In two weeks, the 93rd Academy Awards ceremony is scheduled to take place in Los Angeles.

The Oscars are the most prestigious film awards and millions of movie fans are looking forward to seeing what this year’s “Best Picture” will be.

Fans had to be patient as the official ceremony was delayed by a few weeks due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

Oscar Piracy

That’s not the only thing that changed. The legal availability of many top contenders, including Nomadland, is also lacking in several countries. That’s the result of closed theaters and slow digital releases.

A few weeks ago UK piracy tracking firm MUSO warned that the unavailability of these movies could trigger a piracy boom . The piracy numbers for Oscar winners tend to shoot up every year. When these films can’t be accessed legally, this will only be worse.

Do Nominations Boost Piracy?

With this in mind, we certainly plan to take a closer look at how the upcoming winners will ‘perform’ on pirate sites. That said, could it be that the nominations themselves have had an effect already?

To research this we looked at a sample of torrent downloads of the Best Picture nominees “Nomadland” and “Judas and the Black Messiah”. The timeframe starts March 5th, ten days before the nominations were announced, and ends ten days after, March 25th.

Generally speaking, pirated movie downloads will vary quite a bit throughout the week, usually peaking on the weekend. While the nominations were announced on a Monday, we decided to add the non-Oscar contender “Honest Thief” as a control.

Piracy Peaked

The results in the graph below clearly show that the downloads for both Oscar contenders peaked after the nominations were announced. Meanwhile, there is no significant change in downloads for “Honest Thief,” which even appeared to dip a little bit.

Percentage-wise, the nomination boost is obvious as well. On the day after the nominations, “Nomadland” downloads were 213% higher than the week before. A week later, these had dropped by more than 50% again.

A similar pattern can be seen for “Judas and the Black Messiah” which saw a 74% increase compared to the week before, to then drop by more than 50% a week later.

Availability is Key

It is worth noting that pirated copies of all these films were available in a high-quality format during the entire period, so that didn’t impact the results in any way.

The only logical conclusion is that Oscar nominations act as a promotion. This drives legal consumption but also piracy. With that in mind, the rightsholders would be wise to make sure that their content is available legally when the winners are announced.

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Note: The data used in this article comes from Iknow , which tracks torrent downloads through DHT and PEX. While it may not be able to track all downloads, it’s a substantial sample, which acts as a good proxy for the overall interest on all pirate sites and services.

It is worth stressing that this sample only looks at torrent downloads. Views on streaming platforms, direct downloads, and other piracy sources can’t be measured directly. That said, we assume that the trend will be similar there.

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

As one of the most popular anti-piracy tools, site-blocking attracts plenty of attention.

Originally a mechanism to prevent static torrent and streaming sites from reaching their audiences, site-blocking is now just as likely to encompass relatively nimble live TV and sports streaming platforms too.

Over the past several years, Danish anti-piracy group Rights Alliance has invested considerable resources into blocking all kinds of pirate sites, with interesting results.

Rights Alliance Annual Report Covering 2020

Last year, Rights Alliance revealed that in 2019 its work had resulted in 141 sites being blocked by the majority of ISPs in the country. Citing a MediaVision survey covering the same period, the anti-piracy group concluded that around 450,000 Danes were using illegal sites, between them chalking up around 146 million visits annually.

In its latest annual report made available this week, Rights Alliance (RA) reveals that it had 196 “illegal domains” blocked in 2020, up 55 on the previous year. The focus was on “mirror sites”, i.e sites that look identical to their previously blocked counterparts while attempting to circumvent blocking with automated redirection systems and new domain names.

RA says that mirrors have a “volatile nature” in that they have a shorter lifespan, are harder to find, and thus require special handling when it comes to blocking. In part, however, this can be dealt with via court-ordered dynamic blocking injunctions which are currently in place covering a wide range of content including movies, music, TV series, literature and live sports.

Pirate Visits Static But Pirate Users Down?

