Xi'an

You lose

Okinawa

Tedious

Whiplash

Thermostat

DCS World

The Helsinki Court of Appeal has confirmed that Peter Sunde, the co-founder and former administrator of The Pirate Bay, violated the rights of various record companies. According to the Court, Sunde helped to distribute copyrighted recordings via the torrent site between 2005 and 2009. As part of the entertainment industries’ mission to have infringing sites blocked by ISPs in Finland, in 2011 the Helsinki District court ordered local ISP Elisa to block The Pirate Bay to prevent music piracy. A year later, IPFI filed a lawsuit against two other providers and the administrators of the Pirate Bay, demanding that the former restrict access and the latter cease-and-desist their activities. In 2016 and after the operators of the site failed to respond, the Helsinki District Court handed down a default judgment requiring site co-founder Peter Sunde to pay several record labels including Sony, Universal, Warner and EMI, around €350,000 in damages. On top, Sunde was restrained from any further infringement on pain of a €1,000,000 penalty. Better Result for Sunde at District Court Sunde appealed the decision and in 2018 the District Court agreed to drop the €1m threat. In addition, the recording labels dropped their €350,000 damages claim. Sunde was kept on the hook for around €7,700 in various costs, however. In its decision, the Court found that Peter Sunde was liable for infringements that took place via The Pirate Bay only between 2010 and 2014, citing Sunde’s involvement in a trademark dispute centering on the Pirate Bay’s logo that took place in that period. Sunde, however, said he only stepped into that matter as a public duty and was not involved in the site. Both parties appealed the District Court’s decision to the Helsinki Court of Appeal. Sunde said the action was inadmissible since it hadn’t been heard on its merits and asked for the case to dismissed in its entirety. The record companies said that Sunde should be held responsible for copyright infringement from July 2005 onwards and should be prevented from any further breaches under the threat of a €1,000,000 penalty. Court of Appeal Hands Down Decision The Court handed down its decision Friday, noting that it had only been proven that Peter Sunde acted as an operator of The Pirate Bay between July 2005 until August 2009 and was therefore only responsible for infringement that took place during this period. There was no evidence to show that Sunde had been involved in the site later on. “The defendant is prohibited from repeating the infringements under threat of a fine of EUR 35,000. The Court of Appeal found that it was competent to also hear the case in respect of the distribution of recordings via Swedish telecommunications operators on the grounds that the defendant was domiciled in Finland and the recordings had been available in Finland,” the Court’s summary of the decision reads. Sunde was also ordered to pay legal and other costs totaling around €19,200. Anti-piracy group TTVK welcomed the decision. “The judgment of the Court of Appeal is clear and well reasoned. Naturally, we welcome that and hope that the long process for Sunde will end here. It is good to remember that the original and most important goal of the right holders was to prevent the operation of the world’s most popular pirate service in Finland,” the TTVK statement reads. IFPI also welcomed the decision but complained that despite all of the work and numerous legal processes, The Pirate Bay remains stubbornly online. “We welcome the decision from the court today. Copyright infringement harms the music ecosystem and prevents music creators from being fairly compensated,” IFPI says. “Right holders have been forced to pursue The Pirate Bay across multiple jurisdictions in Europe over a ten-year period. Despite a vast number of court decisions confirming the illegality of the service, The Pirate Bay remains available in many countries within the EU. A successful digital single market requires effective measures so that creators can enforce their rights across the EU.” Sunde Comments Peter Sunde informs TorrentFreak that he’s happy to hear that the court realized that he hasn’t been involved with The Pirate Bay for well over a decade. Still, he’s not happy with the decision itself. “It’s a bizarre situation being in a court case in 2021 regarding evidence from a 16-year-old court case in another country. It’s very kafkaesque and shines a light on the unequal power distribution between ideological activists and big capital,” Sunde tells us. According to Sunde, intellectual property rights continue to be misused. Access to potentially life-saving inventions and vaccines can be restricted by patents, which are used to secure the profits of large organizations. “The idea of immaterial rights has transitioned from a noble one – protecting speech and promoting a more enlightened community; to a tool to control monetary flow for the benefit of the super-rich, to the cost of the rest of society,” Sunde notes. The court’s decision in Finland should be viewed in that light, the Pirate Bay co-founder argues. “The people that are trying to control the narrative of today’s society, by using immaterial rights and their influence in culture, are some of the most dangerous people in the world. Not only because they are selfish but also because they don’t realize what they’re doing. And this is the key takeaway from today’s society: we can’t expect a fair outcome, a fair trial unless we make the rules be about fairness and not about power.”

