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Stanford Researchers Trying to Protect P2P Networks
dirvish writes "New Scientist has a story about efforts from researchers at Stanford to protect peer to peer networks from attacks that could be permitted by the proposed Berman Bill. Neil Daswani and Hector Garcia-Molina of the Database Research Department at Stanford University have mathematically modeled the Gnutella network to discriminate between nodes and supernodes. They then tested the nodes to find which rules could be applied to best avoid a malicious node on the network thus conserving bandwidth."
Circumventing attacks technologically is a good thing.
But stopping Congress from passing bad laws is equally as important. Join the Electronic Frontier Foundation and help build a lobbying group that can defend our rights. Her's more info about what your money can do for all of us.
"We're sorry, but the website you're trying to reach has been disconnected."
More importantly, Join the ACLU. The EFF has practices that unfortunetly go against practicality. The ACLU is an old and established group that fights for our rights. They do fight for our first amendment rights anywhere, including on the web. Lobbying againt the right wing republicans and ashcroft is a good thing
This technology seems to be a bit limiting from the story, would someone be able to provide more detail? I'm a bit concerned that it would significantly reduce the ability of a normal node to request files indenpendently of everyone else. It seems right now alot of P2P services suffer from "Me too" style networks, where if it is new and popular, everyone has it. But if it is even remotely indie, it seems you're the only one looking.
(as a slightly off-topic aside) Maybe that's just my bad luck, but I've been noticing that trend for awhile now. I wonder if that was the work of the *AAs...plague diverse and robust information exchange systems with a monomeme. Hmmmm....
Zech Harvey, MCSE, MCDBA, CCNA
If you can see it, and you can hear it, somebody will figure out a way to copy it
Any fighting back is simply bad business for the RIAA. They need to embrace the Internet, and include it in their business model in a much larger way. Gone are the days where people spend $20 on a cd, at least most people.
The reason Santa is so jolly is that he knows where all the bad girls live.
If the RIAA or another group knows more about how p2p works then everyone else they will have an advantage.
If other groups do research at least it will be a fair fight.
Maybe if looking at different types of attacks methods to protect against them will be found. If effective means can be found to validate requests this could go a long way to reducing all types of DOS attacks.
Attacking defending p2p networks is just a special case. This sort of research may be widely applicable.
Naah, tech defences are better. Who gives a shit about US laws? I mean, apart from Americans, and they've hardly been very successful in stopping legal attacks on free speech.
"Land of the free" indeed. You guys need a new slogan.
Someone needs to come up with a network that has file-rights management that lets you literally *share* your music. Once every device is wireless, even with DRM, you can just own say 25 CDs, and you can allow them to be shared into the network, so long as you lose the right to listen to them as they're being played on someone else's device. Because you (currently) legally own the right to share it (ie, give it away temporarily, as you would a pressed CD), once you've listened to a song, it's released back into the system for someone else to borrow.
Basically, the system will allow you to legally borrow on a song by song basis. This should meet all current legal issues, because you will not be able to listen to a song while someone else is. But, because everyone doesn't listen to the same song at the same time, not everyone has to own every CD.
Even if DRM is implemented, there must be a way to transfer a file from device to device (assumably removing it from one device) This "system" will just facilitate that transfer on a temporary, song-by-song basis, and keep track of who permenently owns an individual song.
Think of it as a "universal library."
I would love to see the record companies try to find some problems with this. I think the supreme court would smack em on their collective asses.
Wireless+"True Sharing"+Lending Distributer = Totally legal way to screw the record companies.
Lobbying againt the right wing republicans and ashcroft is a good thing
That is your opinion, and you have every right to it. It just really bothers me when people say their opinions as facts that everyone else should acknowledge. Personally, I signed a petition showing my support for Ashcroft, which I would sign it again today if it was needed. He agrees with a lot of the things that I agree with. And, Yes, that is my opinion. The ACLU fights for the rights they believe in. Granted, not ever group can defend all of our rights. That is why you should support the group that most aligns with your own ideals. In my case, it would be the EFF, and Ashcroft. The two are made up of- and are people just like you and I. Just as we don't agree, in some cases, they don't either. Such is life.
