Apple announced plans to retire iTunes at the company’s worldwide developer conference in San Jose, Calif. on Monday. The tech giant will replace its well-known media storefront and library with three distinct applications for music, podcasts, and television that will work on desktop and mobile. “The future of iTunes is not one app, but three,” Craig Federighi, Apple’s vice president of software engineering, told the crowd. iTunes launched in 2001 amid the rise of piracy and went on to become the dominant online music store during the mp3 era, but subscription-based streaming services like Spotify and Apple’s own Apple Music have recently supplanted the program as the primary way we listen to digital music. In turn, iTunes sales and downloads have declined in recent years. The new standalone Apple Music, Apple TV, and Apple Podcasts applications are expected to launch in September alongside a new iPhone. Readers can take comfort in knowing that you will still be able to store and organize local files in the new music app.

Actor Suriya and Selvaraghavan's maiden association, NGK – Nandha Gopala Krishnan had hit the screens on Friday. Touted to be a political thriller, the film features Rakul Preet Singh and Sai Pallavi in the lead roles. With the film is performing averagely at the box office and receiving mixed reviews from the audience and critics, the film has now become a victim of piracy. A clear print of the film has been released in just eight hours of its release by the notorious Tamil Rockers website. Prabhu Deva and Tamannaah starrer Devi 2 wasn't spared either. This isn’t the first time a new film has been picked by the portal. Vijay's Sarkar, Vijay Devarakonda's Taxiwaala, Venky's F2 were all leaked within hours of their release. And recently in Tamil, three new films were leaked within hours of thier release and they are Atharva’s Boomerang, Kathir’s Sathru and Bharath’s Pottu. The website had also leaked Rajinikanth’s 2.0 and Petta. It has turned out to be a major threat to the film industry putting out every brand new release for download. The General Secretary of the Nadigar Sangam and President of the Tamil Film Producers’ Council Vishal, who had promised to curb piracy in the film industry, has been working towards this goal right from the day he took over as the President of the TFPC. The producer council even came up with some stringent measures. The most important of it is that every theatre should have CCTV cameras installed at the earliest and the last deadline for it was November 15, 2018. Theatres with no CCTVs or with non-functional CCTVs are not allowed to screen new movies, according to the new rules. But none of his measures worked post which he said this can be eradicated only by the government. Recently he met Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, Edappadi Pazhanisamy requesting the government to take steps to bring down the Tamil Rockers website which has been putting up all the latest releases online. NGK, produced by SR Prakashbabu and SR Prabhu under the banner Dream Warrior Pictures, was made on a lavish budget. The film also stars Bala Singh, Ponvannan, Uma Padmanabhan and others play crucial supporting roles. The film had music by Yuvan Shankar Raja, cinematography by Sivakumar Vijayan and Praveen KL in charge of the editing.

For years DISH has gone after pirates who use boxes to access DISH signals without paying. Now it looks like through DISH’s NagraStar’s SatScams.com joint venture DISH is also going after people who stream DISH-owned content through IPTV services. Here is how SatScams.com describes what they do: “Welcome to SatScams.com. This site is provided by NagraStar to help educate and inform people about the civil and criminal actions taken by NagraStar and their partners, DISH Network and Bell TV. These actions are taken against those who try to obtain DISH Network or Bell programming in a fraudulent manner including, but not limited to, receiving programming without authorization by and payment to DISH Network and Bell TV; or illegally designing, manufacturing, marketing, selling, or using devices that could allow access to DISH Network or Bell TV satellite signals without authorization and payment.” From the looks of it, NagraStar seeks to educate people on the dangers of piracy and also acts as an enforcement group for DISH and Bell targeting both streaming pirates and people who use devices to access DISH and Bell signals without paying for them. In the past they mostly focused on people who pirated their satellite signal. Now they are also targeting subscribers who use IPTV services to stream content online. In the past most lawsuits targeting IPTV services have gone after the owners and people who sold the services. Now DISH is targeting people who paid for these services but didn’t run them. Here is one example of a story of an IPTV subscriber that was posted on NagraStar’s website recently: Hello. I heard about rocket IPTV and set about subscribing to it. I wasn’t positive it was illegal but I figured it probably was. I went ahead anyway as I had just been disabled and figured I’d have a lot of TV time ahead plus I was pretty broke. It was a bad, wrong idea and if I can pay my way out of this I’ll be glad again. Sadderbutwiser (and poorer!) Here is one more example of a subscriber who received a letter from DISH’s NagraStar: I made a mistake. Four years ago, I made a payment to a subscription [service] to watch TV channels. I thought I was not committing any crime. I was wrong. I was watching Dish Network channels including premium channels. I received a certified letter from NagraStar telling me to communicate with them. The staff explained to me very professionally the process to follow to solve the situation. I agreed to a payment plan with them to fulfill my responsibility for the mistake I made. What I have come up with is a lesson in life. I learned to be more cautious with the services they offer online. I recommend not subscribing to any illegal service online. If you have doubt about a service do not subscribe. The consequences are terrible. My recommendation for all the people who have received the letter is that they communicate with NagraStar and assume responsibility in good faith. It is not worth getting into legal lawsuits if an agreement can be reached. According to the NagraStar website they are willing to accept $3,500 from those who have purchased illegal content and $7,500 from those who sold it. The website does say they are open to lowering that settlement. “NagraStar also is open to negotiating the settlement amount. Piracy equipment such as set-top boxes and streaming devices can be sent in to lower the settlement amount. We also accept piracy forum credentials in the form of a username and password. If you are experiencing financial difficulties or hardships, our team will work with you to create a personalized monthly payment plan. Please don’t ignore the letter.” NagraStar does say if they do not hear back from a suspected pirate that they may refer them to their law firm for “litigation.” This is a massive shift in the world of piracy. Gone are the days of just worrying if your streaming piracy services will be shut down. Now you may face a legal notice with a demand for money or a potential lawsuit. In recent months several IPTV services have shut down. One of the larger ones was Vader, which promised hundreds of channels streamed online for a low monthly fee. NagraStar talks about Vader on their website and Vader’s claims that they will protect customer data. This raises the question about if NagraStar may have targeted Vader causing it to shut down. Have you received a letter from NagraStar? Send us a message. We would love to talk to you and will keep your comment anonymous.

