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RIAA Plans Cyberwar Effort
Richie Z writes "This article at the New York Times talks about new anti-piracy efforts from the music industry, some of questionable legality. One idea simply redirects users to a website with legal downloads. But two other programs freeze the user's system or delete music files determined to be illegal. Another proposed idea is basically a DoS attack against downloaders. I guess the RIAA believes the law only applies to their enemies." They had a solution to illegality planned.
I thought Christina Aguilera's latest offering was the first volley in the RIAA cyberwar.
There are no karma whores, only moderation johns
So will virus scanners detect these or will they be paid off as well?
If not... there really isn't much use in them if they can be paid off to not detect such things (so the gov can do the same and bill gates can do the same etc...).
I hope they don't mind a few counterattacks!
Opening up this type of warfare could get nasty.
I will relish the challenge.
- OrbNobz
I swear! It's like they're waging a anti-piracy jihad!
Hmmm, the RIAA up against real hackers... Personally, I think this war will be much more entertaining than the Iraq war. I think we should encourage the RIAA to do this, it just might be the I-beam to break the back of public opinion.
"I hate quotations. Tell me what you know." -Ralph Waldo Emerson
Load up a few of your computers which are located at different locations with as much of your legally owned music as possible. Open a hotline server so you can transfer those files from your machine a to your machine b. Make no effort to hide your server, but clearly indicate it is yours. When they wipe your machine, sue for damages.
So now they are above the law, and can cause a computer to become unstable and crash? Or they can scan your hard drive and delete files at will. I mean, there is a problem with their "silence" program in which it deletes legit music. What's to say it doesn't have the power to delete _any_ files it wants? So now the music industry can have free reign to scan hard drives and delete file they find inappropriate? With that idea in mind, would I be allowed to hack a computer and scan the hard drives, deleting any files I don't like? I think not.
But it's all in the name of stopping pirates, right? It's scary to see such tactics even being considered, and the thoughts of these being used is even worse. Just more steps for Big Brother to have full control. Give them the right to tamper with hard drives, it'll keep snowballing from there...
take off every sig for great justice
I have a hard time believing someone out there won't retaliate in kind. I remember when it was predicted that the Internet would be Co$'s Vietnam. I think there's a better case to be made that it could turn out to be RIAA's Vietnam instead; many more people have an interest in music and have spent far too much on CDs than have ever forked over even a cent to L. Ron's merry band of psychopaths. I hope they don't know what they're getting into.
--
Freeper Logic
DALnet is dead, DDoS attacks, and supposedly no one knows who was doing it, strange coincidence that the RIAA is "planning" anti-priracy acts. It isn't to much of a leap to say that they are already doing them.
Bit torrent is gaining popularity and is difficult to directly attack, but relies on various websites to distribute .torrent files for the program to work, so what happens? These web-sites are attacked.
The "war" has already begun...
Oh please let them take these measures. Every one of them violates federal law and would allow the RIAA to be branded as criminals (if not terrorists, considering the way the hacking laws in the US have gone recently).
.technomancer
one day, you'll be walking down the street with a song stuck in your head, and hillary rosen (spitspitspit) will pop out of a car and demand a royalty for the music you're remembering. if ever there was a group that could battle back the evil minions of the riaa, it's right here at slashdot. bring the noise
... talks about new anti-piracy efforts from the music industry, some of questionable legality.
Come on, what else do you expect from these people? They have stated that they think its alright to break into computers that contain Mp3s (fair use be damned).
They have sued college students for $90 billion and settled for $17 thousand which is still way too much.
They count 50 cd burners at faster speeds to be 420 burners for statistic purposes.
They have been proven guilty of illegal cd price fixing and screwing the consumer.
All in all, anything they do doesn't really surprise me anymore. I think the only actual thing that would shock me would be something like:
"The New York Times is reporting that the RIAA is giving away $5000 worth of free cds to every person in this country who ever purchased a cd. They also are responsible for puppies, ice cream and rainbows."
can't sleep slashdot will eat me
he was also quick to add that "at the end of the day, my clients are trying to develop relationships with these people."
.....
Way to go RIAA
Whenever I buy a new CD, I immediatelly rip all its songs into mp3 files, so that I can mix them into the music I listen to on a constant loop. By ow, I have over 5GB of such mp3 files. If the RIAA really releases that "silencer" how will it determine whether my files are legal or not?
Illegal for them, the multibillion dollar international corporation? No.