Overall, RA observed a decrease in ‘pirate’ site users last year, down from 450,000 in 2019 to around 370,000 users in 2020. Interestingly, however, the overall number of visits to pirate sites in 2020 remained stable at around 12 million visits per month, i.e very little change when compared to the 146 million reported overall in 2019.

RA believes that the decrease in identified users can be in part attributed to blocking but concedes that VPNs and third-party DNS services play a part, as does migration to other platforms where piracy is less easily monitored.

Using Legal Platforms to Consume Pirate Content

“Unfortunately, the decline in the number of users is probably also due to the fact that the users have moved to other platforms where consumption cannot be immediately measured in the data sets of MediaVision and SimilarWeb,” RA writes.

“A new challenge that has become clearer in recent years is the increasing decentralization of illegal content to legal services, such as YouTube and Facebook. Here it is not possible to measure illegal consumption and the users are not necessarily aware that they are consuming illegal content, as the service itself is legal.”

Rights Alliance and its rightsholder partners are not defenseless in this scenario, since legal ‘UGC’ platforms are more likely to respond to takedown requests than pirate sites. Additionally, both YouTube and Facebook have their own suites of anti-piracy tools and will be required to respond to important aspects of the new EU Copyright Directive. Rights Alliance says it has this under control.

“In 2020, we have therefore intensified the work with the platforms’ responsibility for copyright infringement – i.e through dialogue with the platforms and in the work of implementing Article 17 of the EU Copyright Directive in Danish law,” RA notes.

The Rights Alliance Annual Report 2020 can be found here (Danish, pdf)

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

Legal streaming services such as Spotify and Apple Music have been the music industry’s most effective weapon against piracy.

Many people don’t even bother ripping or downloading albums of tracks nowadays. The legal alternatives are just more convenient.

Despite this success, legal streaming platforms have their challenges as well. For years, artists have complained about low payouts. And to make things worse, ‘pirates’ are starting to abuse legal services as well now.

Pirated Music on Legal Streaming Services

A few weeks ago we reported that the RIAA was sending DMCA takedown notices that targeted Spotify, Deezer, Amazon, and various other legal music outlets . Apparently, some artists were using the works of others without permission.

At the time we weren’t sure if this was intentional or a mere licensing dispute. The RIAA didn’t respond to our questions on the matter. However, this week we spotted yet another takedown notice and, this time, there is more of a backstory.

On Wednesday the RIAA sent a takedown notice to Google identifying several infringing URLs on the legal streaming service Tidal. The links point to tracks that were published by Nigerian artist Wisekid but, according to the takedown request, they are from the local music star Wizkid .

Wisekid Rips Off Wizkid

Looking more closely at the matter, we quickly noticed that Wisekid appeared to have uploaded an entire album from Wizkid, passing it off as his own.

The album in question, titled “Lasgidi Made” is the same as Wizkid’s “Made in Lagos,” but the track order and titles have been changed, apparently to make the similarity less obvious.

This ‘pirated’ album made its way onto popular music services including Apple Music, Amazon, and Tidal, and reportedly generated substantial revenue for the scam artist.

Millions of Streams

Apparently, Wisekid was quite proud of his accomplishments as he posted a screenshot on Twitter showing off that he had millions of streams and more than a thousand digital sales on Apple’s service. This is when things started to go downhill.

Several commenters on social media noticed the similarities between Wizkid and Wisekid, accusing the latter of running a scam and ripping off a hard-working musician.

Wisekid, however, claimed to be innocent. Instead, he indirectly blamed his distribution company “Freeme Digital” for being responsible. Or in his own words (edited for readability);

“I don’t know who did that. I just accessed my apple artist name I saw streams. I just wanted to get people to check me out nothing more,” he wrote.

“Freeme Digital is the company that distributes all my songs. I’m just an upcoming artist and I know nothing about this. Please, I am not the one distributing Wizkid’s album on apple music.”

Deny and Delete

Soon after, the news was picked up by the Nigerian press while Wisekid removed his Twitter profile. Around the same time, the distribution company responded to the controversy, denying any involvement.