Tamil film Kolaigaran starring Vijay Antony and Arjun Sarja leaked online for free HD downloading by notorious website Tamilrockers. The nail-biting thriller has opened up with positive reviews and is also one of the biggest movies of the year. Kollywood often gets affected by Tamilrockers and it has now got hard for them to escape from the piracy. The film’s box office collection might be affected by the leak. However, it is running successfully in the theatres. However, this is not the first time the Tamil film industry is hit by piracy. Earlier films such as Maharshi starring Mahesh Babu and Pooja Hegde, Sarkar, Kaala, Vishwaroopam 2, Lisaa, Sita And Neeya 2 was also hit by the piracy. Not only Tamil films but Bollywood and Hollywood films also get leaked by the piracy sites. Recently, Salman Khan’s Bharat and Sophie Turner starrer X-Men Dark Phoenix leaked online for free HD quality downloading within hours of its release. Despite strict actions taken by law enforcement agencies, Tamilrockers has been involved in the leaking of full movies online for a long time. This should be noted that watching a pirated version of the film leaked online only encourages such website incurring a loss to the entire team of the film. However, the government had on February 12 introduced a bill in Rajya Sabha to amend the Cinematograph Act and impose a strict penalty to combat the menace of film piracy. This should be noted that watching a pirated version of the film leaked online only encourages such website incurring a loss to the entire team of the film.

Tom Keaveny, the managing director of beIN MENA, tells World Screen about the threat that the piracy platform beoutQ poses to the global media and entertainment industry. Since it first popped up in the Middle East in 2017, beoutQ has emerged as one of the most prolific, extensive piracy platforms in the world today. For an annual subscription price of about $100 (varying by market and often cheaper), the beoutQ box offers up, over a mix of satellite and live streaming, virtually every major channel across the globe—broadcast, basic cable and premium—live sports events, 10,000-plus on-demand movies and more than 35,000 TV episodes. The content rights holders certainly aren’t being compensated; indeed, beIN Media Group labels it as “industrial-scale theft of world sports and entertainment.” beIN Media Group was beoutQ’s first target, but the Qatar-based company is sending a message to the global media economy that it’s not the only one being affected—and that it can’t fight the battle on its own. “There are two big misconceptions,” says Keaveny. “One is that it’s a Middle Eastern problem; it’s not. The IPTV element to the box is everywhere and has every single channel you can think of, sports and entertainment. And the second misconception is that it’s political, Saudis against Qatar. It had its roots in that dispute but is now affecting rights holders across the world. It’s pure and simple commercial theft of content. So when anyone says to us now, from a rights holders perspective, Oh we don’t want to get involved in politics. We say to them, that’s not acceptable, this is theft.” The beoutQ story began in the months following the blockade against Qatar by a group of Middle Eastern countries, including Saudi Arabia. Once the embargo started, viewers in Saudi Arabia no longer had access to beIN Media’s channels, with the broadcaster kicked out of the country overnight. At the same time, news emerged that Saudi Arabia was launching a new sports service, PBS Sports. That platform never came to fruition. “What did materialize was beoutQ, basically a hybrid, in logo form, of beIN and PBS Sports,” Keaveny says. “beoutQ was launched as a streaming website and quickly morphed into an encrypted, ten-channel, satellite pirate TV operation. Those ten channels were taking the live feeds of beIN and other broadcasters. There’s a seven-second delay. In those seven seconds, beoutQ’s logo is imprinted on top of ours in the top right-hand corner. Occasionally their own commentary is inserted. They have their own advertising breaks. They sell that space. If we make an announcement about beoutQ during intervals, they’ll cut to something else. Every major sports event for the past two years has been stolen—from the Super Bowl to NBA games to FIFA, UEFA, every single game of the World Cup, the Asian Cup, Wimbledon, Roland-Garros, Formula 1. Every sport you can think of has been distributed on the ten live encrypted channels, which in turn are distributed over Arabsat, a regional Saudi-headquartered and owned satellite provider.” For its part, Arabsat has publicly denied that its frequencies are being used by beoutQ, despite, beIN says, “beoutQ openly advertising on its Facebook and other social channels the specific Arabsat frequencies to receive its service.” Soon, beoutQ was selling its own branded set-top boxes featuring the ten pirated channels plus what Keaveny describes as a “bespoke app store” that serves as a gateway to the global content landscape. “You can access everything from HBO to FOX, every entertainment channel you can think of, Netflix, all the sports channels, the latest blockbuster films, almost the day they are in the cinemas.” The boxes are available across the Middle East and North Africa, but, Keaveny notes, they are spreading further afield. “These boxes are appearing in Florida, in Geneva, in London, any major city—it’s a contagion.” The extent of the offering is shocking, with channels organized by country (U.S., U.K., France, Turkey, the Netherlands, etc.) and even multiple feeds of premium channel bouquets like HBO and Starz (East and West Coast versions), per a video demonstration of the box supplied to World Screen by beIN. beIN is using a variety of approaches to battle beoutQ, including launching a $1 billion international investment arbitration suit against Saudi Arabia (which has denied that it is backing beoutQ). Per beIN, $1 billion is an estimation of lost revenues simply for a six-month period in this now two-year-long saga. Separately, Qatar has launched a complaint against Saudi Arabia with the World Trade Organization. A variety of sports bodies, including FIFA, UEFA, Premier League, La Liga and Bundesliga, have denounced beoutQ and some are taking legal action. The problem with working through the courts, however, is time. “Fundamentally, the limitation of legal action is it takes many, many years,” notes David Sugden, the director of corporate affairs and communications at beIN. “The commercial rights that are being stolen are measured in seconds and minutes, not years—the length of a soccer game, a tennis match or a movie. The solution from a technology point of view is also very challenging because if you have a satellite stationed many miles above the Earth beaming the feed to set-top boxes, it’s very hard to disrupt the service if the satellite provider refuses to turn off the feed and adhere to international law.” Not that beIN is neglecting tech initiatives. “We are trying to maintain the integrity of our platform through the use of technology,” Keaveny stresses. “And our spend in technology has gone up into the tens of millions.” The company has also stepped up its political lobbying and awareness-raising initiatives. To that end, beIN has been meeting with ambassadors from around the world, the policy advisors to a range of U.S. politicians and working with trade bodies like the Motion Picture Association and the Asia Video Industry Association. In January, beIN launched beoutq.tv, a website detailing what it refers to as “Saudi state-supported piracy of world sport and entertainment.” While the sports world has been vocal, Keaveny argues that the response from the broader entertainment landscape has been insufficient. The BBC and Sky in the U.K. have called on the European Commission to crack down on beoutQ, and more recently, demands were made by British Parliament members for the U.K. government to take action against Saudi Arabia. Meanwhile, the U.S. Trade Representative placed Saudi Arabia on its priority watch list for failing to protect intellectual property in its 2019 Special 301 Report. “Saudi Arabia has not taken action against the rampant satellite and online piracy made available by illicit pirate service beoutQ,” the report says. “While Saudi officials have confirmed the illegal nature of beoutQ’s activities and claim to be addressing this issue by seizing beoutQ set-top boxes, such devices nevertheless continue to be widely available and are generally unregulated in Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia also has not taken sufficient steps to address the purported role of Arabsat in facilitating beoutQ’s piracy activities.” “There’s going to be a financial implication with all of this,” Keaveny says on why content companies, trade bodies and governments need to step up their efforts against beoutQ. “This is a negative multiplier. Less money going into [the industry], fewer taxes being paid, it’s hitting company profits, it’s hitting GDP.” Asked for comment, the Motion Picture Association (MPA) says it takes the beoutQ problem “very seriously,” Stan McCoy, president and managing director for Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA), tells World Screen. “Consumers love the choice and convenience of official TV and film digital services and apps. One reason why piracy devices and apps are so insidious is because many present themselves as legitimate, easy-to-use offerings with names that imitate genuine services. beoutQ exemplifies that. The beoutQ device and services infringe the rights of companies that invest in high-quality sports and entertainment content, undermining the growing legitimate Middle East marketplace and causing damages to content creators and the hardworking people in the creative sector. Reducing this kind of piracy requires a comprehensive approach, from expanding access to legal content services to enforcing the rule of law to hold pirate operators and organizations accountable. We therefore welcome the recognition of beoutQ as a key example of ISD [illicit streaming device] piracy in the recently published USTR 2018 Notorious Markets report.” beIN itself has had to change its approach to licensing expensive sports rights, opting not to renew its Formula 1 agreement this year. “People’s responsiveness and respect of their own IP is a definite factor when we renew our deals,” Keaveny says. “Saudi Arabia’s beoutQ has poured petrol on the world’s broadcast piracy problem and, if it is not stopped now, the economics of the sports and entertainment industry will never be the same again.”