Xenops

Inertia

Artichoke

TK Maxx

Voracious

Dead to me

Discreet

Jobs

A bank that refused to hand over the personal details of a person behind an account used to receive funds for the largest IPTV supplier in the Netherlands acted unlawfully, a court has ruled. Dutch anti-piracy group BREIN brought the action against Rabobank in an effort to track down the name and address of the account holder after other efforts failed. Dutch anti-piracy group BREIN is constantly engaged in investigations to deter or take down piracy operations, including those involved in the supply of unlicensed IPTV subscriptions. These investigations can be extremely complicated, something revealed in documents detailing BREIN’s mission to unmask the person in control of the bank account used to handle money for the Netherlands’ largest IPTV supplier. Background – GoFastIPTV.eu According to court documents, GoFastIPTV.eu is an IPTV provider that violates the rights of the companies represented by BREIN. It provides unauthorized access to movies, TV shows and live streams of pay TV channels, plus more than 85,000 on-demand titles. The provider offers 1-month packages at 15 euros, 3-months at 30 euros, and 80 euros for a year, and BREIN believes that it’s the largest pirate IPTV supplier in the Netherlands. As a result, BREIN has gone to great lengths to identify its operators, meeting significant resistance on the way. BREIN reports carrying out test purchases and says it was told to transfer funds to PayPal or directly to an account at Rabobank in the Netherlands. BREIN subsequently sent summons letters to various email accounts related to the service but could not identify the owner. The anti-piracy group also sent summons letters to companies hosting the IPTV service’s website but the address and phone numbers both led to people unconnected with the matter. Research on various company names in the UK and Brazil also led to dead ends as did an investigation into IPTVGo.eu, a site operating identically to GoFastIPTV.eu. This trail ran cold when the domain was traced to a hotel in Lisbon, Portugal. After BREIN’s substantial efforts failed to provide a clear lead, the anti-piracy outfit put pressure on Rabobank to hand over its customer’s personal details, considering this an important step to learn his or her true identity. Rabobank refused on privacy groups so BREIN took the matter to court. Court Rules The Bank’s Refusal to Provide Data Was Unlawful BREIN reports that since it had tried hard to obtain the account holder’s identity by other means, Rabobank should have provided the name and address of the relevant account holder. BREIN argued that despite the account now being closed, it had a valid interest in obtaining the information. The court agreed. The decision was based on a ruling from the Netherlands Supreme Court dating back to November 2005. The landmark case saw the Court uphold a previous verdict that compelled internet portal Lycos to hand over the personal details of one of its subscribers to Dutch stamp trader Pessers. According to BREIN, the assessment criteria are that the unlawfulness (in this case infringement) must be sufficiently plausible, that the applicant (BREIN) must have a valid interest in obtaining the information, and that there are no less severe options available to obtain the data. Also, when it comes to a weighing of interests between those of BREIN, Rabobank, and the account holder, the balance must be in favor of BREIN. Rabobank argued that the GDPR prevented it from handing over data. The bank also said that the account holder could’ve been put there for the purposes of shielding the identity of another person, so his/her privacy would need to be protected. BREIN argued that even if the person was indeed acting as some kind of proxy, obtaining their personal details would help them get closer to the main target. The court accepted this argument. The bank’s arguments that BREIN had unused opportunities to identify the person elsewhere also failed. “The judge ruled that it is not the case that there has to be no other option available before the bank should provide data,” a statement from BREIN reads. “BREIN has made extensive efforts to establish the identity of the infringer. It is not expected that the summons of foreign parties will provide a result within an acceptable period of time with a sufficient chance of success, according to the judge. Filing a criminal report is no less drastic and is by no means always followed up by the authorities. “Just like hosting and access providers, a bank cannot demand that all other options for retrieving personal data are exhausted first,” BREIN concludes. The court gave Rabobank five days to provide BREIN with all identifying name and address information relating to its former account holder and pay BREIN’s costs of 1,775 euros.