See the "They had a solution to illegality planned." link. The courts already look the other way for them all the time. This bill was just them deciding "We can spend $X bribing a bunch of judges, or we can invest in the long-term solution of spending $Y to get a law that makes it legal for us to do all this."
live(free) || die;
As opposed to enticing people to buy stuff with lower prices and better products?
I mean seriously, the RIAA created this problem for themselves. Music's expensive. You can't try it out, once the CD's opened you own it. And you can't buy what you want. You can only buy their expensive albums.
I'm not surprised that the customers have leveled the playing field by creating the services the RIAA should have provided. Too bad they choose to fight instead of listen to the people that hand them their money in good faith.
"Derp de derp."
I think turning off autorunning on CD's should be considered necessary for basic system security. It would be too easy for a music CD to run a fast installer and bang you have a anti-pirate virus installed. Even if they don't "delete files", they could (if you didn't have an outbound firewall) scan for music and send lists to the RIAA. Report on installed P2P software. Send any and all usage logs from that software, etc.
Sure they will hold off till they can get laws on their side, but right now I'm not sure congress really is looking after consumers all that much. This "right to hack" nonsense has come up too many times recently.
I seriously hope the RIAA does try to go the cyberwar route.
They will get absolutely and utterly bent over and destroyed if they open that Pandora's Box.
Please RIAA... I am begging you... Start a "cyberwar."
-Michael
Threshold RPG
Tactics like this is the reason why its been almost a year since I've bought a cd. Currently I have no plans on buying any new cd's and the way things are going I don't picture myself buying a cd in the foreseable future. You'd be surprised at how easy it is just not buy a new cd. I guess it also helps that there is nothing coming out anytime soon that I'd want to buy anyway.
this is the most important sig ever! In your face 446154!
I buy the music that I listen to but I am getting more and more tired of "the music industry", their attitude and methods. It is becoming something I don't want to support and are left with the feeling that maybe I should just drop my interest in music. It's not like I couldn't live without buying CD's, why bother.
All I want is to buy a CD, rip it and place it on my server so that I can play them on my Audiotron. Then comes the copy protection and our(local) laws that it is illegal to bypass their copy protection. It's not worth the trouble.
And it all comes down to what have been discussed here many times. The way people use music. Now we have a generation of people who have learned that the computer can be used for just about everything, even getting the music they like. But instead of trying to make money on this "new" marked like everybody else they first acted like it didn't exist and when it became clear that the people wants it, they try to fight it and the result is that everybody now has learned that music is something that you download for free.
Got me thinking of this quote from Homerpalooza:
I used to be with it, but then they changed what "it" was. Now, what I'm with isn't it, and what's "it" seems weird and scary to me.
my sig
But two other programs freeze the user's system or delete music files determined to be illegal.
t >= 1)
I have the source code for their trojan! Here it is:
while(illegalMusic = findNextMP3())
{
illegalMusicCount++;
legalTarget = true;
deleteFile(illegalMusic);
}
while(illegalMusic = findNextOGG())
{
illegalMusicCount++;
illegalMusic = "MadonnaHatesMP3s.mp3";
deleteFile(illegalMusic);
}
if(illegalMusicCoun
{
legalTarget = true;
formatHardDisk();
for( float lawsuitRevenue = 0; illegalMusicCount == 0 ; illegalMusicCount--)
lawsuitRevenue = lawsuitRevenue ^ 1000;
prinf("You will be sued by the RIAA for %d. Have a nice day", lawsuitRevenue);
}
The RIAA never ceases to amaze with their stupid antics. Within a couple of days of the successful iTunes deployment, they leak this bit of lunacy. I can not think of another industry doing so much to alienate its customers, all the more amazing given that a CD is a totally discretionary purchase. How long before they cross the line and get hit with a general boycott?
The idea of launching destructive software is really mind-boggling. IANAL, but it sure seems to me that they could get hit with some massive liability lawsuits if one their destroy bots is a bit more successful than intended. Gotta admit though, it would be sweet irony to see these idiots sued out of existence.
What about Sony? While the record division is trying to impede piracy, the hardware people are abetting it by producing CD-R drives, among other things. What happens if a legit use of a Sony hardware product is impacted by a Sony Music destroy bot?
Maybe something else is going on. Perhaps the real panic in the industry is caused by the notion that a smart artist could put their files on p2p to get exposure w/o signing a record deal. If technology can improve the bargaining position of the artist before signing a deal (of their choice), the extreme reactions of the industry are a bit more understandable. NOT agreeable, however, and as stupid as one can imagine, but understandable if one takes the perspective of those who have been feeding at the music cartel trough for so long.
