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Hollywood Muscles Aussie ISPs Over Movie Downloading
Tenaka Kahn writes "Whirlpool is reporting that American movie companies are using a company (MediaForce) to try and muscle Aussie ISPs into disconnecting users who indulge in movie sharing."
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Proving once again that U.S. government and businesses recognize no boundaries, CNN (among others) carries tidings of U.S. District Judge Stephen V. Wilson refusing to drop a copyright infringement suit against Kazaa owner Sharman Networks Ltd. (based in Austrailia, incorporated in Vanuatu) brought by the music (RIAA, no doubt) and movie (MPAA, also, no doubt) industries. Perhaps Sharman Networks spokeswoman, Kelly Larabee, should consider the fate of Manuel Noriega and how 21 million (where do they come up with these numbers?) americans are at risk of subversion by wanton music and movie swapping. Battle of the Coral
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
It seems like if they can't stop it in the US of A they might as well try some other countries...
A company can not just barge into another country and demand their wants and rules be met. They have no legal clout, they filed no suit, it's as if someone from the next town over from where you live barges into your house and tells you to stop using your alarm clock to wake up in the morning because he created the alarm-buzzer noise.
If they cave though, then bullying becomes a legal and effective way of getting your way, and we're all screwed.
SecondPageMedia - Wha
President Georges W. has announced a new US NAVY/USAF taskforce destined to take out the communication equipment of foreign ISPs who are complained against by the *AA. The technology used is a combination of EMP and smoke-signal broadcasting.
How did anyone else other than the ISP get the IP addresses? For this company to get this information, they have to be doing some sort of spying. Obviously this is only taking place in AUS because these people could not get away with it here.
Tracking by IP address is becoming more and more useless all the time. You can basically just wardrive around your neighborhood until you find an open network, and then download all your warez from there. Who will get in trouble? Not you!
Some people can even connect to other networks without leaving their own house (some California houses are really close together). You could even target someone to get in trouble just by using their open network (they might have thought they were being generous).
Sex - Find It
With 1 GB or 3 GB transfer caps, and very expensive per MB charges for data transfers in excess of this, Australian broadband users are hardly likely to be sharing any movies.
Thanks ... from now on, I'll just have to get my copyrighted materials from a reputable pirate.
Karma? Karma? I don't need no stinkin' karma.
I imagine that about now, a whole bunch of small Aussie ISPs are pooling some cash for legal advice on exactly what they are liable for. IANAL, but such things as "common carrier" provisions, "Fair Use" and so forth are not the same as in the US. For instance, you can't tape television shows on your VCR in Australia. (warning: PDF links abound).
More info on Australian copyright law is available from the Australian Copyright Council. Interesting links:
"Einstein argued that [...] God is not capricious or arbitrary. No such faith comforts the software engineer." ~ Brooks
Take a look here for a sample. This is what the ISP received, most likely.
Since you own this IP address, we request that you immediately do the following:
There really isn't anything that MediaForce can do. Their issue is with the user, not the ISP. I'm sure the ISP will be willing to answer any subpoena requests, but the idea of the ISP seriously thinking about disabling a customer because of one of these notices is silly.
Ask anyone who is in the right place at a big ISP. They'll tell you they get hundreds of these.
Adam
Warner Bros: Hello, some of your customers are downloading copyrighted material on KaZaA.
ISP: Ummm... Well, we're going to have to get back to you on that.
Warner Bros: While we're on the phone, would it be possible to send Steven Case to you guys via air mail? We don't want him.
ISP: Ummm... No.
Warner Bros: He may be useless, but he doesn't eat much. Please?
ISP: Goodbye.
*click*
Warner Bros: Never a break...
...oOOo..'(_)'..oOOo...
I imagine that only a tiny fraction of the movies shared are made by Warner Bros anyway, after all they don't actually produce pr0n do they? :p
IANAL, but isn't sharing a movie or music a copyright violation? The owners of the copyright are asking the ISP to stop the people who are infringing their copyright. What is the problem? Copyright is pretty much international law with the Berne convention. I see no jurisdiction problem here.
Q.
You said: "Well, I suppose when Bush wins in 2004 and we all move to Australia, we'll have to run our file-sharing apps via carrier pidgeon."
Fortunately they'll be prepared. There is a protocol: RFC 1149 and a sucessful test by a LUG in Norway.