While Freeme Digital indeed worked with Wisekid, the company said that the ‘Lasgidi Made’ album was not distributed via their platform. The company also decided to cut its ties with the artist.

“We will be deleting the rest of Wisekid’s content on our platform and we have informed our legal team to immediately commence investigation on the issue and prosecute the matter to the full extent of the law.”

Removing Pirated music (and More)

Meanwhile, Wizkid’s management said it was working hard to take down the illegal uploads across all digital platforms. The RIAA helped out as well, which brings us back to the takedown notice we spotted on Wednesday.

In addition to the RIAA, UK-based industry group BPI also sent a takedown notice identifying Wisekid’s infringing upload. Sadly, this notice also flagged several news reports as copyright infringement, but that’s a different rabbit hole.

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

In recent years the European Commission has proposed and adopted various legislative changes to help combat online piracy.

This includes the Copyright Directive which passed last year as well as the Digital Services Act , which was officially unveiled last December.

These laws will have a significant effect on how online services respond to copyright infringement complaints. However, according to some, upload filters and other broad enforcement tools don’t go nearly far enough.

Next week, the Legal Affairs Committee of the European Parliament will vote on a draft resolution that goes a step further. The proposal in question is superficially tailored to deal with pirated live sports streaming, which is a thorn in the side of major sports leagues.

30-Minute takedown Window

According to the draft, prepared by rapporteur Angel Dzhambazki, sports event organizers face significant challenges in the digital environment due to piracy. To help combat this problem, online services should remove infringing content as soon as possible, within minutes of an event beginning.

Specifically, this means that current legislation should be updated to “specify that the removal of the illegal content should take place immediately after reception of the notice and no later than 30 minutes after the event started.”

According to some EU lawmakers, this proposal doesn’t go far enough and several compromise amendments have been negotiated to make the language even stronger. This includes the use of “trusted flaggers,” who may act on behalf of copyright holders.

These takedowns could be sent to streaming services such as YouTube, but they may also be targeted at hosting providers. A similar system is already in play in the UK, where sports streams can be taken down in real-time, with proper court approval.

No Court Order Needed

The EU proposal doesn’t necessarily require judicial oversight and will involve more parties. This is something sports organizers will welcome, but it opens the door to overblocking as well, which occasionally happens in the UK too.

The proposed resolution is not welcomed by all Members of Parliament. Patrick Breyer , MEP for the Pirate Party, says that he and his fellow members of the Greens/EFA Group will vote against it.

“This text reads as if it had been dictated by lobbyists in the rights holders industry, it threatens fundamental digital rights,” Breyer says.

Shorter Takedown Window Than Terrorist Content

According to Breyer, the Digital Services Act should be sufficient to deal with online copyright infringement issues. The new proposal is overbroad and excessively burdensome to online services, he adds.

“A 30-minute deletion requirement would be shorter than is foreseen for terrorist content, and outside of business hours it would be much too short, especially for small and non-commercial providers.

“Allowing private interest groups with self-interest to have content removed without review by a court would foreseeably lead to an excessive blocking of legal content as well,” Breyer adds.

Breyer informs TorrentFreak that he had submitted an amendment that called for the deletion of the new legislation. That would be the best solution in his view.

“There is no need for the specific legislation on sports streams the resolution calls for. The existing means and instruments are more than sufficient,” Breyer says.

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

For more than a decade, French anti-piracy agency Hadopi had made headlines in its quest to reduce illicit sharing on peer-to-peer networks such as BitTorrent.

France became a pioneer of the so-called “graduated response” system back in 2010, with Hadopi chasing down persistent copyright infringers with threats to disconnect them from the Internet. Since then, however, many aspects of the piracy scene have changed and France believes that change is needed to better tackle today’s threats.

Bill Presented to Council of Ministers

This week, France’s Council of Ministers was presented with a new bill that aims to more tightly regulate and protect access to cultural works in the digital age.