New deal will help keep unauthorized music off Spotify, Apple Music and other streaming services. DistroKid, the digital distribution service that allows artists to upload their music across a variety of digital platforms, is making moves to combat the uploading of stolen content to Spotify, Apple Music and other services through a new strategic partnership with content recognition company Audible Magic. The partnership, announced on Wednesday (June 12), comes as a slew of bold-faced artists -- including Beyonce, SZA and Rihanna -- have seen their unreleased music uploaded to streaming services under fraudulent names. Most recently, a snippet of a leaked Playboi Carti song entitled "Kid Cudi" (retitled "Kid Carti") was uploaded to Spotify -- via DistroKid -- under the fake name Lil Kambo. The track eventually reached No. 1 on Spotify’s US Viral Top 50 chart before seemingly being removed, though it remains hidden in a playlist on the service and is now readily available on YouTube. Under the partnership, artists who upload song files via DistroKid will now have those files cross-checked for authenticity by Audible Magic’s RightsRxTM solution, which boasts access to a registry of over 20 million media assets. Additionally, DistroKid will become the first distributor to utilize Audible Magic’s Broad Spectrum, an extension of the company’s ContentID service that can "uniquely identify extreme manipulations of rate, pitch and tempo using only small clips of audio." "In this day and age, it’s imperative for artists everywhere to register their content to not only claim ownership, avoiding impersonators, but to also ensure that they are being accurately credited and compensated," said Audible Magic president and CEO Vance Ikezoye in a statement announcing the partnership. "DistroKid has a positive reputation amongst artists for making distribution fast, reliable and easy. This partnership signals our joint commitment to an industry working towards clean data, proper rights management and improved artist attribution." The Spotify logo displayed on the screen of an iPhone. READ MORE Spotify Enlists DistroKid to Help Enhance Its Direct Upload Feature In the press release announcing the partnership, DistroKid also revealed a new, free resource entitled DistroLock that allows any artist to upload and register their unreleased tracks to the service, which are then encoded with a unique audio fingerprint and added to Audible Magic’s registry. The resource, which DistroKid developed with insights from Audible Magic, is described as "an industry-wide solution" designed to block unauthorized music from appearing on streaming services and social platforms. DistroLock additionally includes an API that will allow other distributors and streaming platforms to validate the authenticity of music uploaded to their own platforms. "Until now, there hasn’t been a definitive way for artists to say, 'this is my audio, don't let anyone else release it,'" said DistroKid CEO Philip Kaplan. "With the launch of DistroLock, any musician can preemptively register their audio to help ensure that unauthorized releases don’t see the light of day. This partnership with Audible Magic and the creation of DistroLock will help artists by ensuring that their original content is uploaded and distributed fairly, with accuracy and speed." DistroKid was founded in 2013 and is now used by over 40,000 artists including 21 Savage, Ludacris, Will Smith and Tom Waits. They offer services including distribution, monetization, metadata customization, storage and promotion. Audible Magic’s other clients include Facebook, TikTok, Soundcloud, NBCUniversal, CD Baby, Twitch and Twitter. The company was founded in 1999.

