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Asgaard News FreeLeech ON All Torrents Free FreeLeech [ON] set by o**** Until 14 Sep 2020 (2d 22:13:45 to go)

Horror Site News Google Translation: There has been a name change on our site, but we continue to work the same way. New URL: https://selection-tracker.net/

Treat pirates like competitors' FIFA tells sports broadcasters FIFA warns of growing sophistication of pirate TV operations The footballing body was speaking as part of Synamedia panel on piracy Sports TV providers need to continue “upping their game” to tackle IP theft Sports TV outfits need to up their game as video pirating grows in sophistication and becomes smarter at adopting to the latest consumer trends, executives from FIFA and Synamedia have warned. In Tuesday’s IBC Showcase Session Outsmarting the Pirates Synamedia’s security expert Yael Fainaro said the best method for combating pirates was to view them as competitors. “It’s the most effective way I’ve seen Pay TV clients fight back to ensure people use legitimate services over pirated ones,” she added. To this end, one of the measures Synamedia has taken is to provide business intelligence on the pirates’ latest modus operandi, so that OTT operators can fight back by offering their best service. Fellow speaker Eva Norroy, FIFA’s broadcaster servicing manager, noted that Pay TV companies were already broadening their offerings and ‘upping their game’. Both execs admitted that pirates were growing in sophistication and prevalence as new technologies and platforms decrease the barrier to entry. A recent Ampere Analysis study found that only sixteen per cent of those surveyed claimed that they’d never watched illegal pirated sports. Fainaro added that there were over 20m active subscribers to illegal pirate sites in Europe - a 25 per cent increase over the last 18 months. Her advice was for companies to have an “all encompassing strategy” that needed to be regularly revised. For many rights owners, anti-piracy measures are becoming a contractual requirement and Norroy adds that football’s governing body expects broadcasters to “do their upmost to protect themselves and ensure their feeds aren’t being circumnavigated.” Historically, Norroy said that FIFA’s PayTV clients have made heavy investments in the fight against piracy, although many tend to leave one plank of anti-piracy strategy – educating end users about illegal content– to the rights holders or public bodies. While social media streams are a low barrier to entry for pirates, both FIFA and Synamedia agreed that it was not as big a threat to the industry’s revenue streams as browser-based or IPTV-based piracy. “Consumers with the potential for conversion won’t settle for the poor quality that exists on social networks, but it has been used as an important marketing tool for illegally streamed pay-per-view events,” Fainaro noted. Norroy said that measuring the success of anti-piracy measures could be a thankless task. “When the amount of piracy is lower you start to worry about whether your detection mechanisms are working…but if the rate of detected cases is high, then that’s also no reason to celebrate.” Fainaro added that Synamedia was making strides in this area and was introducing tools to measure the effectiveness of anti piracy measures on its platform that would enable service providers to trigger certain actions. She added that Synamedia’s platform can currently identify and measure the number of non-paying members of an OTT service, for instance, producing data on where they were coming from, which devices they used and how many were casuals sharers etc. “The industry has been operating on a ‘best effort’ basis but now we’re coming at it from a different approach: You build the intelligence and an action plan, relevant to you, that allows you to make an impact and get a clear ROI on that,” she said

Le Saloon v2.0 News Google Translation: Freeleech torrents Hello We have a problem with freeleech torrents Please stop grabing them until the problem is solved and we will notify you. At the time of this post any freeleech torrent you grab Will not be refunded

Aither News Security check for Unit3d needs help At the moment, the dev of unit3d (our tracker code base) are going to start security tests. This means hiring "engineers" to try and get pass the security. This is just as important as it is for all Unit3d trackers. Security we all value. So please consider helping the dev, to do that follow link below. https://github.com/sponsors/HDVinnie Thank you. Dearest regards...

LeagueHD News Google Translation: [Shifang Guizhong event] [Week 2] 2020/9/13 ~ 2020/9/19 In response to the feedback of the students, the 3 singers will be changed from mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, Europe and the United States to Chinese, Japan, Korea, Europe and America every week, starting from the third week of the event. [Shifang Guizhong event] [Week 2] 2020/9/13 ~ 2020/9/19 here If the albums of male gods and goddesses in your heart have not yet been collected, you can reply to the singers you want, and the working group will prioritize arrangements next week!