“Much awaited by cultural and audiovisual professionals, this text provides concrete answers to three major challenges in the field of audiovisual communication in the digital age: the protection of rights, the organization of our regulation, and the defense of public access to French cinematographic and audiovisual works which constitute our heritage,” a statement from the Ministry of Culture reads.

The bill’s aims are split into three broad sections, two of which deal with piracy matters – the protection of creators’ rights and the modernization of regulation.

Protection of Creators’ Rights

A key aim of the bill is to make it much harder for sites that profit commercially from the distribution of infringing content to operate freely. Under the current system, much focus had been placed on French Internet users using P2P networks to share content but with a shift towards other technologies, France sees a need to upgrade its toolbox.

“This bill thus strengthens the means of combating counterfeiting on the internet against streaming, direct download or indexing/linking websites, which profit from the posting of works in violation of the rights of creators,” the Ministry says.

In particular, the bill will see the creation of a centralized “ blacklisting ” system for blocking pirate sites, restricting their appearances in search engines, and preventing them from generating revenue from advertising, for example.

The bill also aims to establish a system to combat “mirrors”, sites that help to facilitate access to platforms blocked as part of earlier enforcement actions. In addition, France wants to create a new mechanism to deal with piracy of live sporting events, one that is able to cope with the urgency associated with preventing access in real-time.

Modernization of Regulation

In 2019, France’s Ministry of Culture revealed early plans to create a powerful authority capable of regulating both audiovisual and digital communications by merging Hadopi with the country’s electronic media regulator. Those plans are moving ahead.

“To implement these new innovative and ambitious anti-piracy tools, the bill creates a new regulator, marking both the desire to move up a gear in the fight against pirate sites and to include this action in a broader policy of regulation of online content,” the Ministry notes.

The plan is to merge Hadopi with the Higher Audiovisual Council (CSA) to create the Audiovisual and Digital Communication Regulatory Authority (ARCOM), an agency with greater powers and jurisdiction over the entire field of audiovisual content, “whether that is to fight piracy, protect minors or defend the public against online disinformation and hatred.”

The bill will now be discussed by the French Parliament.

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

Popular CDN and DDoS protection service Cloudflare has come under a lot of pressure from copyright holders in recent years.

The company offers its services to millions of sites, some of which offer access to copyright-infringing material.

Cloudflare prefers to remain a neutral service provider and doesn’t terminate clients based on DMCA notices. Instead, it forwards these to its customers, only taking action when it receives a court order.

Repeat Infringer Lawsuit

This stance is not appreciated by all rightsholders and in 2018 the service was taken to court over the issue. The case wasn’t filed by major entertainment companies, but by two manufacturers and wholesalers of wedding dresses. Not a typical “piracy” lawsuit, but it’s a copyright case that could have broad implications.

In a complaint filed at a federal court in California , Mon Cheri Bridals and Maggie Sottero Designs argued that even after multiple warnings, Cloudflare fails to terminate sites operated by counterfeit vendors. This makes Cloudflare liable for the associated copyright infringements, they said.

Cloudflare disagreed and both sides are now conducting discovery to collect evidence for an eventual trial. Among other things, the wedding dress manufacturers were asked to hand over detailed sales records. In addition, the CDN provider is also interested in the companies’ DMCA takedown partner XMLShop LLC.

Cloudflare Wants DMCA Takedown Evidence

Over the past few months, Cloudflare has tried to get further information on how XMLShop, which is also known as Counterfeit Technology , collects evidence for its takedown notices.

These takedowns play a central role in the lawsuit and XMLShop and its employees could provide crucial information. Thus far, however, Cloudflare hasn’t been able to get what it wants.

To resolve this issue, Cloudflare submitted a motion asking the court to compel the DMCA takedown company to comply with its requests for information. According to their filing, the company may be holding back important evidence.

“Plaintiffs and XMLShop, who use the same counsel, appear to be using XMLShop’s status strategically as a ‘non-party’ to conceal relevant documents from Cloudflare. The Court should reject their gamesmanship,” Cloudflare informed the court.