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In the long term, the most that you can say about the proposed bill, and research into protecting p2p, is that it will simply turn into a technological arms-race.
That will continue indefinetly, the real answer is not to allow such a blatantly stupid and damaging bill to be passed, and if it is passed, to get it struck down as soon as possible. Passing the technological edge back and forward in a war between the media monopolies and their p2p opponents, might sound fun to some, but its not the real answer.
Anyone who considers arithmetical methods of producing random numbers is, of course, in a state of sin.-John von Neumann
Well, I think userfriendly put it best, in that case.
There's a trade-off the RIAA and others like it (MPAA) don't realize. The kind of tactics they're using are not just driving people away from the sanctioned download sites, but they're driving people away from CDs themselves!
They're hurting their own user base. Right now, it's a very small percentage of that user base, but it's the educated and motivated portion, which is a danger to them in the long-run.
The Republican takeover of the (U.S.) Senate has at least one positive outcome - the indefinite shelving of the Hollings bill.
Everyone knows that the ACLU is hardly an unbiased organization. They support the first amendment, but only to the extent that it doesn't impede their own leftist agenda. Meanwhile, other important rights, like self defense and religion, are ignored or even attacked.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
"which I would sign it again today if it was needed"
No comment required on the above. These are indeed Asscraft's constituents.
The above story describes a classic example of a technical fix for what is essentially a political problem. That congress would even consider a bill legalizing such nefarious activity on the part of a corporate elite speaks volumes about who these people in Washington really are. Though I do believe that the difference between Republicans and Democrats is only a matter of degree, I must say that Asscraft has taken political demagoguery to a level heretofore unknown since the invention of writing.
"Lobbying against the rightwing Republicans and Ashcroft is a good thing."
I would only amend this to say that "lobbying against the rightwing" politicians of whatever party "is a good thing." I would also dare to suggest that lobbying against leftwing politicians who have fallen under the charm of massive corporate campaign contributions to the extent that they support bozo legislation that can only lead to a technological spy-vs-spy series of escalating dirty tricks is a good thing.
Hic iacet Arthurus, rex quondam rexque futurus.
I do believe the auto companies would be quite upset if people stopped buying cars
But you are missing the point. If we can now clone cars, there is no need for automobile assembly lines, since we can *all* have a car. What the IP proponents are proposing is that the cloning machine be outlawed in order to keep the auto manufacturers in business because they have some inherent right to exist, even at the expense of the populace at large. NOT COOL.
"But who will design the new cars?" some will ask.
Listen, if we have cloning machines and everyone can clone what they need, there will be a great deal more time for hobbyists who like to design new cars to come up with really fun new designs on their own. And as new designs come out, *everyone* can have one. No artificial limits, and everyone benefits, you see?
This is exactly what happens now in the free software community, so often maligned as idealists and communists and whatever else... but nobody can deny that the software is excellent... and that the programmers who work on it are happy, because they can work on what they like to work on, contribute it to the world, and expect other peoples' excellent contributions in return... it's a wonderful new age. Why kill it to save some company?
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
The problem is that people aren't "printing" their own material, they are using what the RIAA puts out. If the RIAA closed shop tomorrow, the face of P2P wouldn't change at all. It would still be used to trade songs that were put out by the RIAA. I have no problem with people using P2P to put out music they own the copyright on, but this is about .001% of the traffic on P2P networks. The RIAA isn't upset because the P2P networks are being used by people to put out music not on the RIAA labels (because that is not what is happening). They are angry because P2P networks are being used to trade music that the copyright owners don't want traded.