Dirt Rally

The results of a study published by cybersecurity firm Webroot suggest that 90% of pirate streaming sites offering live football and shared on social media contain scams, malware or extreme content. While the headline figures are probably accurate, the key threats highlighted by the firm can also be mitigated to an extent. However, that has an interesting effect that contributes to existing anti-piracy measures. Over the past decade or more, entertainment industry companies and their anti-piracy partners have gone to extreme lengths in an attempt to deprive pirate sites of revenue. The thinking is simple – if pirate sites cannot easily make money then people won’t bother to run them. It’s a credible and logical strategy that is likely to pay off to some extent in the long run. However, there are consequences that aren’t often discussed, namely the side effects on people who use these sites. Strangling Advertising Options In years gone by it was not uncommon to see mainstream companies advertising on pirate sites. In most cases that happened through no fault of their own but since they paid good money, pirate sites were happy to host the ads. Today the landscape has changed dramatically. In the majority of cases, high-paying advertisers are long gone after being put under pressure by various schemes designed to blacklist pirate portals. As a result, many pirate site operators (especially those in live sports streaming) are left with a stark choice – run highly questionable ads and incorporate other highly dubious schemes or shut down. While some choose the latter, there are way too many sites that don’t care about their users, as we have previously highlighted. 90% of Illegal Football Streaming Sites Carry Threats This week cybersecurity firm Webroot released the results of a study that looked into the dangers of sites offering illegal football streams for the Carabao Cup Final and major clashes across the Premier League, La Liga, Serie A and Bundesliga. According to the company, 92% of the illegal streaming sites analyzed were found to contain “some form” of malicious content. The figure sounds about right given the often broad definition of “malicious”. However, the vast majority of sites operating in these spaces have little choice but to run terrible ads and similar schemes since the alternative is to close completely. Interestingly, Webroot notes that the sample investigated were all platforms shared on social media channels. This could be significant since, unlike more seasoned pirates, the average social media user can be blissfully unaware of the threats. That makes them particularly good targets for various nefarious schemes. But what are these threats? Malware, Pop-Ups and Crypto Scams….Of Course Webroot lists several “threats to watch” which begin with bitcoin scams “promising riches and asking users for banking details” alongside “convincing ads and websites that link directly to fake news sites with local celebrities and politicians.” Dealing with this threat is not hard and it begins with people realizing the nature of the sites they are using. These are pirate streaming platforms that are illegal, sometimes criminally so, in most parts of the world. Are genuine financial companies likely to be advertising on pirate sites? No. Do they want to share their wealth with you? Of course not. So why hand over banking details? It’s a question best answered by those that do but some clearly get sucked in. Fake mobile app scams also make an appearance. According to Webroot, they can have in-app purchases that range from £2.90 all the way to £114.99. That’s a frightening prospect but again, it’s easily mitigated. People need to understand where they are and ask themselves what’s wrong with Google Play or the App Store if they need a reputable app and intend to start spending money. On a similar front, Webroot warns of mobile applications that come with hidden and excessive subscription fees which, completely ironically, center on people’s desire not to become infected with viruses. “On streaming sites these are often in the form of fake virus ‘scans’ that push users to download antivirus software. The software looks legitimate but provides no protection,” the company writes. Some Users Can Mitigate Some Issues But Risks Remain There is plenty of anecdotal evidence online suggesting that people are able to avoid malware on pirate streaming sites but that is not the default position. Most threats, including those listed by Webroot, can be avoided but that requires work in the technical and common sense departments. Firstly though, people intent on watching matches should consider what kind of experience they want. If a second-rate, unreliable, and invariably risky experience is desired, many pirate streaming sites can provide that. If viewers want to relax and they have the money, official offerings will be a much better option. That being said, there are still those who don’t mind a game of Russian roulette, albeit with fewer bullets in the chamber. This is usually achieved by installing decent anti-virus software and anti-malware software such as MalwareBytes, from their official sources. NOT from ads listed on pirate sites. But even this isn’t enough. Many tech-savvy people report using good pieces of browser filtering software too, such as uBlock Origin and NoScript. In many cases, these can prevent the threats from appearing in the first place but again, this won’t ensure that everyone always stays out of trouble. Crucially, what neither of these will do is completely prevent people from doing reckless things, including but not limited to handing over banking and credit card details or installing completely unknown apps. Nor will they stop people from clicking on the ads that may get through the defenses provided by browser addons or security software. In an ideal world all ads would be either blocked or failing that ignored, and if a questionable streaming site attempts to prevent use after detecting blockers, backing out completely is sensible for novices. People shouldn’t be fooled by sites asking if they can send them notifications either, since this will almost certainly get abused too. The Perhaps Counter-Intuitive Consequences of The Above At this point, it’s worth looking at the bigger picture. If people are visiting pirate sports streaming sites that require extensive mitigation measures to keep them safe, they might start asking themselves whether they should be visiting them at all. The operators of these platforms are obviously under pressure to stay afloat but the provision of high-level scams shows disrespect for users and a complete disregard for their welfare. There are sites out there that don’t engage in this behavior and while we aren’t going to list them, as a reference point, people should know they exist. On the other hand, using blocking tools such as uBlock Origin and NoScript (to name just two) also has an interesting effect on these platforms. When they work as planned, sites can lose much of their ability to push malicious ads, software and scams onto their users. This means that the schemes don’t generate money as they should. This creates an interesting situation. Like the anti-piracy measures being carried out by entertainment companies to prevent decent ads from appearing on pirate streaming sites, these mitigation and blocking techniques only serve to starve streaming platforms of their revenue. The end result is that this actually helps those who want to shut these platforms down by making them financially unviable. It’s a chicken and egg situation that lower-tier pirate streaming sites will have to solve, if they want to stay relevant and afloat.