After serving two subpoenas, the takedown company only produced one document, Cloudflare notes. Meanwhile, the publicly available information on the company is highly confusing or even misleading.

Who Works at XMLShop?

For example, Cloudflare would like to question XMLShop’s employees, but the company hasn’t handed over an employee directory or payroll log that would reveal who works at the company.

“XMLShop has not been forthright about its operations, leaving Cloudflare in the dark as to who else may be a witness with relevant knowledge,” Cloudflare writes.

According to XMLShop’s attorney, the company only has one employee named Suren Ter-Saakov, but this claim is contradicted by its own website and Linkedin.

“XMLShop’s own public statements contradict its counsel’s statement. Its website boasts ‘a big team of professionals working in three offices, located in Ukraine, the United States, and Dominican Republic.

“And a LinkedIn profile for an individual named Blair Hearnsberger represents that she or he is the CEO at Counterfeit Technology,” Cloudflare adds.

Fake Profile

According to the takedown company’s attorney, this profile is fake and Blair Hearnsberger does not actually exist, but Cloudflare is not convinced. Therefore, it hopes that the court will compel XMLShop to verify who works at the company and in what roles.

In addition to finding information on possible employees, Cloudflare also requests further information on the software that Counterfeit Technology used to find infringing content.

Special Takedown Bots?

The wedding dress manufacturers claimed that their takedown partner “scours the internet with special bots designed to locate and identify the unauthorized use” but it’s unclear how this technology works.

Cloudflare would like to assess the software to see how accurate it is, especially since the company states that it spends only 10 seconds sending notifications of claimed infringement to all traffic sources.

“Its use — and the reliability — of that technology is at least relevant to the predicate allegations of direct infringement it asserts. It is also relevant to Cloudflare’s contention that it never received any notifications of claimed infringement from Counterfeit Technology that were valid,” Cloudflare writes.

The CDN provider asked the court to compel XMLShop to produce the subpoenaed documents. In addition, XMLShop should be held in contempt for failing to obey the subpoena and ordered to pay the legal costs Cloudflare incurred to submit the motion.

This week, XMLShop responded to the request stating that it has already produced everything it could. It views the remaining requests as incredibly broad, since these ask for “sensitive” trade secret information. It is now up to the court to make a final decision.

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A copy of Cloudflare’s memorandum in support of its motion to compel XLMshop to comply with the subpoena is available here (pdf).

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

In summer of 2013, TorrentFreak learned that City of London Police had begin sending warning letters to torrent and streaming sites, advising them to shut down or face the consequences.

In December 2013, the launch of the Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit was officially announced, with the news that the unit had secured £2.56m in initial funding from the UK government’s Intellectual Property Office (IPO).

Just a few months later, PIPCU announced the creation of the “ Infringing Website List “, an official blacklist that is regularly used by advertisers in order to disrupt cash flow to allegedly infringing sites. Since then, PIPCU has been involved in dozens of operations against piracy, including modified set-top box and IPTV suppliers, plus counterfeiting operations. More recently, however, another player began making its presence known.

North West Regional Organised Crime Unit

Starting in 2019, the North West Regional Organised Crime Unit (NWROCU) began announcing actions against various entities involved in the Kodi add-on scene and the supply of pirate IPTV

It was fairly clear that NWROCU had become involved in PIPCU-type work and there is now official confirmation that the pair have teamed up to form a brand new police unit focussed on tackling intellectual property crime.

North West Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit

“The City of London Police, the lead force for fraud, has partnered with the Intellectual Property Office and the North West Regional Organised Crime Unit to set up the North West Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit,” City of London Police has now revealed.

“This is an extension of its intellectual property capability, based in the City, which is focussed on intellectual property crime, ranging from copyright offenses to fake goods.”

The unit (‘NWPIPCU’) will combat intellectual property crime in North West England, which has already seen fairly significant action against operators and other players in the pirate device and unlicensed IPTV markets. The unit says it will support existing partners in an effort to disrupt and prosecute existing and new offenders.