European movie technology company Motion will be in Shanghai from this week seeking investors and content partners for its online distribution tool. The company positions itself as enabling paid-for peer-to-peer streaming, by connecting movie producers and sales agents directly with their audience. Backed by a trio of companies — Cinemarket, White Rabbit and LeapDAO – it launched in Cannes last month. The company is currently attempting to raise EUR1 million in a funding round that will close at the end of June. It says it has over EUR500,000 of financial commitments. French production companies Haut et Court, Elzevir and Le Bureau “have invested their library and have committed to investing cash,” Motion told Variety. “It’s important for us that the film industry owns the technology and is represented on the board of Motion.” Motion says it is significantly different from the rights trading platforms and streaming services, such as TRX, BidSlate and FilmHub that have emerged in the past couple of years to address the independent film sector. “We are not another platform, but rather a tool, a browser plug-in. The user only needs to install the Motion plug-in. Then when users stream peer-to-peer content, we facilitate a direct payment from them to the rights holders in under three seconds,” the company said. It is also available as an app that can be downloaded to a user’s smartphone. RELATED Cannes and Shanghai Film Festivals Bridge Cultural Differences Shanghai Film Festival Abruptly Pulls Opening Film 'The Eight Hundred' “The plug-in is a tool which can go with any platform or streaming site. Users can choose their favorite P2P sites and stream however they want, from wherever they have the films or the user experience they prefer. The plug-in sorts out the rest.” Motion uses Ethereum blockchain-enabled technology for micro-payments. Anne-Spohie Lehec, former head of sales for Hong Kong-based Asian Shadows and previously head of festivals partnerships at MUBI.com, will be in Shanghai representing the company. In Cannes, co-founder Florian Glatz presented the technology from a legal perspective, illustrating how IP rights can be better protected and exploited via blockchain. The company contends that many people who use piracy services to view content are simply frustrated fans without a legal means to pay. But Motion also positions itself and the peer to peer streaming market as a rival to the world’s global streaming giants. China has three of the largest streaming platforms, accounting for 60% of global streaming subscribers according to a recent study, as well as a host of fast-growing specialty streamers that are emerging in specific areas such as games streaming, short-form video, and which cross-over into social media. “Peer-to-peer is a potential 10x larger market than Netflix – and it will be in the hands of content creators, not Silicon Valley,” said co-CEO and film producer Alan R. Milligan. “Tech companies have taken advantage of our content and put themselves in a dominant position for digital distribution and recently, production. It’s time the film industry owns the tech, and ensures that its used to our advantage, rather than being subject to tech companies pushing the film industry aside. Not only will the film industry become shareholders, they will also be actively taking part in our development and on our board.” Berlin-based Motion is currently developing the Beta version of its ecosystem, with plans to launch it in test markets in January 2020. Results are planned to be presented at the next Cannes film festival, May 2020 and in Shanghai in June 2020. Founded by Milligan, White Rabbit is a company seeking to professionalize the peer-to-peer market, collect data and revenue for rights holders. Cinemarket is a services company specializing in copyright management and licensing for the consolidation of film and video catalogs. It was created by French film writer and director Adrian Lugol and German lawyer Glatz. LeapDAO (formerly PARSEC Labs), was created by Johann Barbie and pitches itself as “the first ever decentralized adaptive organization.”

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The growth of pirated traffic on the internet in Russia now stands at 10%, according to Group-IB CEO Ilya Sachkov, speaking last week at the St Petersburg International Economic Forum and quoted by Comnews. This compared to 12% in 2018 and up to 20% in previous years. Meanwhile, Alexander Zharov, head of Roskomnadzor, said that 330,000 piracy links have so far been removed from the search engine Yandex. Furthermore, legal traffic to online movies has quadrupled since the signing of an anti-piracy memorandum last November.

What do “elite upcoming lawyers from around the world” really think about file-sharing and copyright? A new study based on a survey of international LL.M. (Masters of Law) students at Harvard University has been trying to find out. “We expected lawyers to take highly conservative ethical positions on the issue of online copyright infringement,” wrote the study’s authors. “This hypothesis is strongly rejected by our data. We find that digital file sharing ranks relatively high in terms of ethical acceptability among our population of lawyers – with the only notable exception being infringing copyright with a commercial purpose. Moving away from the previous focus on laymen and undergraduate students, it therefore appears that the lawyers themselves perceive file sharing practices as ethically acceptable, as long as individuals do not derive monetary benefits from them.” The caveat, which to be fair is made clear in the study too: “Only 37% of our respondents rated their expertise in copyright law as greater of equal to 3, out of a 5 points scale. Therefore, while our all of our respondents can be described as highly qualified lawyers, not all of them are copyright experts.”