Bell and Rogers Defend Canada’s Pirate Site Blocking Order in Court Canada's Federal Court of Appeal has to decide whether the country's first pirate site blocking order can stay in place. Internet provider Teksavvy objected to the far-reaching measures but, according to a new filing from media companies Bell, Rogers, and TVA, website blocking is lawful and much-needed. Last year Canada’s Federal Court approved the first pirate site blocking order in the country. Following a complaint from major media companies Rogers, Bell and TVA, the Court ordered several major ISPs to block access to domains and IP-addresses of the pirate IPTV service GoldTV. There was little opposition from Internet providers, except for TekSavvy, which quickly announced that it would appeal the ruling. The blocking injunction threatens the open Internet and is not permitted under Canadian law, the company argued. Landmark Case What started out as a small copyright case against a relatively unknown IPTV provider transformed into a landmark court battle. If upheld, the order would open the door to dozens, if not hundreds, of similar blocking requests. As such, the appeal attracted widespread interest. Over the past months, various stakeholders had their say in court, to oppose or support the site-blocking measures. Last week, respondents Rogers, Bell and TVA filed their memorandum of facts at the Federal Court of Appeal, to argue in favor of the blocking order. The three companies are copyright holders but Bell and Rogers are also Internet providers, which means that they themselves have to implement site blocking as well. They will gladly do so of course, as they see no other option to bring online piracy to a halt. Pirates Continue to Evolve According to Rogers, Bell and TVA, pirates continue to evolve. Over time, this has made it harder to stop them, especially when the operators of pirate sites and services are anonymous. “Over the years, the tools used to distribute infringing content have moved from physical media, to satellite signal piracy, to peer-to peer Internet systems, to online streaming. Each new technological advance brings infringing content closer to users, while at the same time allowing infringers to move away from the spotlight and remain anonymous,” the companies write. The companies started this legal battle by filing a lawsuit against the pirate IPTV service GoldTV. This resulted in a court order that required the operators to halt their activities. However, the order was simply ignored. With few other options left, the rightsholders asked for a site-blocking injunction, which was granted. According to TekSavvy, this order violates Canadian law and regulation, which is now the focus of the appeal. Site Blocking Not Mentioned in Copyright Act One of the main contested issues is whether courts can grant site-blocking injunctions under Canada’s Copyright Act. According to TekSavvy, they can’t, as this enforcement effort isn’t specifically mentioned in the law. This is where Canada differs from many other countries where site-blocking injunctions were issued. In the EU, for example, the availability of site-blocking measure injunctions is codified in the European Parliament’s Copyright Directive. TekSavvy argued that without a specific or explicit mention in the law, blocking injunctions shouldn’t be granted. However, in their memorandum, the copyright holders disagree. They argue that courts should have “unfettered discretion” to issue any type of injunction if a party’s copyrights are at stake. “In order to argue that a type of injunction is unavailable, it is therefore not sufficient to demonstrate that the Copyright Act does not explicitly grant that power. Rather, a clear statutory restriction of the Court’s inherent injunctive powers must be identified,” they write. Net Neutrality? Another argument that was brought up in the appeal deals with net neutrality. TekSavvy mentioned that the Canadian telecoms regulator CRTC is the proper authority to decide on blocking orders. After all, ISPs are not allowed to meddle with traffic without CRTC’s approval. Bell and the other rightsholders disagree. They note that, in this case, the ISPs don’t decide unilaterally to block content. They do so following a court order, which should be allowed. “The present case does not involve a common carrier unilaterally controlling or influencing the content it carries at its own discretion,” they write. “Rather, it involves the Court concluding that a communication is illegal on a strong and uncontested prima facie basis and, as a result, enjoining common carriers to block access to that content” Bookstore Analogy The copyright holders go into detail on a variety of other issues and also touch on the possible freedom of expression concerns. To illustrate this, TekSavvy used a bookstore analogy where ISPs were ordered to remove “books” from “virtual shelves”. This is not disputed by Bell, Rogers and TVA. They follow the analogy but stress that, in this case, the books are clearly illegal and that the “authors” and “publishers” (the pirate IPTV service) can’t be reached. “While the injunction under appeal ‘removes books from the virtual shelves’ of ISPs serving the majority of Canadian Internet users, these ‘books’ do not contain expression that could attract Charter protection, and they are clearly illegal,” they note. As with every appeal, it will ultimately be up to the court to decide the outcome. Depending on one’s own conviction, there is something to say for both sides. However, it will ultimately depend on how the Federal Court of Appeal interprets the law. — A copy of the memorandum of fact and law, submitted by Bell, Rogers and TVA, is available here (pdf) Source: Torrentfreak.com