And work is already underway.

New Operation Targets IPTV Offenders

Following an investigation, NWPIPCU says that on Thursday March 4, it executed five warrants for IPTV offenses. This resulted in two arrests plus the seizure of electrical items, cash and counterfeit goods. While no further details have been revealed, actions of this type have become increasingly common in recent months.

Last June, Lancashire Police executed a search warrant at a house on Buckley Grove in the seaside resort of Lytham St Annes. Carried out under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, a 28-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of being involved in the supply of pirate IPTV services and illegal TV streaming devices. High-end cars, expensive jewelry and designer clothes were also seized.

In December, the Lancashire Police Cyber Crime Unit announced it would begin sending warning letters to around 7,000 users of the raided service, warning them that they should stop watching pirate services or face the possibility of prosecution.

NWPIPCU Launch Welcomed By PIPCU and NWROC

“The world of intellectual property crime is constantly evolving and the formation of the North West Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit clearly demonstrates that police, Government and industry are committed to protecting the UK from both established and emerging threats, many of which are now operating from online platforms,” says Superintendent Pete Ratcliffe at City of London Police.

“Intellectual property crime costs our economy hundreds of millions of pounds a year and threatens thousands of jobs. The unit has ongoing investigations with an estimated potential loss to industry of £2.3m. Through launching the NWPIPCU, we are sending out a clear warning to organized crime groups that IP crime won’t be tolerated.”

Superintendent Paul Denn of the North West Regional Organised Crime Unit warns that yesterday’s action against those involved in illicit IPTV represents just the start of a series of operations aimed at discovering the true scale of the IP crime problem in the North West.

The launch of the unit set to carry those out is welcomed by Intellectual Property Office CEO Time Moss.

“We are delighted to be further strengthening our partnership with City of London Police and building a new one with North West Regional Organised Crime Unit,” Moss says.

“Effective collaboration is vital for success in combatting IP crime. We are excited about the vital role the new IP crime hub will play in supporting the already impressive capability of this partnership, helping to reduce counterfeit goods and copyright offenses in the north west.”

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

In the wake of the RIAA’s effort to have ripping tool youtube-dl removed from Github , YouTube-ripping service Yout.com went on the offensive.

In a complaint filed at a Connecticut court, Yout argued that previous actions by the RIAA against its service, including the delisting of its homepage from Google based on the allegation that Yout circumvented YouTube’s ‘rolling cipher’ technology, were wrongful and damaged its business.

RIAA Fights Back

As reported in January, the RIAA presented a robust response in a motion to dismiss, noting that just because Yout had “figured out” how to defeat the YouTube rolling cipher, that did not make the Technological Protection Measure (TPM) any less eligible for protection under section 1201 versus one that could not be defeated.

“Plaintiff concedes that it ‘encounters’ the rolling cipher and then ‘reads and interprets the JavaScript program’ and ‘derives a signature value’ to access the file,” the RIAA wrote .

“The only reasonable inference to draw from those vague allegations is that the Yout service enables users to avoid or bypass that technological measure—that is the very definition of circumventing a TPM under section 1201.”

Furthermore, in response to Yout’s claims that the RIAA must’ve known that the service did not circumvent technical measures and therefore shouldn’t have filed DMCA notices against it, the RIAA pointed out that under 17 U.S.C. § 512(f) , only misrepresentations regarding alleged copyright infringement are available, not misrepresentations regarding alleged circumvention.

Yout’s Opposition to RIAA’s Motion to Dismiss

In Yout’s latest response, the stream-ripping service reiterates that it does not decrypt, bypass or avoid any measures on YouTube as the necessary information to access streams is freely available to anyone who seeks it. Yout describes that as essentially a “copy/paste” scenario, as provided for by any online content stream.

Yout’s Mere Use of the Signature Value Does Not Violate 17 USC §1201

The company says that the words “avoid” and “bypass” suggest ‘abuse’, countering that what its service actually does it ‘use’ a technological measure, which is an entirely different matter. Citing an earlier case involving DISH Network, Yout says that by utilizing the intended mechanism for decryption, no bypassing, avoidance or bypassing of a system took place.