A study conducted among Harvard-educated lawyers by Professor Dariusz Jemielniak revealed a casual attitude towards copyright theft. The paper — published in The Information Society journal — polled perceptions of 100 international Masters of Law students at Harvard. The respondents were asked to evaluate how acceptable they found several piracy scenarios. The piracy scenarios presented ranged from downloading a TV show or movie that isn’t legally available to pirating music to save money. Nineteen different alternatives described situations in which piracy could occur. Researchers expected the lawyers to have conservative ethical opinions when presented, but the opposite proved true. Most respondents leaned toward the acceptable point of the scale for each piracy situation, meaning they felt most actions were acceptable behavior. Researchers concluded that digital file sharing ranked high in terms of ethical acceptability among its survey population of lawyers. Drilling down and looking at the results of the survey reveals that not all types of piracy were treated as ethically equal, however. Pirating content because it is not available legally was given the highest score for acceptability. Pirating due to lack of financial resources was the next form of piracy with the highest acceptability score. Piracy for educational purposes also received high ethically acceptable marks. Once downloading copyrighted material for commercial purposes emerged, the ethical acceptance of piracy began to fade. Pirating to avoid payment or subscription service also ended up on the unacceptable side of the scale. Another interesting point in the study is the difference between the lawyers surveyed. Those who work in the public sector, or planned to work in the public sector, were more tolerant of copyright infringement. Lawyers in the private sector were less tolerant of the practice. MORE NEWS: The RIAA, Music Canada, and IFPI Successfully Shut Down Pirate Cyberlocker DBR It’s important to note that lawyers who participated in the survey were not all experts in copyright law. However, the study illustrates that there is a clear divide between the law and what legal scholars believe is ethically acceptable.

Scores of Indian Game of Thrones (GoT) fans woke up at 6.30am today (April 15) to catch the first episode of the final season of the show. But instead of logging into the HBO’s official streaming partner Hotstar, many frantically looked up free alternatives. Between 5am and 9am, Google Trends clocked more interest in the related topic “Torrent file” than “Hotstar” in India. GOOGLE TRENDS/SCREENSHOT GoT related searches. The top ten rising related queries—searches with the biggest increase in frequency—were for specific torrent sites like DIRECTV (and its misspelling “direct tv”), ETTV, and MkvCage, or more generic searches for torrent downloads. Related queries Rising interest 1. direct tv +800% 2. ettv +700% 3. directv +700% 4. directv now +600% 5. game of thrones s08e01 +500% 6. game.of.thrones.s08e1 download +500% 7. game of thrones season 8 torrent +500% 8. game of thrones season 8 episode 1 torrent download +500% 9. mkvcage +450% 10. gameofthrones s08e01 torrent +450% The hunt for Game of Thrones latest season on torrent sites is unsurprising. After all, it is the world’s most pirated show. In 2017, four Indians were even arrested for leaking episodes of the show before it aired. The demand for the torrent sites was also all about GoT today. GOOGLE TRENDS/SCREENSHOT “Direct tv” trends on Google. GOOGLE TRENDS/SCREENSHOT ETTV trends on Google. GOOGLE TRENDS/SCREENSHOT MkvCage trends on Google. GOOGLE TRENDS/SCREENSHOT “Directv” trends on Google. Indians who’re eager to get their hands on the first episode through illicit routes, as soon as it airs, should have bigger concerns than just fighting spoilers. GoT tops the list of pirated shows with malware, according to the cybersecurity firm Kaspersky Labs. “Game of Thrones accounted for 17% of all the infected pirated content in 2018, with 20,934 users attacked, despite being the only TV show in the list that didn’t have new episodes released (that year),” the Moscow-based firm’s recent research revealed. The first and last episodes are especially plagued with malware. “Winter Is Coming,” the very first episode of the show, was the one most actively used by cybercriminals. Released nearly eight years ago, the question is, does the latest episode “Winterfell” face a bigger threat?

Tamil Rockers is at it again. The piracy website has been responsible for leaking some of the most awaited films of this year, including the likes of Uri: The Surgical Strike, Kesari, Manikarnika: The Queen of Jhansi, and many others for that matter. And now, the website has leaked Sophie Turner starrer superhero film, X Men: Dark Phoenix. The movie did not have a very grand opening in the Indian markets, however, this leak is only going to affect the numbers even more. More recently, the website also managed to leak Salman Khan and Katrina Kaif's Bharat, however, the movie did make its own record-breaking numbers and has managed to stay put, inching super close to the 100 crore mark. However, with this leak, it is only worrying how piracy is on the increase despite the protocols and methods that have been taken by the governments. While it is true that the South film industry has been the one to be the most affected by the piracy websites, even a blocking of 12,000 plus websites over time hasn't led to the curbing of film's getting leaked online. (ALSO READ: Bharat Movie Leaks Online: Salman Khan & Katrina Kaif starrer falls prey to piracy website Tamilrockers) Meanwhile, Sophie was quite upbeat about the film's release and being a part of it, and she was quoted as saying, "I was quite nervous. I mean, in 'X-Men: Apocalypse' I didn't really have a crazy amount to work with. I had a little bit of the character. And so, I wasn't prepared when (director) Simon Kinberg told me. But I read the script and it was a delicious five-course meal for an actor."

NEW DELHI: The Delhi high court has banned around 30 torrent sites from using content that violate the copyright of film production companies such as Twentieth Century Fox and UTV Software Communication Ltd. The court has banned these sites from hosting, streaming, reproducing or distributing such content, including movies, music and shows. “This court is of the view that since website blocking is a cumbersome exercise and majority of the viewers/subscribers who access, view and download infringing content are youngsters who do not have knowledge that the said content is infringing and/or pirated, it directs the MEITY/DOT to explore the possibility of framing a policy, under which a warning is issued to the viewers of the infringing content...and cautioning the viewers to cease viewing/downloading the infringing material," Justice Manmohan said in his order dated 10 April. “In the event the warning is not heeded to and the viewers/subscribers continue to view, access or download the infringing/pirated content, then a fine could be levied on the viewers/subscribers," he added. The Delhi high court said the websites and their owners, partners, proprietors, officers, employees and all agents acting for or on their behalf should be permanently restrained from hosting, streaming, reproducing or distributing any cinematograph work or content having copyright. It also directed internet service providers, such as Bharti Airtel, Reliance Jio and MTNL, and the department of telecommunication (DoT) and the ministry of electronics and information technology (MeitY) to issue a notification to telecom service providers to block access to the sites. In its order, the court also said that “mirror", or “hydra headed" websites, floated by rogue websites to provide the same content, should also be blocked to check piracy. To deal with this problem of “hydra headed websites; the plaintiffs shall file an affidavit confirming that the newly added website is a mirror/redirect/alphanumeric website with sufficient supporting evidence and an application under Order 1 Rule 10 to be impleaded as a party. On being satisfied that the impugned website is indeed a mirror/redirect/alphanumeric website of a Rogue Website(s) and merely provides new means of accessing the same primary infringing website, the Joint Registrar shall issue directions to ISPs to disable access in India to such mirror/redirect/alphanumeric websites in terms of the orders passed. The court said that a rogue website involved in streaming illicit or infringing material, should be examined with a “qualitative approach and not a quantitative one". It added that a website should not be judged on the “percentage of legitimate content", but on whether “the primary purpose of the website is to commit or facilitate copyright infringement", besides its “silence or inaction after the receipt of take down notices pertaining to copyright infringement". UTV Communications and Twentieth Century Fox had moved court seeking directions to ban torrent websites, such as RARBG, YTS, ExtraTorrent and Pirate Bay, which were involved in streaming pirated versions of original content produced by them.

