeback from a different domain with a different look?

What evidence does Nintendo need to show that a new domain is a ‘variant or successor’ and is it then up to a company such as GoDaddy to ‘judge’ whether this is enough?

These are all hypothetical situations but it is likely that GoDaddy refused Nintendo’s initial request because they don’t want to be the arbiter. Future refusals will come at a price, however, as Judge Zilly ruled that failing to comply opens the door to punitive and monetary sanctions.

Legal uncertainty aside, this order doesn’t necessarily end the ‘whack-a-mole.’ There are plenty of foreign registrars and registries that don’t fall under the jurisdiction of US courts. Some of these will demand a local court order from Nintendo, which will start the process all over again.

TorrentFreak reached out to Stxwitch to ask what their plans are for the future. We have yet to hear back, but at the time of writing, they are still accepting new orders.

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A copy of the order from US District Court Judge Thomas Zilly is available here (pdf)

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