Suddenly, the hairy finger of a familiar monkey tapped me on the shoulder. It was time.--G. T.
prepare for karma burn...
australia still has copyright law, and ISPs still tend to protect themselves by stating in their TOS that users who use the service to break a law are subject to termination of service. the majority of "hollywood" (read: major studio productions) are protected by international copyright, thus making it entirely legal and right for the american studio to inform the australian ISP of a user on their system violating copyright.
it's just as if you contacted an australian ISP and informed them of a user sending out SPAM. would you not expect the ISP to repremant the user, if not disconnect them entirely?
of COURSE the studios have legal clout. it's basic, every day copyright. you run a distribution system for movies protected by international copyright, you are breaking the law. this is not personal use. this is not fair use. this is an illegal distribution meant to subvert payment. framing it as anything else destroys every good-natured and honest approach to legal reasons for allowing filesharing. when you lie, you make a better case for filesharing to be illegal.
Did any one catch that? First of all, it is unfortunate that they are considering to abide... but that is not the scary part. The scary part is that Australian ISPs are seeking legal advice to check whether US companies have any jurisdiction in Australia!!!!!. Naturally, there are few lawyers here, but isn't it obvious that regardless of how big or scary a company is, it has no jurisdiction outside of US. Nothing in US has jurisdiction outside of US (besides the army maybe...)
In case the RIAA feels left out, do your MP3 collection too. Of course, the RIAA coud poison the stream as it were by encoding the "Stallman Sings" MP3s, but that might be a little too evil, even for them.
I bet you could even make it rather difficult to track origin of the CDs down (Corner post box 3 states over, anyone?)
Of course, I don't pirate (Really!) I just like not having to shuffle through 50 or 60 CDs every time I want to listen to one specific song in the collection. I am also offended by the fact that the potential of the technology to deliver any content to my home any time I want to view it is being slaughtered by the *AA in the name of protecting their outdated business model. If there'd been a Horse Buggy Association of America 100 years ago, we'd still be riding in horse drawn carriages today.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
What if you had another reason to use those ports, a reason they don't know about.[?]
Well, you could either convince your admin to open the port to you, or buy your own connection. You're in college to learn - unfettered net access is not a requirement.
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
Look at
/ 0, 2000024985,20271225,00.htm
http://www.zdnet.com.au/newstech/security/story
One interesting quote:
"Brendan Scott, a lawyer with Gilbert and Tobin, said it was uncertain whether MediaForce could bring legal proceedings against an Australian ISP. "The reason I say maybe is that the law prohibits reproduction and distribution to the public, but, from memory, doesn't directly impose obligations on third parties," he said."
So, mediaforce is probably going to have to go after the users one by one...
IP RANGES - MediaForce "MediaDecoys" have been spotted on irc networks (dalnet and efnet, at least) from these netblocks:
4.23.190.*, 65.247.105.* (matching *.regional-one.net hostnames), and 65.215.219.*
They have another netblock 208.251.137.0/24, as well.
MODUS OPERANDI - The "Decoys" are described briefly at http://www.mediaforce.com/services/mediadecoy.asp
The description they give their MediaDecoys exactly describes what we call a Denial of Service attack. They're boasting that their decoys are capable of flooding an alleged copyright infringer with requests to prevent anyone else from downloading from them. Such an action is unambiguously illegal in many states, and this company is doing it all without actually verifying that the person is offering AND sending a copyrighted work. They're taking blatantly abusive action against people that haven't been proven to be violating any laws.
The decoys that we see on IRC essentially do the following (discovered by watching their activity from the viewpoint of the irc server itself):
1) after connecting to an irc server, issue a LINKS command, presumably to discover more irc servers to connect to
2) occasionally do a LIST to get lists of large public channels
3) join the discovered channels and watch for activity
4) if there are any public fserves advertising in the channel, the decoy first attempts to do a public trigger to activate the fserve and get a list of files being shared from it
5) if the channel is moderated the decoy attempts to trigger the fserve directly via private msg or ctcp, or does a standard XDCC LIST. No files are actually requested or downloaded
6) after 2 or 3 minutes of no fserve advertisements, the decoy leaves the channel and continues searching for more.