The full movie of TN Krishna's Hippi starring Karthikeya and Digangana was allegedly leaked on torrent sites of its opening day. Its free download is likely to take a toll on its collection at the box office. Hippi has become the victim of piracy, even before its afternoon show on the first day completed. A notorious gang allegedly recorded the full movie during its screening in cinema halls and released it on its website, which offers seven prints of the full movie ranging between 2.1 GB and 200 MB for free download. Hippi is a romantic comedy movie, which is about Devadas (Karthikeya), who is in a relationship with Sneha, but falls for her close friend Amuktamalyada (Digangana), He breaks up with Sneha in a bid to have a live-in relationship with Amuktamalyada. What happens next forms the crux of the story. Karthikeya and Digangana in Hippi Karthikeya and Digangana in HippiTwitter Hippi has been written and directed by TN Krishna and produced by Kalaipuli S Thanu under his production banner V Creations. Karthikeya Reddy Gummakonda and Digangana Suryavanshi have played the lead roles, while JD Chakravarthy, MD ASIF, Jazba Singh, Vennela Kishore and Shraddha Das appeared in other important roles of the movie. Hippi is a small budget movie, as it features less popular actors. But the makers have spent generously on its production and promotion. Its promos had grabbed many eyeballs and generated a lot of curiosity about the film before its release. But the movie has received a mixed response from the audience and critics. Karthikeya and Digangana in Hippi Karthikeya and Digangana in HippiTwitter However, Hippi is clashing with the Telugu version of Salman Khan's Bharat, Seven and Killer at the box office. This clash coupled with the mixed talk might take a toll on its collection at the box office. The filmgoers, who can't afford time and money for all these films, may opt to download its pirated copy. Thus, full movie download will dig a hole in the pockets of its distributors. We at International Business Times, India, are strictly against piracy of any film and we condemn people who support it. We always stand by the film industry which has suffered huge losses due to piracy. We also request you to join us in the fight against piracy. Say no to piracy and encourage filmmakers by watching films in cinema halls.

The federal government has amended Canada's Copyright Act to clarify that piracy notices sent to Canadians can't demand cash. (CBC) 477 comments Close to four years after its piracy-notice system took effect, the federal government has amended the rules to clarify that the notices can't demand cash from Canadians. Implemented in 2015, Canada's notice system enables copyright holders to send warning emails to people suspected of illegally downloading content such as movies or music. Since its inception, critics have loudly complained that some notices crossed a line by threatening legal action if the recipient didn't pay a settlement fee — often hundreds of dollars. Recipients of such notices also loudly complained, including 89-year-old grandmother Christine McMillan in Toronto. In 2016, she received a notice demanding money for something she says she never did — illegally download a shoot 'em up video game. "I was really angry," she said. "This is a scam that's being perpetrated by the government." Christine McMillan received a piracy notice accusing her of illegally downloading a video game and asking for a settlement fee. (CBC) The government has now clarified the rules with new amendments to Canada's Copyright Act. They state that piracy notices can't ask for personal information or a payment including a settlement fee. "Our amendments to the regime will protect consumers," Hans Parmar, spokesperson for Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada, said in an email. However, some internet service providers (ISPs) claim the amendments don't go far enough. GO PUBLIC'Shocked' grandmother on hook for illegal mutant game download Rights holders don't know their suspect's actual identity, only the IP address linked to the illegal download. While ISPs won't disclose the identity of a customer behind the IP address, they're obligated by law to forward that customer any piracy notices. To cope with the flood of notices they must pass on, ISPs largely rely on automated systems, which means ones demanding cash could still slip through. "The immediate onus is on ISPs to either search for or find some way to filter for these settlement demands, which is, I think, not really possible," said Andy Kaplan-Myrth, vice-president of regulatory and carrier affairs for internet provider TekSavvy. Some have paid up Canada's notice system was created to discourage piracy, not collect cash. But that didn't stop some content creators from sending notices demanding money plus a link to a website where people could pay by credit card. A compliant recipient not only paid a fine they weren't obligated to pay, but also exposed their identity. "It's just not good for customers to be getting misleading information and misleading links and we don't want any part of it," said Kaplan-Myrth. McMillan watches a video trailer for Metro 2033, an apocalyptic first-person shooter video game she is accused of illegally downloading. (CBC) In McMillan's case, she was told if she didn't pay a fee, she could face legal fines of up to $5,000. She chose to ignore her notice. But others have complied, including a 60-year-old woman who claimed she was falsely accused of illegally downloading porn and, out of fear, paid a settlement fee of $257.40. Her notice, along with McMillan's, were sent by Canadian anti-piracy company Canipre on behalf of rights holders. Canipre says it didn't break any rules by asking for fees and that its goal was simply to educate abusers and deter them from reoffending. "When you have to pay something out of your pocket, it hurts," said Barry Logan, Canipre's managing director. "It's a deterrent." 'Terrified' 60-year-old woman told to pay up for illegally downloading porn 'A shakedown against Canadians': Hollywood still telling internet pirates to pay up Logan said his company wasn't out to make money or collect personal data from alleged pirates. "There was a myth out there, that, 'Don't contact them, they track you.' No. Come on. This isn't the KGB." Logan declined to say how much money Canipre has collected in fees and said the company stopped sending these types of notices in early 2018, due to concerns expressed by the government. He said he's not disappointed by the new amendments because Canipre's notices requesting fees achieved its goal by educating people about the repercussions of piracy. "We got through to a few people. I know we did." 'Millions of notices' Canipre said it has stopped sending requests for cash, but some major ISPs fear the new amendments may not be enough to stop a company that defies the rules. In a recent submission to the government's standing committee on industry, science and technology, a group involving six major ISPs including Bell, Rogers and Telus, asked for additional amendments to toughen up the government's rules. The group, which calls itself Business Coalition for Balanced Copyright (BCBC), said internet providers now must weed out settlement fee notices — an imperfect plan considering they deal with "millions of notices per month." BCBC recommends the government also mandate a standardized piracy notice that senders must adhere to, which would help eliminate the risk of non-compliant notices slipping through. Andy Kaplan-Myrth with TekSavvy voiced his concerns about notices requesting settlement fees before a government committee in September. (Canadian Government) TekSavvy isn't a member of BCBC, but agrees with the plan. "The change that should have come sort of hand in hand with this new addition is some kind of standard form," said Kaplan-Myrth. Even Canipre's Logan said he's fine with a standardized notice format — as long as it can still contain information about the legal ramifications for illegally downloading content. Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada said that the concerns raised by ISPs will be explored during the government's current review of the Copyright Act.