Aither News Notice:  Please consider helping the developer of Unit3d (the tracker code), its the future of trackers. do it here ---> https://github.com/sponsors/HDVinnie Also Please support this site and become VIP with many benefits. BON, Invites, freeleech, seedbox discount and more

Pirates of the UK (PotUK) News HTTPS tracker activated - New Announce - Old torrents will continue to work *****/announce is the new announce url using ssl connection for our tracker. The old announce cannot be used anymore and all new torrents posted will need to use this new url. All old torrents will continue to work all peers seeders etc, and new downloads, will all remain working. The announce url change, brings us more in line security wise, and now your host cant even decrypt what the tracker says to you, and what you send to the tracker. Obviously it can still monitor what you exchange with peers if your connections are not set to secure, but we've done as much as we can for now our end to try keep you all as safe as currently possible. I have set this thread to force read, in hopes we can catch all our uploaders before they try using the old url out of habit Admin

Anthelion News Freeleech Pool Tipped! ***** has triggered the Freeleech Pool! The following film(s) have been randomly selected and are now freeleech for the next 48 hours. Here Thanks to users who donated to the pool. Now go drop some of your own orbs into the next pool!

DesiTorrents News FREELEECH IS OVER As of today FREELEECH IS OVER. For every torrent you download, you are required to seed it to a 1:1 or more Ratio Watch If your ratio dips below 1:1, your account will be placed on ratio watch for 21 Days. if you're not able to restore your ratio within that time the download rights will be disabled.