“Here, the methodology employed by Yout is analogous. Yout utilizes the same signature value freely distributed by any video-sharing website, such as YouTube. This is the exact same signature value that appears to any web browser,” Yout’s response reads.

“Yout need not decrypt, bypass, or avoid anything as these signature values are freely given, and Yout uses the value, not in any cryptic way, but just as it is provided by any video-sharing website to anyone that requests it.

“Anyone can access and use the signature value of any free streaming content’s [sic] using only a browser, without other software, youtube-dl, the Yout service, or any similar tool,” Yout writes.

RIAA has not Identified any Copyrighted Works at Issue

Running with the claim that Yout does not circumvent any effective technological protection measure, the company says that the requirement that circumvention takes place without the permission of the copyright holder is not reached. However, the fact remains that the RIAA has failed to identify any copyrighted works that have allegedly been infringed.

“To prove a violation of § 1201, Defendant’s members must show not only circumvention but that the circumvention results in access to a copyrighted work. However, nothing in the RIAA’s notices references ownership of any specific copyrighted work purportedly protected by the rolling cipher,” Yout’s response reads.

Yout acknowledges that case law potentially raises complications but reminds the Court that the RIAA’s notices clearly accuse Yout of facilitating copyright infringement, specifically contributory copyright infringement. This leads Yout to raise the issue of misrepresentations in the RIAA’s DMCA notices and the music group’s claim that under 17 U.S.C. § 512(f), penalties are only available for misrepresentations regarding alleged copyright infringement.

Settlement Conference Has Been Scheduled

After Yout asked the Court to reject the RIAA’s motion to dismiss, United States Magistrate Judge Robert A. Richardson reported that a video settlement conference had been arranged for May 5, 2021, with both parties ordered to attend.

The Judge’s order requires Yout to have someone attend with full and final authority to dismiss the case with prejudice and to accept any settlement amount or offer. The RIAA must be represented by someone with the authority to commit to a settlement amount.

“The purpose of this requirement is to have in attendance a person with both the authority and independence to settle the case during the settlement conference without consulting anyone not present,” the order reads.

Not less than 14 days before the conference date, the parties are required to begin negotiating the terms of any settlement.

Yout’s Response to RIAA’s Motion to Dismiss / Conference Order here and here (pdf)

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

A group of connected movie production outfits, including Voltage Pictures and Millennium Funding, has pursued legal action against key piracy players in recent years.

The makers of films such as “Hunter Killer,” “Automata,” and “I Feel Pretty,” went after individual file-sharers, apps such as Popcorn Time and Showbox, and pirate sites including YTS.

This week, the movie companies expanded their efforts by going after a man and company associated with the VPN provider “LiquidVPN.”

Movie Companies Sue VPN Provider

Technically, VPNs are neutral services, much like regular ISPs. In most cases, this means they are not liable for the activities of their users. However, the movie companies argue that that logic doesn’t apply to LiquidVPN.

The complaint lists Michigan resident David Cox and his company SMR Hosting as the defendants. They allegedly operated LiquidVPN until early 2019, after which it was sold to the Puerto Rican company 1701 Management.

In addition to these ‘LiquidVPN defendants,’ as they are referred to, the complaint also lists 100 ‘Does’ who used the VPN service while downloading pirated films.

Update: The same movie companies have now filed a separate lawsuit (pdf) against 1701 Management and its sole shareholder Charles Muszynsky, which they say is the current owner of LiquidVPN. The allegations and demands virtually identical to the ones against the “LiquidVPN defendants,” which are detailed below.

In recent years we have seen several lawsuits against ISPs but, as far as we know, this is the first time a (former) VPN provider has been sued for copyright infringement in the US. The nature of the business is not the main concern, however.

According to the movie companies, the LiquidVPN defendants went further than simply offering a VPN service. They allegedly promoted and encouraged copyright infringement as well.