I'm sure the RIAA would like to control all distribution, but that is not what this argument is about. They didn't want Napster to stop trading all music, they wanted them to stop trading the music the RIAA controls (which, whether you like it or not is their right). Napster could still be around trading music from indie bands that want their stuff traded on it, but no one is interested in that, they are interested in downloading the newest Britney or Backstreet Boys song. If there was P2P that only traded in non-RIAA songs, the RIAA couldn't touch it, but anyone who makes P2P knows that people won't use it if they can't get what they want, and what they want is what the RIAA owns.
"Information wants to be expensive" - Stewart Brand, the same guy who said "Information wants to be free"
That your arguments make the (false) assumption that IP is valueless in all instances. Sure, the cost to copy digital information is (virtually) nothing, but that information itself has an inherent cost.
My brother is an independent recording artist. He's not signed to a label, but has a decent following. When he wants to produce a CD, the manufacture of tracks, mixing, engineering those tracks cost money. Hiring and paying engineers and additional musicians is not free. Even if you remove all barriers in distribution (ie distribute digitally; no record company) The actual recorded material has an inherent cost-- and therefore an inherent value.
While you're saying buzzwords like "rethinking the paradigms" perhaps you should be considering more than the distribution method.
While the most extreme of cyber-communists point to the open-source and free-software movements as an example of how "information should be free" They neglect to realize that the media created is a drop in the bucket compared to commercial software-- especially entertainment. Name one open source or free software game that can come close to competing with Grand Theft Auto or Age of Empires or Black and White or Resident Evil. They can't.
So, until the entire world becomes a communist state, where there is no money, and no motivation to work other than the betterment of mankind, (and this includes cleaning the toilets and laying the asphalt) people will be motivated by money, will need to be paid for their work, which will give an inherent value to IP.
The government cares more about shuting down distributed, encyrpted, p2p system, that provides anonymity more than they do ones that act as strictly a client-server model, such as napster. Why do I say this you ask, well it's simple, government's desire for control over the flow of infomation trumps out any over any other consideration. No amount of lobbying will help, joining ACLU or EFF is futile, government interest are too great. One only needs to look at their latest campaign finance law, to see how much they care for "the people". This war on terrorism, will be their excuse to shut down p2p's and demand complete control over the code on the internet, and people are so damn blined by lies that they will go along with it. Everyone with a brain knows that doing this will not help any anti-terrorism efforts, just as Jesus spoke in parables, so that people didn't see, the "terrorist" will use whatever architecture that the government lays down and just "say it in code".
"supposedly designed with DOS attacks etc... in mind" /. effect"
:)
/. crowd after 0.5, and even now it's not the least bit of a practical solution. Look at the usability for the non-technical community. Do you really think your average Kazaa user can just hop on over to Freenet and have the slightest clue what to do? From all I've seen so far, Freenet is much like how the early WWW was (in late 80's early 90's); hard to navigate, tough to find something unless you know what you're looking for. When there's a fast, reliable search engine that's easy to use, then Freenet will be close to ready. When there's no more data lose on the network, then it will be just about complete. When it's much, much faster (takes upwards of 3 or 4 minutes for a freesite sometimes), then and only then will it be a replacement. Until then, we best hope the research yields usable results for the kazaa/gnutella developers.
"it apparently suffered from
So it handles DoS's, just not very well?
I hopped in with the rest of the
-- "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."
Or maybe the engineers will just kill the legislators with their missiles and avoid the problem entirely. It's hard to pass laws when you're dead.
But trying to tell legislators "we know better than you" is immoral.
Yes, god forbid we should tell our elected representatives what we want them to do. Who the hell do we think we are? Citizens?
It is rather a sad state of affairs when university researchers are actively working to circumvent a (potential) new law. The government should really be wondering if this new law is a good thing, when a major, well-respected university is already fighting it!
If RIAA attacks P2P networks with the stated intention of protecting their copyright, wouldn't systems for countering that specific threat be in violation of the DMCA?
It would seem defensible if it were framed as an effort to make P2P more robust in general, but to describe it as a hedge against actions of the copyright holders, IMHO, opens them up for some serious deep-pocket litigation.