Libtorrent Adds Support for BitTorrent v2, a Potential Game-Changer Libtorrent has just released version 2.0, which is a potential game-changer. The BitTorrent library, which is used by popular clients including uTorrent Web, Deluge, and qBittorrent, adds support for the new BitTorrent v2 protocol specification. This opens the door to various new features and introduces a new torrent format, which creates a separate swarm. Millions of people use BitTorrent every day but only a few know all the ins-and-outs of how it works. Meanwhile, an even smaller group is actively involved in shaping the future of the file-sharing protocol. BitTorrent was first made public by inventor Bram Cohen nearly two decades ago. While it was swiftly embraced by the masses, the protocol itself was far from perfect. Over the years many new features were added, including DHT, UDP trackers, peer-exchange, and support for streaming. As developer of one of the leading BitTorrent libraries, Libtorrent, Arvid Norberg has been closely involved in the protocol’s development. It’s his code that makes a wide variety of torrent clients function properly. This includes uTorrent Web, Deluge, and qBittorrent. LibTorrent 2.0 and BitTorrent v2 This week, Norberg announced the latest release of Libtorrent; version 2.0. This new version comes with many changes that eventually will make their way to torrent clients. The most crucial one is the implementation of the BitTorrent v2 protocol specification. BitTorrent v2 is an improved version of the early BitTorrent standards and includes several technical changes. It was first proposed by Bram Cohen in 2008 and updated and improved along the way. Since most changes take place under the hood, the public at large won’t immediately recognize them, except for one. Tech-savvy readers can get the complete lowdown from the Libtorrent site but for the sake of simplicity, we will focus on how the changes will affect users. V2 Torrents and Separate Swarms BitTorrent v2 changes the way torrents are ‘compiled’ and the newer version is not backward compatible. Older torrents have a SHA-1 hash and the new versions use SHA-256 hashing. This means that going forward, there will be different torrent versions. These different (v1 and v2) torrents will also create separate torrent swarms. People who download a v1 torrent can’t share anything with people who download a v2 torrent and vice versa. While that sounds like a step back, the reality isn’t that bad. There is an option to create so-called “hybrid” torrents that can connect to both swarms. These are basically two torrents in one. As a result, all torrents will have the same number of people sharing. “A v2-enabled client would still be able talk to all peers, and peer-exchange would still work across v1 and v2-enabled peers. The main impact, I think, is that a v2-enabled peer would announce twice for a hybrid torrent, once for each info-hash. Both to trackers and the DHT,” Norberg tells us For now, it makes sense that publishers, including torrent sites, are best off using hybrid torrents. After all, torrents that only use the v2 specification will have access to a limited number of peers. Norberg agrees. “I think it would make sense for publishers to generate hybrid torrents. At least experiment with it to ensure it works well. v2-only torrents would only make sense for closed ecosystems right now, where the publisher also controls all clients.” Important Changes Under The Hood While new torrents are the most visible change, for outsiders it’s merely a byproduct of important changes under the hood. For example, the switch from SHA-1 to SHA-256 hashing will prevent a possible hash collision, which can be used for attacks and exploits. Norberg tells is that the risk of these attacks is mostly theoretical, but this may change over time. So changing to SHA-256 is certainly wise. An even more exciting change, according to the developer, is the use of ‘per-file merkle hash trees’ for the piece hashes. Merkle Hash Tree https://torrentfreak.com/images/merkle-hash-tree.png In simple terms, this means that all files in a torrent will have their own unique identifier (hash). So, a collection of 100 photos will have a unique hash for each photo. This comes with several advantages. For example, it will allow torrent clients to quickly check if they are receiving the right file. This prevents pollution attacks that can be used by outsiders to slow down torrent transfers. “With the v2 hash trees, corrupt data will be detected immediately and the peer responsible for it can be disconnected. Currently, there’s more complex heuristic involved in attributing corrupt data to a peer, which means a malicious peer can do slightly more damage before being disconnected,” Norberg says. Mutable Torrents and Merging Swarms In addition, it opens up the door for peers to get the same file from multiple torrents. This is already technically possible today, as BiglyBT’s ‘swarm merging’ feature shows, but with unique file hashes, it’s easier and more reliable. “Doing that is technically possible today, but to make it work generally for arbitrary torrents is very complicated. Having ‘per-file merkle trees’ greatly simplifies implementing this,” Norberg notes. The same is true for so-called ‘mutable torrents’ where publishers can update torrents to add or remove files. That’s much easier with BitTorrent v2. Finally, we should mention that it’s not just the .torrent files that will change. The v2 and hybrid magnet links are different too. And they will likely start downloading quicker, as the initial transfer of all piece hashes will be smaller. That is most noticeable when streaming or for downloading large archives. Just how soon the v2 torrents will work depends on when clients update to the latest Libtorrent version. That can take days, but also more than a year. When large publishers and torrent sites will embrace the changes is uncertain as well, but eventually, it’s the way forward for all. Source: Torrentfreak.com