“Promoting Piracy”

“The LiquidVPN Defendants actively promote their LiquidVPN service for the purpose of movie piracy, including of infringing Plaintiffs’ Works,” they write.

These are serious allegations that are discussed in a lengthy court filing, with a myriad of arguments. Some are stronger than others, but the overall theme is that the VPN specifically appealed to a pirate audience.

For example, with regard to the piracy app Popcorn Time, LiquidVPN started stating that their VPN service could help avoid prison sentences and settlements.

“The LiquidVPN Defendants state their LiquidVPN service can be used to “Watch Popcorn Time without being detected by your ISP and P2P tracking software,” the complaint reads

“The LiquidVPN Defendants further state, ‘Experience everything Popcorn Time has to offer in the United States and the UK. Except the risks’, ‘Stream Content Anonymously. Why bother risking complaints from your ISP, settlement demands, threats and jail time for streaming your favorite TV show’.”

The complaint mentions a variety of other examples where the defendants directly or indirectly referenced copyright infringing activity. This includes a screenshot of Popcorn Time which shows the Millennium film Survivor.

In another example, it mentions that streaming media with Popcorn Time can result in a jail sentence, which can supposedly be avoided with a VPN.

“Avoid Jail Time”

“The LiquidVPN Defendants even blatantly promote their service to be used to stream copyright law [sic] in violation of criminal laws and encourage their users to do so,” the movie companies write in the complaint.

The reasoning is that these public statements ‘encouraged’ the “John Doe” defendants to use LiquidVPN to pirate movies. While the complaint only lists one IP-address, this could have been used by multiple users.

No Safe Harbor

In the US, online service providers can invoke safe harbor protections under certain conditions. However, the movie companies argue that this doesn’t apply to the LiquidVPN defendants, as they failed to terminate repeat infringers despite ample notification.

In addition, the company never had a registered DMCA agent, which is another requirement under the DMCA. On the contrary, LiquidVPN described itself as a DMCA-free zone.

“The LiquidVPN Defendants even promote the fact that their LiquidVPN is a ‘DMCA Free Zone’ as a positive aspect that makes them stand out from competing VPN providers.”

All in all, the movie companies accuse the defendants of contributory and vicarious copyright infringement, as well as various violations of the DMCA. As compensation, the filmmakers demand damages, which can go up to $150,000 per pirated title.

At this point, it’s worth repeating that the defendants – Mr. Cox and SMR Hosting – no longer operate LiquidVPN. This means that the accusations apply to past activities. Whether the movie companies will also sue the present owner is unknown. (update, as mentioned above, the alleged current owner 1701 Management is sued in a separate case)

Site Blocking and Port Blocking

This is particularly relevant when we look at the relief that’s requested. In addition to the damages, the movie companies also want the LiquidVPN defendants to take other actions. This includes terminating repeat infringers and blocking websites.

Specifically, they request an order requiring the defendants to “block subscribers from accessing notorious piracy websites,” to “block ports 6881-6889” which are often used for torrent traffic, and to adopt a policy that “provides for the prompt termination of subscribers that engage in repeat infringements.”

The list of sites to be blocked spans all sites that are covered in the USTR’s notorious markets report. This includes classic pirate sites such as YTS and The Pirate Bay, but also foreign e-commerce platforms such as Amazon.co.uk and Snapdeal.com, as well as the social media site VK.com.

It’s unclear to us how the defendants can comply if they no longer have control over LiquidVPN. However, it’s possible that SMR Hosting still works with the VPN company in some shape or form.

Needless to say, these allegations and requests are quite broad and have yet to be proven in court. It is just one side of the story and the defendants can share their position in court during the weeks to come.

Yesterday, the LiquidVPN website was offline for a few hours but it has come back since. TorrentFreak reached out to a contact who was involved with LiquidVPN at the relevant time but we have yet to hear back.

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A copy of the complaint, filed by Millennium Funding, Hunter Killer Productions and Voltage Holdings at the US District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan is available here (pdf)

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