Wings of prey

Nomadland was the big winner at the Oscars last weekend, securing the best picture, actress, and director awards. This major achievement puts the movie in the spotlight and increases interest through legal and illegal channels. Fresh data collected by TorrentFreak shows that pirate downloads surged right after the awards ceremony. The Oscars are the most anticipated movie awards show of the year, closely followed by hundreds of millions of movie fans around the world. This year’s ceremony was initially delayed a few weeks due to the coronavirus pandemic. The show itself was more intimate as well, with a much smaller audience than usual, also on TV. In the end, however, the aesthetics are pretty much irrelevant. It’s the winners that matter and with three Oscars including the crown jewel of the best picture, “Nomadland” came out on top. Oscars, PR and Piracy Winning an Oscar is arguably the best thing that can happen to a movie. It significantly raises the public’s interest, which directly translates into sales. However, there is a ‘darker’ side to this success as well. Over the years we have seen that Oscar winners tend to do very well on pirate sites. This issue was also bought up by piracy tracking firm MUSO a few weeks ago, which warned that the legal unavailability of Oscar winners could do a lot of harm. In recent weeks we have kept a close eye on the key contenders to see how these were doing in pirate circles. Previously, we already showed that the nominations significantly boosted the interest in the top contenders, but a big surge in pirate downloads was expected this week. To capture this effect we looked at a sample of torrent downloads of the Best Picture winner “Nomadland,” contrasting it with another contender “Judas and the Black Messiah”. The timeframe starts on Monday, April 19, and ends on Tuesday, March 27, two days after the Oscars were announced. Because both films were nominated in the “best picture” category and since “Judas and the Black Messiah” won two awards in smaller categories, we decided to add the non-Oscar contender “Honest Thief” as a control movie. The results in the graph below clearly show that “Nomadland” downloads increased more than 1000% from less than 15,000 last Monday to over 173,000 a week later. “Judas and the Black Messiah” also saw a sizable 400% increase, but that pales in comparison to the Best Picture winner. Meanwhile, there is no significant change in downloads for “Honest Thief,” which sees a stable stream of downloads. That confirms that these increases are indeed driven by the Oscars. What was perhaps more surprising when we looked at the data is that the number of estimated downloads in our sample already started to increase before the awards ceremony. Downloads on pirate sites have been relatively stable for Nomadland, hovering around 10- 15,000 over the past month, but in the week leading up to the Oscars they picked up. The Friday before the Oscars the number of downloads had roughly doubled and on Saturday they had tripled. This suggests that pirates were already downloading the top Oscar contenders before the awards were handed out. A broader overview of the estimated downloads for Nomadland starting early March, 10 days before the nominations, shows that the initial nomination boost mid-March pales in comparison to the surge after it won the Oscars. While we don’t have access to detailed legal viewing and sales data, we expect that the interest through official channels peaked as well. Winning an Oscar is great PR for a film, after all. Aside from the increase in piracy the days before the Oscars, these results don’t really come as a surprise. If Hollywood can learn anything, it’s that Oscar contenders should be widely available through legal channels. Unfortunately, availability was lacking in several countries this year, which pushed some people to pirate sites. Luckily there’s another chance in 2022.

Bellicose

Two teams with more money than sense battling it out. PSG was unlucky at the second half imo I think they can still make it through but it'll be really tough.

Unique

triceratops