The Premier League is back and it’s an illegal live stream bonanza Empty stadiums and strict social distancing rules in pubs will likely create a piracy boom As Liverpool and Leeds kick-off at 5.30pm, the champions will be looking to prove that last season wasn’t a one-off. Millions of fans across the world will also be tuning in to figure out the same. And, for the first time ever, the new Premier League season will begin without fans in attendance. While grounds will be silent, more games than ever before will be broadcast live on TV. Following a last-minute deal between the Premier League, broadcasters and clubs all of the 28 matches being played in September will be shown on either Sky, BT Sport, Amazon or the BBC. The previous plan had 17 matches scheduled for TV, with the remaining 11 being inaccessible (Burnley and Newcastle hadn’t been picked be on TV at all). For fans, it could prove costly. People may need a grab-bag of digital subscriptions and pay-per-view options to follow their clubs. For those wanting to watch as many games as possible, the cost is likely to be even higher. Only one of the first month’s matches will be shown on free-to-air TV. (Leicester vs Burnley on the BBC on September 20). The lack of free-to-air games is a sharp contrast to the end of Liverpool’s championship-winning season, when 33 games that were played behind closed doors were broadcast for free. Empty stadiums and strict social distancing rules in pubs will likely create a piracy boom as fans turn to illegal streams to watch the new season. “I expect when the Premier League returns on Saturday that there will be significant wholesale piracy occurring,” says Mark Mulready, vice president of cyber services at anti-piracy firm Irdeto. The company has worked with the Premier League on its anti-piracy efforts for the last five years. And if the end of last season is anything to go by, the numbers will be big. “We saw about an eighteen-fold increase in traffic to the popular streaming sites in May and June,” Mulready says. From June to July, there was a 50 per cent increase in people looking for sports streaming links. Stopping illegal live streaming of sports is a difficult battle to win. Those working in the industry compare getting illegal live streams removed to playing whack-a-mole. As soon as you take one site down, pirates get another live. The Premier League has a big role to play in protecting its own intellectual property. During the 2019/20 season 300,000 live streams were blocked or disrupted in the UK alone, the Premier League says. Independent analysis has found illegal streaming of Premier League games costs clubs £1m per match. Premier League matches are broadcast all around the world with other countries charging vastly cheaper prices for people to tune in. Before the last-minute change this week, 160 of the season’s 380 matches weren’t planned to be televised in the UK. Whereas NBC’s streaming and catchup service in the US will provide access to all 380 matches this season. International broadcasts of Premier League games can increase the chance of the streams being put online illegally – in April the Premier League said Saudi Arabia was a “centre of piracy” that impacted right holders all around the world. The Premier League says it has one of the most comprehensive anti-piracy programmes in the world, invests in technology to identify streams and disrupts them in real-time. This includes working with social media companies to make sure live streams don’t appear on their sites. Streams are removed from the web using legal mechanisms. In 2017 the Premier League obtained an injunction from the high court that compelled internet service provides to block pirate servers. As spotted by TorrentFreak this has been renewed for the 2020/2021 season. This allows detected streaming sites to be blocked in the UK. A report from France’s intellectual property protection body, HADOPI, cites the Premier League’s system as working effectively. It says each week the football body identify servers that broadcast sports content illegally and add them to their injunction. “In practice, the list of servers to be blocked is circulated via a secure platform and is updated at least twice on each match day,” the report says. And it isn’t just servers that the Premier League is targeting. In March 2019 three men who sold illegal streams to more than 1,000 pubs, clubs and homes were jailed for a combined total of 71 years. The crimes made them £5m. The Premier League says it will take action against illegal streamers no matter their size. In the last year it has taken legal action against two retailers working on Edgware Road for selling illegal streaming devices. And just last month a man pleaded guilty to copyright and fraud offences and received a 36-week prison sentence, suspended for two years. Stopping criminals distributing illegal streams is a key way to cut off vast swathes of viewership. “In my view, the only way to stop them is to disrupt the illegal criminal IPTV services and do it day in day out to make the illegal service of the sports rights impossible to consume,” says Simon Brydon, a senior director of sports rights and anti-piracy at video firm Synamedia. “Degrade the service so the only option is to watch it legitimately or don’t watch it.” But there’s also a big role for technology to play in detecting illegal streaming in real-time. Mulready says Irdeto has a 24-hour threat detection team that gathers intelligence ahead of fixtures being played. “A lot of the links are shared in advance or shortly in advance of the particular game,” he says. The firm uses web crawlers similar to those used by Google to find illegal streaming links online. “For us it’s about arming our crawlers for the particular sites we are going to be crawling to detect the pirate streams.” Despite the proactive work, it isn’t difficult to find streams online. Each match day people search for illegal streams through social media, forums, subscription services or Kodi boxes. A simple social media search for specific games can bring up links being shared that claim to be showing the matches. On Reddit there are still guides that point people in the direction of streaming sites. This is despite the site banning a soccer streaming subreddit and threatening to ban r/piracy last year. Many streaming sites also come with their own threats. Streams can be laden with intrusive advertising and it isn’t difficult to inadvertently download malware when hunting for illegal streams. While live sport stopped when the UK went into lockdown on March 23, online piracy for other types of content went up. “There was an immediate spike in piracy the next day, you can see it take place as people stop taking their kids to school,” says Peter Clothier, commercial director at anti-piracy firm MUSO. And with more people looking for pirated content, it became easier to find. “You'll see during lockdown that links for family content would be shared on Mumsnet,” Clothier explains. MUSO’s statistics show there were 300 million visits to piracy sites in the UK in March alone. Other stats show a similar rise: in May, the UK’s intellectual property service Fact said links to streaming sites had doubled between February and April. Even though live sport stopped during lockdown, Mulready says pirating of sports didn’t. Pirates turned to historic games. During lockdowns around the world sports governing bodies, including football leagues, released some of their library of old content to allow broadcasters to fill slots in their emptying schedules. “Pirates being pirates, saw that as a good opportunity,” Mulready says. “They also pirated that content and they added them to their live pirate broadcasts or to their video-on-demand offerings.” At the same time Irdeto saw pirates being more innovative with how they were working – a pause on new TV and films being produced also affected their illegal services. Mulready adds that the company saw pirates be “much more savvy in their marketing”. He says services were contacting customers offering discounts during the height of lockdown in an attempt to reassure them that sport would be illegally streamed soon enough. “They were using encrypted messaging services, WhatsApp, Telegram and the like, to stay in direct contact and explain to the customers ‘We’re going to deal with these issues.’” With the return of live sport, time is of the essence in the whack-a-mole piracy fight. It’s no good identifying and removing streaming links after a match has finished. “Technology is your best weapon in that very compressed window,” Mulready says. “If you're viewing an illegal stream and it’s going down and up or it’s poor quality eventually you’re going to get frustrated. These days there are plenty of legitimate, very safe, alternate options.”