7) the decoys watch channel activity for mentions of any other channel names (channels that are 'private' and don't show up in the public channel list), and attempt to join those channels as well.
8) a few (not many) of these decoys have also been observed sending XDCC LIST commands to other clients that simply have 'dcc' in their nicknames.
Nobody has observed these decoys actually downloading anything, so it baffles me how they can assume that the files being advertised are the actual files being sent if a person COULD download the file, or even assume that the person is in fact SENDING any files. In addition, if there are other decoys on the network whose sole purpose was to launch some sort of attack against irc clients sharing files (as described on the page mentioned above), we haven't found them yet.
Hope this clears a few things up about how their decoys work and what to watch for.
Max, the webspider monkey says "MediaForce Sucks!"
I actually like the decoys, and am surprised those here who profess to respect copyright don't also. Points:
It's not entrapment; the "victim" goes in with a predisposition to pilfer copyrighted music, and the gov't isn't involved anyway. Perhaps the victim could say they weren't aware the material was copyrighted, but really, they were saved from committing an offense. Wasted bandwidth? Direct consequence of the pirate's misdeed. Deception? Yes, and entirely legal, even just. The best argument against it is merely ethical, that the decoys are (maybe) interfering with fair use, if fair use can be stretched that far. Perhaps also the bogus files clog up the P2P network by spilling into legitimate searches, but I'd like to see evidence of it first.
It's a shame, really, that piracy has to break up things like Napster, and perhaps soon Kazaa et al. It ruins the fun for the rest of us and hobbles a promising technology. The pirates should be recognized as partners with industry in bringing these down. Without the infringement the industry would have nothing to take to court, eh?
So, load 'em up.
Unfortunately, there are some people who respond to threats. In Australia we have had a number of ISPs that have failed to honour the contracts they have made with their customers out of fear of litigation. This kind of yellow belly behaviour is common where the threatened feels no respect for those who will suffer from their complacency. These are the people we need to report.
If you have had your account removed or your service disconnected by your ISP, please report it!
It is the responsibility of our freedom loving society to avoid service providers who fail to protect that freedom. If each of us take notice of these reports and boycott those ISPs that fail to protect us, then maybe we can affect real change.
How we know is more important than what we know.
Go to a different school. That's about all you can do. Last time I checked, we still hadn't passed the Constitutional amendment that guarantees free and unfettered broadband internet access to all citizens regardless of race, religion, color, creed or P2P app. So, write your congress person today!
Today's Sesame Street was brought to you by the number e.
I have no problem with the record/movie companies going after the users. Isn't that what the slashdot crowd has been crying all along? Don't go after the networks, go after the users? Hell, when people stop crowding my isp with nothing but illegal traffic, maybe my connection won't run like a pig?
What I do have a problem with is a bunch of arrogant american fuckwits, obviously blinded by the sunshine that comes out of their mate's asses, who think they have the right to force THEIR laws on others. Here's an idea assholes, if you're going to tell people in other countries how to run their god damn lives, take 5 minutes, 5 MINUTES to find the relevant australian law to go after them with.
......http://online.securityfocus.com/archive/1/30647
technically, when one participates in a P2P network such as FastTrack, they're still not violating copyright law.
Here's the point I want to make in a nutshell, and argue about it as you will:
nobody is violating copyright laws by simply "sharing" files. The only copyright infringers are the ones who download shared files without owning a license to those copyrighted works.
In other words, in order to break the law, one must download a copyrighted, non-free file that you don't have the rights to use. When the RIAA or MPAA claims you are breaking the law, they are bluffing - they have no way to ascertain whether you've actually got a license to use the files you share, and they have no idea whether you're downloading files which you don't have rights to.
Note that this whole argument took place many years ago when the VCR first came into popular use.
An ISP should not take action based on an unsubstantiated e-mail from some unkown entity who claims to have some authority.
These buffoons in their airconditioned offices with their window views are going to have to put in a full days work to make a difference here.
Any ISP worth their salt will not give these people any personal details. They will also know that they cannot take action against the user without some proof or some order from a local authority.
If Media Force wants to get into Australia they are going to have to stop sending worthless e-mail s and speak to local Australian law enforcement. Learn local laws and try and take this to offenders properly.
In reality they won't do that. They are going to just sit back and send their worthless e-mails and collect their fat cheques from Warner etc. No big days work coming out of Media Force, I'll wager.
