Welcome to community, enjoy your stay here

Welcome to community, enjoy your stay here

Welcome to community, enjoy your stay here

Welcome to community, enjoy your stay here

Welcome to community, enjoy your stay here

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@Ethan I promoted InviteHawk and proof as follows https://imgbox.com/2zkxbvCs https://imgbox.com/eo9fdXIY https://imgbox.com/TWFNelXN https://imgbox.com/oCTIvde7

The former operator of Mangamura, a now-defunct site blamed for causing billions of dollars in losses to the Japanese manga industry, has been sentenced in Japan. Romi Hoshino, 29, was sentenced by the Fukuoka District Court to three years in prison and fines in excess of US$650,000. After being founded in 2016, pirate site Mangamura was said to have caused huge damage to the local manga industry. According to Japan-based anti-piracy group CODA, in just two years Mangamura caused around $2.91 billion in losses but in April 2018 the show came to an abrupt end. Just days after the government in Japan announced emergency websites blocking measures against several sites, including Mangamura, the download platform shut itself down. At the time the move appeared to be voluntary but serious developments were taking place behind the scenes. It transpired that a criminal investigation was underway into the Mangamura’s activities, which eventually led to the arrest of the site’s operator, Romi Hoshino, in Manilla. Hoshino was later deported to Japan where he was arrested by the authorities in advance of a criminal trial. Close to two years later, Hoshino has now discovered his fate. Three Years in Prison, Heavy Fine On Wednesday at the Fukuoka District Court, Hoshino is reported to have appeared all in black and sporting a ‘buzz cut’. Nikkei notes that he maintained the same expression throughout as Judge Hiroshi Kamihara handed down a guilty verdict. According to the Court, the 29-year-old breached copyright law and concealed the criminal proceeds from Mangamura by depositing them into a foreign bank account. Judge Kamihara sentenced Hoshino to three years in prison and fined him 10 million yen (US$91,146). The Judge also levied an additional fine of 62 million yen (US$565,105), an amount equal to the advertising revenue earned from Mangamura between December 2016 and November 2017 and banked overseas. Justifying the sentence, the Judge noted that the punishment handed down was appropriate given the scale of the offending and the implications of allowing piracy to run away unhindered. “There is a risk of destroying the profit structure of copyrighted works from the ground up and hindering the development of culture. It is highly illegal,” he said. Publisher Shueisha Welcomes The Sentence After the decision was handed down, a spokesperson for publisher Shueisha welcomed the sentence and expressed hope that it would deter others. “If a work created with heart and soul is released for free, it will damage the soil where interesting works are born. The prison sentence is appropriate. We expect it will have a deterrent effect,” the company said.