In the seemingly endless battle against live–sports-video piracy, it’s understood that there is no magic bullet and that, in many ways, the pirates tend to stay a step ahead of the general-media industry. However, there has been tangible progress in the overall crackdown on piracy of streaming sports video in recent years. Much of that is thanks to league investment in technology to keep up. Piracy is especially rampant when it comes to soccer, and major leagues across Europe have made fighting piracy a top priority. By working with lawmakers and investing in technology to track and shut down illegal streams, some organizations have even, in some cases, hired their own “pirates” to quash piracy in real time. “We are heavy investors in technology, and technology is both friend and foe in this space,” Arne Rees, EVP, strategy, Bundesliga in Germany, said during the Sports Anti-Piracy Summit last month in Mexico City. “I’ve always felt there’s a certain maturity about innovation. It’s something you experiment with, but you learn with these things very fast that it isn’t just adventurous. These are must-haves: if you don’t do them, you get left behind. We really have no choice but to embrace technology.” Rees acknowledged that, with technology, the challenge is that pirates possess the ability to stay one step ahead and leagues largely play catch-up. In this digital age, with fans wanting to access live sports right away, it’s more about finding the most easily accessible stream. In such cases, an elite streaming product that your best fans will want and appreciate is often the best solution. “One of the best defenses against this is certainly having legal product everywhere,” Rees noted. “If a fan simply can’t get you, their mind-set is, I want to watch it, and, if only a pirated stream is available, they will justify that. At the very least. we have to create an environment where legal product competes with the illegal product. The legal product will always be the better product.” Many major soccer entities across Europe are also working directly with internet providers to nip piracy in the bud as efficiently as possible. Unlike in the world of pirated music, movies, or television, the value of a sports event has a very small window. Sports doesn’t have the luxury of taking weeks to eliminate a pirate. This war is waged in real time. “When you try to identify the most successful countries and systems to fight piracy,” said Julien Taieb, head of legal and public affairs, LFP in France, “you see, for example, in Portugal and the UK, a system where the ISPs and the rightsholders and the broadcasters work together and trust each other. The rightsholders update a list of IP addresses that they share with the ISPs and ask them to block access to content on illegal websites in a very swift way. The mainstream public does not access the matches too easily. We know we will never beat the pirates. It’s not about that. It’s really about making sure the mainstream audience still feels compelled to buy a subscription.” Collaboration is critical. Using the law can be challenging, because most governing bodies move too slowly to have any real effect in keeping up with pirates. Also, given the global nature of soccer, getting consistency across numerous countries is virtually impossible. As Rees pointed out, the Bundesliga is broadcast in more than 200 countries across the world. There will never be uniform legislation regarding intellectual-property rights across all those governments. “Piracy is a very common and global problem,” said Seong Sin Han, head of marketing, legal services, UEFA. “It’s an issue that we all face. It doesn’t matter if it’s Liga MX or UEFA; the problem is the same. Ultimately, the pirates are going to be technologically ahead of where we are. The legal framework does not provide the tools or the power to actually prevent what is being done, not in any relevant time frame. There’s variation from one country to the next, but none of them has the perfect solution. Tools are very local in blocking off servers at the ISP level. UEFA, in the past two years, has taken out a court order in the UK to force ISPs to block servers live as we detect them: we find this server right now; please block it right now. It’s not the choice of the ISPs. That’s the benefit of a court order: they have to do it.” At the end of the day, there are four major players in this effort: content owners, broadcasters, ISPs, and the pirates. Can the first three find common ground to work together for the good of the entire industry? “Of those four, three are legitimate, and one is not,” says Sin Han. “The three legitimate entities have to work together. Ultimately, in the long term, if the piracy problem continues, then it’s a problem for all of us.”