The Shinning (TSH) News Google Translation: Bundesliga prediction game 2020/2021 Hi community The survey showed that you don't want a prediction game, but in order not to disappoint the users who voted yes, the team made an effort to but so to start the prediction game you can bet from 14.09.2020. The prices remain the same as with the last betting round. Have Fun # Staff

Tracker Name: ScenePalace Genre: General Review Sign Up Link: https://scenepalace.info/signup.php Closing Time: Soon Additional Information: General tracker with low seed numbers but decent seed retention, torrents from 2016 are still seeded.. amazing

Tracker Name: Twilights Genre: General Sign Up Link: https://www.twilightsdreams.com/signup.php Closing Time: Soon! Additional Information: Twilights is a Private Torrent Tracker for Movies / TV / General Releases.

Asgaard News FreeLeech ON All Torrents Free FreeLeech [ON] set by o**** Until 14 Sep 2020 (2d 22:13:45 to go)

Acid-Lounge News Recent Content Fellow Loungers, It is in fact a sad sad news post indeed, as you will probably have noticed there appears to be very little being uploaded in most categories. One of the big fish in the Release Group pond SPARKS have had a bit of bad luck recently and in the last few weeks the wheels have come off a bit in the general uploading process - this will affect other sites and like Covid the true damage is unknown. If you want to read more and follow the progress you should have a look at the news posts on TorrentFreak. If you have not heard of it, Google it and you will see the posts. In the meantime, use this to share what you have that is not on site as the site is set to Global Free Leech, so everything on site is free and you will earn double upload - even if you're still downloading - so no 72 hour before the reward Post in a few forum topics and let's all stick together Staff

Le Chaudron (V3) News Google Translation: Le Chaudron is in freeleech thanks to the Common Pot