The database of DDoS-Guard, a bulletproof hosting service utilized by many pirate sites, is reportedly up for sale on a hacking forum. DDoS-Guard was previously reported to the USTR as a 'notorious market' by the MPA for allegedly playing host to file-sharing giants BS.to, S.to, and file-hosting site GoUnlimited. According to the sale, the leak includes the details of whoever operates major Russian torrent site RuTracker. So-called bulletproof hosting services are a thorn in the side of anti-piracy groups everywhere. They operate much like regular hosting companies but are much more lenient when it comes to complaints from third parties, meaning that spammers, online gambling entities, and other questionable actors have a better chance of keeping their content online. Given that pirate sites now fall into these categories, bulletproof hosters are also havens for pirate sites. As a result, they attract the negative attention of Hollywood studios who complain about their refusal to deal with takedown notices responsibly. DDoS-Guard Previously Reported to the USTR Late 2020, the MPA made its annual submission to the USTR’s notorious markets study, including familiar pirate site targets such as The Pirate Bay, RARBG, YTS, 1337x, Popcorn Time, Leakthis, and Rapidgator, among others. The Hollywood group also included several Internet infrastructure companies for consideration including Peter Sunde’s Njalla, the .to domain registry, and several hosting services including Cloudflare and DDoS-Guard.net. The latter earned its place on the MPA’s list for playing host to large pirate and file-hosting sites including BS.to, S.to, and GoUnlimited. DDoS-Guard was also linked to so-called ‘pirate CDNs’ (including Kodik) operating from Russia. “Some of the biggest sites are taking advantage of DDoS-Guard’s services, including bs.to and s.to from this list. DDoS-Guard is not responsive to takedown requests,” the MPA told the USTR. While DDoS-Guard didn’t make it to the final report published earlier this year, the service could now have an even more serious problem on its hands. DDos-Guard’s Database and Source Code Reportedly Up For Sale According to a report from cybersecurity company Group-IB, last week it discovered an unusual sale taking place on the forum of hacking site Exploit.in. The forum is currently down, but Group-IB says the DDoS-Guard database and source code were allegedly on offer. “The database supposedly contains information about DDoS-Guard’s customers, including their names, IP-addresses, and payment information. In addition to the database, the threat actor claims to have the source code of the DDoS-Guard’s infrastructure,” Group-IB’s report reads. “The seller is currently auctioning the entire set at a starting price of $350,000. It is not possible to verify the authenticity of the alleged stolen data, as the threat actor didn’t provide the sample.” Obvious Implications For Pirate Sites Operating out of Russia (and according to the MPA, also the UK) DDoS-Guard is fairly well known for its dealings with pirate sites. In 2020, for example, Germany-focused music piracy site DDL-Music.to went offline after Universal Music took legal action against Cloudflare, which had been providing CDN services to the platform. DDL-Music later reappeared using the services of DDoS-Guard but it’s certainly not the only site that could be affected by the alleged leak of the CDN/DDoS mitigation platform’s database. As seen in the Group-IB-supplied screenshot below, the person offering the company’s data for sale specifically mentions RuTracker, one of the largest and longest-standing torrent sites on the Internet. The database and source package was initially offered for $500K but the price has been dropped by $150K, presumably to be of more interest to prospective buyers. The big question, at least as far as pirate sites go, is whether the leak (should it prove genuine) carries any useful information about the operators of the many pirate sites who have used the service. In many circumstances, CDN and DDoS companies are given fake or useless information which can lead to nowhere. However, if there was a level of trust that information would be kept secret, it’s certainly possible that some entities may have let their guards down. Considering its earlier research into the activities of DDoS-Guard as part of its Jolly Roger’s Patron’s report, TorrentFreak has asked Group-IB for a list of pirate sites using the platform. We’ll update this piece when that becomes available.