The good news is that at some point the Record mafia will realise how inneffective these stupid upstart companies are and will drop them.
They will go broke and hopefully go back to loan sharking or selling snake oil.
technically, when one participates in a P2P network such as FastTrack, they're still not violating copyright law.
Here's the point I want to make in a nutshell, and argue about it as you will:
nobody is violating copyright laws by simply "sharing" files. The only copyright infringers are the ones who download shared files without owning a license to those copyrighted works.
In other words, in order to break the law, one must download a copyrighted, non-free file that you don't have the rights to use. When the RIAA or MPAA claims you are breaking the law, they are bluffing - they have no way to ascertain whether you've actually got a license to use the files you share, and they have no idea whether you're downloading files which you don't have rights to.
The only way this could possibly be true is if you have the right to distribute the material, which you don't. Owning an MP3 can be perfectly legal, provided you own the CD and ripped it yourself. But that in no way implies you have the right to distribute that MP3 to anyone else. It is legal for you to have an play, but illegal for you to distribute to other people, even if you believe they own the CD, since it was determine all MP3s aren;t equal, you only legally are entitled to the MP3s ripped directly from your CD. So in essense, the law is being broken twice. Once by the person downloading the material, but also by the person distributing material they have no right to distribute.
"Information wants to be expensive" - Stewart Brand, the same guy who said "Information wants to be free"
ISPs - Don't log anything that isn't 100% necessary, and then set it up so it autodeletes to protect your customers. Remember that your customers are your most valuable business asset, and third parties asking you to close and account are creating a retention problem. Can you afford a 1%-3% increase in attrition?
Record/Movie Biz - Stop the witch-hunt before public opinion turns on you. Copyright is an abridgement of free press and speech... What the people gave you, we have the power to take away... Find ways to lower costs and make getting new music easy... and for God's sake MARKET DECENT MUSIC and MOVIES. Most of the crap you've foisted on us is suitable only for MST3K or the soundtrack of a movie on MST3K... Come out with something NEW already (when the biggest movies of the year are based on an old novel and a comic book or are sequels, you aren't exactly pumping out the new ideas...)
-- $G
However, saying copyright is theft is factually inaccurate. Im going to quote someone more qualified than I on this though:
" This is not a matter of opinion, but rather of law. Copyright violation is a tort, i.e., a claimed business wrong that can be settled as a matter of civil law between the two parties. There are sundry defences and exceptions that might apply. One's local public prosecutors won't pay for the investigation or lawsuit -- because they do that only for matters of criminal law. Which brings us to:
Making a copy of an abstract property over which legislated monopoly exists does not qualify as "theft": Theft is a concept in _criminal_ law, under whose provisions it applies only to tangible property (and therefore not to [downloaded songs or movies]). Crimes are wrongful acts that are considered injurious to _society_, unlike civil torts, which are private disputes that can be settled in court. Criminal cases are underwritten and paid for by the state. Proof must be shown beyond any reasonable doubt, instead of a mere preponderance of the evidence (as in civil cases). The claimed victim can't get "damages", unlike in civil law -- as the dispute is between the accused and the state, not the accused and the claimed victim. Last, the accused can be imprisoned, instead of just being subject to monetary awards and court orders." Rick Moen (Linux Mafia - posted this on the rec.arts.sf.written.robert-jordan newsgroup about "theft" of an e-book. However, its applicability here is obvious.
Course, I tend to forget that the /. crowd likes to lean toward the everything should be free mentality and we all should live in Shangri La where everyone can get whatever they want without consideration of the people who actually created the product.
Finally, just because a company is based in the US it doesn't mean they have no legal complaint in other nations. Many companies hold both US and international patents and copyrights in other nations. With the economy being as global as it is doesn't only make sense to protect your property as much as possible in all of your markets?
Bitch all you want, but if these companies hadn't been publishing the movies/music all these years none of you would have anything to steal/share. This doesn't make those companies infallibe in my eyes but their actions don't make them the hand of the devil either. They are a business protecting their interests - just like you guys contacting ISPs to encourage them to do nothing are trying to protect yours.
Oddly enough though, I imagine if you were the president of one of those same companies I imagine your view would change pretty quickly. People are notoriosly willing to be careless with other peoples money.