Archivists Want Broader DMCA Exemption for ‘Abandoned’ Online Games Several organizations have asked the Copyright Office to renew the exemption to the DMCA's DRM circumvention restrictions. This allows abandoned online games to be preserved for future generations. In addition, the Software Preservation Network and the Library Copyright Alliance ask for an expansion, to allow these games to be made available more broadly. There are a lot of things people are not allowed to do under US copyright law, but perhaps just as importantly there are exemptions too. The U.S. Copyright Office regularly reviews these exemptions to Section 1201 of the DMCA, which prevents the public from ‘tinkering’ with DRM-protected content and devices. These provisions are renewed every three years after the Office hears various arguments from stakeholders and the general public. This also allows interested parties to suggest new exemptions. During the last update in 2018, there was a small but significant win for nostalgic gamers. To preserve ‘abandoned’ games for future generations, the Copyright Office expanded the game preservation exemptions to games that require an online component. This was a crucial addition, as most games nowadays have an online aspect. With the new exemption, preservation institutions that legally possess a copy of a video game’s server code and the game’s local code were allowed to break DRM and other technological restrictions to make these playable. This type of “tinkering” is now seen as fair use by the Government, which rejected critique from the major game companies who feared that libraries and museums might exploit this right for commercial purposes, which would hurt their sales. A few weeks ago the Copyright Office started its latest review of the DMCA exemptions which will be updated next year. Since then, several submissions from archivists, digital rights, and consumer organizations have come in. Several of these ask the Office to renew the current exemptions for abandoned online games. The Software Preservation Network (SPN) and the Library Copyright Alliance (LCA) note that this new exemption ensures that classic games will be preserved. This allows nostalgic gamers and younger generations to play older games that are no longer officially supported. This has already led to some success stories. “For instance, Georgia Tech Library’s Computing Lab, retroTECH, has a significant collection of recovered video game consoles, many of which are made accessible for research and teaching uses by the §1201 exemption. Dozens of Gameboy Advance, console and PC games can now be preserved, with lower risks of copyright infringement claims or legal action,” SPN and LCS write. The call to renew the exemption is supported by the nonprofit group Consumer Reports, which notes that the exemption “has proven very beneficial to consumers in removing this obstacle to preserving the functionality of video games they enjoy.” In addition to renewing the current rules, SPN and LCS have also requested an expansion. At the moment, they are allowed to break DRM, if needed, but these games can only be made available inside the premises of ‘eligible’ institutions such as libraries and museums. In a new submission, both groups ask the Copyright Office to drop this restriction. “SPN and the LCA request expansion of the video game preservation exemption […] to eliminate the requirement that the program not be distributed or made available outside of the physical premises of an eligible institution,” they write. As always, the current DMCA review will take a few months to be completed. While the request will certainly be considered, it’s possible that games companies will object to the new suggestion, as they have done repeatedly in the past. Much of the credit for getting the Copyright Office to adopt the present exemption goes to San Francisco’s Museum of Art and Digital Entertainment (The MADE), which filed its petition three years ago. The Museum, which is loved by many gaming fans, recently had to close its doors and put its collection into storage. However, like many abandoned games, it’s not gone forever. The MADE is currently raising money to respawn elsewhere. Source: Torrentfreak.com

Premier League launch new crackdown to stop fans illegally streaming matches Premier League launch new crackdown to stop fans illegally streaming matches and end IPTV services with new warning THE PREMIER LEAGUE have launched a crackdown on illegal streaming services and IPTV ahead of the new season. England’s top flight aim to put a stop to ALL illegal online viewing in a bitter blow to freeloading armchair fans everywhere. The Prem have thrown money at the problem in a bid to finally quash the money sapping issue. And Scottish tech firm Visualworks have developed cutting edge software to help them in their fight, according to the Daily Record. The tool will warn users of the dangers of signing up to free or low price IPTV (Internet Protocol Television) services. Recent figures from The Intellectual Property Office (IPO) show the Prem blocked 210,000 live streams during the 2018-19 season and more than 360,000 illegal match clips. And it is now hoped the strong stance and clear warning about using such high-risk services will deter those who do. Vistalworks chief executive Vicky Brock said: “Lockdown has led to a rise in people accessing illicit IPTV. “And we expect to see that increase further with the return of the Premier League. “Our checker alerts people using sites like eBay to search for cut-price streaming products that what they’re looking at is both dangerous and illegal. “IPTV sales can end up with consumers’ sensitive information being placed in the wrong hands, which in turn can lead to identity theft and fraud. “And piracy is not a victimless crime. “By purchasing these illegal services people aren’t just putting themselves at risk, they’re potentially bankrolling the criminal lifestyle of major international gangs.” Trading standards have also backed the move. Elsewhere, Prem clubs are facing a £1.25BILLION black hole after the latest Government clampdown added to their financial woes. Premier League fans return in doubt with 1,000 people limits and bans in coronavirus hotspot areas from October 1