FindAnyFilm was launched more than a decade ago to act as a search engine to deter people from pirating movies. Today the service took a significant step forward by adding Disney+ titles to its indexes but there are still major shortcomings. Despite being the leading streaming movie platform with more than 200 million subscribers, Netflix content is still inexplicably absent. Once upon a time, anyone wanting to watch a recent movie would have a straightforward choice – go to the cinema or don’t watch it at all. Nowadays there are many more options but that hasn’t necessarily made things easier – at least for those who want to go legal. In contrast to pirate site users who can access all of the latest films without paywalls and with just a few clicks, those who want to access movies from official sources are confronted with a bewildering number of services, none of which will provide everything the average consumer wants. As a result, millions of people now subscribe to multiple legal streaming services with no easy way of searching across all of them. Add to that the need to pay for downloads of movies considered to be of a more premium nature and consumers can quickly find themselves down a rabbit hole with no straightforward way to find the content they want. FindAnyFilm.com – The Legal Movie Search Engine Founded way back in 2009 and currently operated by the Industry Trust for IP Awareness, FindAnyFilm hoped to become a valuable service to entice users away from the simplicity of pirate sites by providing a search engine to quite literally “find any film”. In practice, FindAnyFilm is useful for finding content available to watch in cinemas or buy on services such as iTunes, Prime Video, Amazon, and Sky Store. But it comes up short when the wider streaming landscape is considered. Today, however, the platform added a significant new string to its bow by incorporating Disney+ titles into its databases. “The Industry Trust works to keep consumers safe with education about the risks of infringing content, and FindAnyFilm acts as the ideal call to action for all anti-piracy outreach,” says Liz Bales, Chief Executive of The Industry Trust. “Building on the collaborative relationship between The Walt Disney Company and the Industry Trust, Disney+ is a vital addition to the site’s SVOD offerings, which serves our shared goal of ensuring that FindAnyFilm.com is the ultimate destination for consumers to search, find and watch content safely.” Discovering Content is Only Part of the Problem While finding great content is now easier than ever with the enhanced FindAnyFilm, the same old frustrations – which are nothing to do with the platform – soon raise their heads. For example, UK viewers desperate to watch the new Disney movie Cruella will indeed find it comprehensively listed on FindAnyFilm. Unfortunately, they will also learn that in addition to paying for a monthly Disney+ subscription, they will need to fork out an additional £19.99 to watch the movie. They could wait until August 27 when it appears in the Disney standard library but those with a penchant for pirate sites can watch it right now without paying a dime. Of course, that isn’t the spirit of FindAnyFilm, but it is difficult to ignore the competition when trying to recapture a pirate audience. But there is a bigger problem too. The Glaring Ommission That Doesn’t Get Talked About The Industry Trust for IP Awareness says that using FindAnyFilm.com ensures that consumers in the UK “can be certain that the content they love comes from a legitimate source, avoiding the personal risks inherent in accessing pirated content.” What it doesn’t mention is the massive hole in its ability to point people to the content they want. With more than 200 million subscribers worldwide, Netflix is not only the largest streaming service in business today but also one of the best piracy deterrents to date. By offering huge volumes of content at a fair price, Netflix has done more than any other platform to turn pirates into paying customers. Unfortunately, users of FindAnyFilm won’t be directed to any titles on Netflix. In 2016, FindAnyFilm told us that there was no working relationship between the platform and Netflix and five years on it appears that hasn’t changed. Anyone searching for ‘Army of the Dead’, for example, should pay close attention since instead of Zack Snyder’s latest horror offering, they could end up buying a movie of the same name from 2008. Anyone looking for the hit movie ‘Extraction’ should also keep their wits about them since the two titles offered do not star Chris Hemsworth. Adding Netflix Would Help Both Platforms Whether FindAnyFilm and Netflix will eventually team up is unclear but at the moment the lack of a partnership means that people are finding less legal content than they should, despite showing clear purchasing signals. FindAnyFilm does work pretty well generally but when it fails to come up with content when it really should, it leads to frustration and as we’ve seen time and again, frustration leads to piracy. The final issue is one of poor exposure to the internet-based audience where pirates can be found. FindAnyFilm.com is by most standards a poorly-trafficked site. Indeed, the numbers are so low that SimilarWeb doesn’t carry any visitor data and Alexa currently ranks the site #1,763,978 in user engagement. Even small pirate sites with the lowest visitor numbers have more reach, so this is something that will need to be addressed in order to transform the portal into a service that can make a big difference when helping people to part with their money.