Given the ubiquity of available content and ease of access which many of us now have to music and video in 2019, analysts had predicted that the streaming age would all but eradicate piracy. This hasn't quite panned out however, according to a new study out of New Zealand, although not for the reasons you might think. _______________________________ Guest post by James Shotwell of Haulix Piracy was supposed to end with the dawn of streaming. Entertainment analysts predicted that having the vast majority of movies, music, and television a few clicks away at any moment would remove any need for digital piracy. After all, who doesn’t have a Netflix and Spotify (or similar subscription services) account in 2019? The solution to piracy was never as simple as people like to believe. Studies show that streaming has changed consumer behaviors, but as more services become available with exclusive content from major stars, a new issue is emerging. Paying for Netflix and Spotify here in the United States will set people back about $25 a month. For some, that figure is not a problem, but others cannot afford it. Add to this, the rising popularity of Hulu ($10 a month), Amazon Prime Video ($8.99), HBOGo ($10), and DC Universe ($7.99), as well as upcoming streaming services from companies like Disney (likely to cost $10 or more per month), and the price associated with seeing everything is getting pretty high. Work-933061_1280That figure is so high, in fact, that many consumers cannot afford to keep up. According to a new study commissioned by New Zealand telecoms group Vocus Group NZ and conducted in December 2018, while the enhanced availability streaming provides is having a positive effect overall, it’s also leading some consumer to pirate. “In short, the reason people are moving away from piracy is that it’s simply more hassle than it’s worth,” says Taryn Hamilton, Consumer General Manager at Vocus Group. “The research confirms something many internet pundits have long instinctively believed to be true: piracy isn’t driven by law-breakers, it’s driven by people who can’t easily or affordably get the content they want.” Speaking strictly to film and television, the majority (75%) of those surveyed said that free-to-air TV services are their weapons of choice for viewing content, with 61% utilizing free on-demand channels offered by broadcasters. Around 58% of respondents said they visit the cinema, with paid streaming services such as Netflix utilized by 55%. The results of the study are mostly positive. Piracy seems to be declining, but as competition for consumer dollars in streaming grows, illegal downloading may see a resurgence. That goes for film, television, and music alike. Access over exclusivity is best for everyone, but it often means less money for creators. Is there a solution that makes everyone happy AND lowers the likelihood of piracy? We don’t know. “The big findings are that whilst about half of people have pirated some content in their lives, the vast majority no longer do so because of the amount of paid streaming sites that they have access to,” Hamilton added in a video interview with NZHerald.

In a recent study of the online content viewing behaviour of Indonesian consumers, it was revealed that 29% of consumers use a TV box which can be used to stream pirated television and video content. These TV boxes, also known as Illicit Streaming Devices (ISDs), allow users to access hundreds of pirated television channels and video-on-demand content. Such illicit streaming devices often come pre-loaded with pirated applications which are either free or charge low subscription fees, which then provide ‘plug-and-play’ access to pirated content. The survey found that IndoXXI Lite, LiveStream TV and LK 21 Reborn are among the most popular pirate applications amongst Indonesian consumers. More alarmingly, 55% of respondents admitted to using free streaming services, with the IndoXXI Lite app (29%) in particular representing a larger userbase than all local legitimate online video platforms combined (19%). The survey, commissioned by the Asia Video Industry Association’s (AVIA) Coalition Against Piracy (CAP), and conducted by YouGov, also highlights the detrimental effects of streaming piracy on legitimate subscription video services. Of the 29% of consumers who purchased an illicit streaming device for free streaming, two in three (66%) stated that they cancelled all or some of their subscription to legal pay TV services. Specifically, 33% asserted that they cancelled their subscriptions to an Indonesian-based online video service as a direct consequence of owning an ISD. International subscription services, which include pan-Asia online offerings, were also impacted – more than one in three (31%) Indonesian users abandoned subscriptions in favour of ISD purchases. The surge in popularity of ISDs is not unique to Indonesia. Similar YouGov consumer research has been undertaken in other South East Asian countries where high levels of ISD usage was also found: 15% of Singapore consumers, 20% of Hong Kong consumers, 25% of Malaysian consumers, 28% of Filipino consumers and 34% consumers of Taiwanese consumers use a TV box which can be used to stream pirated television and video content. “The illicit streaming device (ISD) ecosystem is impacting all businesses involved in the production and distribution of legitimate content”, said Louis Boswell, CEO of AVIA. “ISD piracy is also organised crime, pure and simple, with crime syndicates making substantial illicit revenues from the provision of illegally re-transmitted TV channels and the sale of such ISDs. Consumers who buy ISDs are not only funding crime groups, but also wasting their money when the channels stop working. ISDs do not come with a ‘service guarantee’, no matter what the seller may claim.” Roy Soetanto, Chief Marketing Officer of Catchplay Indonesia stated: “Putting a stop to piracy will need the cooperation of the whole industry. It has been a pleasure for Catchplay to have the opportunity to work with AVIA and be a part of this important initiative to support the anti-piracy movement”. The damage that content theft does to the creative industries is without dispute. However, the damage done to consumers themselves, because of the nexus between content piracy and malware, is only beginning to be recognised. In late 2018, the European Union Intellectual Property Office released a report on malware found on suspected piracy websites and concluded that such websites “commonly distribute various kinds of malware luring users into downloading and launching such files”. The research, which worked closely with the European Cybercrime Centre at Europol, concluded that “the threat landscape for malware distributed via copyright-infringing websites is more sophisticated than it might appear at first glance”. Cancelling legitimate subscription services and paying less for access to pirated content is fraught with risks, as Neil Gane, the General Manager of AVIA’s Coalition Against Piracy (CAP), comments, “Piracy websites and ISDs typically have a click-happy user base, and are being used more and more as clickbait to distribute malware. Unfortunately the appetite for free or cheap subscription pirated content blinkers users from the very real risks of malware infection.” Of those consumers who own an ISD, more than two in five of respondents (44%) claim to have purchased their ISD from one of the largest Southeast Asia-based ecommerce stores. Also, one in three (31%) of ISD owners say they acquired their devices via one of the world’s most popular social media platforms. In addition to the short-term problem of cancelled subscriptions is a longer term problem – namely, many of the cord-cutters are young. The survey found that free streaming apps are particularly favoured among 18-24 year-olds, with almost two in three (58%) cancelling legitimate subscription services as a result of owning ISDs, especially international online subscriptions (34%).