The makers of movies such as “Dallas Buyers Club,” “Rambo V: Last Blood,” and “The Hitman’s Bodyguard” are putting hosting companies that work with VPN services under pressure. In two separate lawsuits, Leaseweb and Sharktech stand accused of failing to terminate customers that have repeatedly been linked to copyright infringement. A few years ago piracy-related lawsuits were pretty straightforward. Copyright holders would either sue alleged file-sharers or the operators of pirate sites. In recent months, we have seen a new breed of lawsuits, filed on behalf of the makers of movies such as “Dallas Buyers Club,” “Rambo V: Last Blood,” and “The Hitman’s Bodyguard.” Early last year these companies scored a big win when they convinced the operator of YTS, one of the largest torrent sites, to settle for more than a million dollars in damages. The echoes of those settlements are still heard in current lawsuits. As part of the agreement, the YTS operator shared information from the site’s database, which provided fuel for many follow-up cases against alleged pirates. The database also showed that several YTS users were using VPNs, which led to another attack vector. In several lawsuits filed over the past few weeks, the movie companies sued VPN providers for facilitating piracy. These cases are ongoing, but already another target group has been identified. Movie Companies sue Leaseweb Last week, Dallas Buyers Club LLC, Rambo V Productions, and various other companies filed a lawsuit against the U.S. branch of hosting provider Leaseweb. The complaint also lists various Doe defendants, which are unnamed VPN companies and their allegedly pirating users. The complaint, filed at a federal court in Virginia, is riddled with allegations. While Leaseweb doesn’t infringe any content directly, it is accused of knowingly providing services to VPNs that have pirating subscribers. For the movie companies, it’s not clear which VPN providers are linked to the IP addresses. They note that Leaseweb doesn’t always update the ARIN IP address assignments, which makes it hard to pinpoint the VPN services in question. Nonetheless, the complaint lists LiquidVPN, NordVPN, and ExpressVPN as potential Leaseweb customers, and Zenmate certainly uses Leaseweb’s services, they write. However, none of these companies are named as defendants. In addition, these VPN services don’t keep logs that can identify alleged pirates. One of the main allegations against Leaseweb is that it failed to terminate the accounts of these unknown VPN companies. The movie companies write that they sent over 32,000 notices but that Leaseweb did little more than forwarding these to its subscribers. Repeat Infringers The alleged lack of a reasonably implemented “repeat infringer” policy, as required under the DMCA, means that Leaseweb can be held liable for these subscribers, the complaint argues. They also claim that this draws other bad actors to the service. “Leaseweb’s subscribers are motivated to become customers from the knowledge of Leaseweb’s practice of ignoring notices of infringements or failing to take any meaningful action in response to said notices,” they write. The complaint argues that the unnamed VPN services and their pirating users engaged in direct copyright infringement, among other things. Leaseweb, for its part, is accused of contributory and vicarious copyright infringement. With this lawsuit the movie companies hope to recoup damages. In addition, they request a broad permanent injunction that requires Leaseweb to block common BitTorrent ports (6881-6889) and terminate repeat copyright infringers. Leaseweb isn’t the only hosting company that’s targeted. The complaint is similar to one that was filed a few weeks earlier against Sharktech. That case is ongoing and the hosting company has yet to file a response. Applying Pressure It’s safe to say that many of the characterizations will be disputed by the defendants. None of the claims have been proven yet, but that may not be the end goal. Looking at the legal history of the movie companies, they often apply pressure to then ‘settle’ these matters behind closed doors. In addition to going after hosting providers, the movie companies also sued VPN providers VPN.ht and LiquidVPN directly. VPN.ht responded to this lawsuit by filing a motion to dismiss, which is pending at the court. Meanwhile, the former operator of LiquidVPN signed a consent judgment with the movie companies. The agreement stresses that the man still has outstanding claims against the new LiquidVPN owners, which he has now assigned to the movie companies. These new owners were sued separately at a federal court in Florida.

Newton’s law of action and reaction applies to an array of things, including the ever-raging tug of war between pirate sites and Google’s search indexing algorithms. With every measure that the tech giant takes to shove these sites deeply down the search results pages, pirates respond with sincere efforts to “trick” the system and get back up. As noticed and reported by TorrentFreak, there’s a peculiar case of abusing the website of the European Banking Authority (EBA) going on right now, and it seems to be working quite well. Source: TorrentFreak The scammers are uploading PDFs filled with piracy-related search terms that people seeking something online are likely to type on Google. Because Google does not mark the EBA website as risky or illegal, the content on these PDFs is indexed, so Google Search displays the results high up. The upload works thanks to a backdoor that the actors have found, and although the EBA site admins are actively removing these files, more keep on coming all the time. The EBA site isn’t the only site facing this problem right now anyway, as the scammers are looking to do the same thing on any reputable organization they can identify as exploitable. Another example is Mississippi’s Department of Public Safety website, which appears to be hosting the same PDF files. So, all in all, the trick is working, and the scammers will continue to follow the same method until Google finds a way to address it. Source: TorrentFreak On that part, we should comment that when it comes to addressing problems that appear “simple,” the solution can be far from that. The scammers are now abusing a gap in the system that isn’t easy to plug, and even if the websites find their backdoors and fix them, the actors will continue to seek and abuse other websites. The solution must be given on the Google level, but again, this is practically very challenging