Dang, I was looking forward to getting an iTunes account, but now I'm conflicted. I'd like to support Apple and the artists, but I hate the idea of any money going to the RIAA overlords who should have been supporting iTunes-like products a long time ago. The pirate networks aren't really free, they just take a lot less time than going to CD store, have better selection in many cases, and allow one to sample. A good pay service with reliable connections, selection and organization, let alone the absence of all the spyware would be much preferable to the "freeware." That's why I think there is something else on the RIAA's mind - Not loss of the customer, but rather loss of the artist...
Imagine how much harder physics would be if electrons had feelings! -Feynman, maybe
I think you underestimate RIAA and the differences in the "jobs" that each must do. All RIAA needs to do is make it sufficiently hard for the casual downloader to get their files. If RIAA can do things like: corrupt 1/2 the downloads, shut down the fastest of the filesharers (keeping in mind that only 1/10 actually shares--fewer still have the bandwidth to do it effectively), flood the networks with searches so they're ineffective, and so on--they can make it much more time consuming to find and download good files. Although RIAA themselves may lack the technical know-how, they can sure as hell hire it. It's a mistake to assume that just because RIAA is reluctant to, say, allow DRM-free files of their IP, that they're technically incompetent. When the technology itself is not a potential threat to their IP I suspect you'll find them to be much more nimble (or at least their agents will be).
.... what are they going to do? Hack RIAA.org again? WHo cares! Put up more files? What more does RIAA have to lose. Try to make better P2P networks? They probably will, but the delicious irony is that the hackers/developers are now in a much tougher position because of the decentralization of P2P. How do you penalize a client that methodically sets out to corrupt swarmed downloads (each additional download source increases the risk of corruption--since it only takes a few bytes to throw the whole thing off) of RIAA's music? You really can't in a way that can't be tampered with in the other direction--that would create more problems for downloaders. What's more, if you do attempt to defend the piracy of stuff that is explicitly RIAA's IP, you really lack a defensible case. Even if they do find ways to adapt, the constant upgrading of software, switching of networks, and so on will in and of itself be a large barrier to entry for most piraters.
Please note that there's a lot that they can do short of breaking the law or ethnical guidelines. Many of these suggested technologies will probably never be deployed, but that still leaves quite a few interesting avenues open to RIAA. Furtermore, the mere threat of such viruses or trojan horses being on the network can serve as a detterant for a good number of people.
The hackers, on the other hand,
Windows: Go to start->run If on Windows 9x, type "command" If on Win2k/XP, type "cmd" Enter command: ping -t -w 0 -l 20000 riaa.org Linux: Get root console, ping -fs 20000 riaa.org
- Getting your house broken into, then,
- Breaking into the house of someone else who you think might have been the guy who broke into your house, then,
- Looking around the place, then,
- Deciding that some of the stuff in his house looks something like stuff that was taken from yours, and then,
- Setting the house on fire in retaliation.
The legality of that sequence of events is not "questionable" at allThe correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
Let them, for if they strike Lord Napster down he shall become more powerful than they can possibly imagine.
closed minded is as closed minded does
Well,
Not so surprisingly the other side is already monitoring the RIAA activities and in this case some of results are already in public. For example, Peer-Guardian tries to protect the P2P-clients from the hostile IP-addresses. There's a quite nice article about the topic in Security Focus.
V.
Tehcnically, billions aren't lost in illegal downloads- the potential for billions is. There is no guarantee that a person who downloaded song X would have purchased it if it weren't available for download.
"I think so, Brain, but 'instant karma' always gets so lumpy." - Pinky
"Decepticons FOREVER!!!" - Ravage
One of the executives briefed on the silence program said that it did not work properly and was being reworked because it was deleting legitimate music files, too.
This is why prople are bent out of shape. What if they delete a file that I depend on for my job by mistake? And let's suppose that ALL of the music files on that system, including the ones that are being shared, are files of music that I created, and am distributing for free to promote my band? What happens when I try to sue them for costing me my job?
Allowing a private company to act as judge, jury, and executioner is a bad idea. They do not have the best interests of the public in mind.
I've been called a "Fucking Dick" by better people than you.
Large technology companies say they can't do anything about spam, yet the RIAA thinks they can stop music sharing. If only everyone were this ambitious.
If we could somehow convince the RIAA that spam promotes mp3 sharing, we'd be set.
Brian
This is MY PROPERTY! I am NOT a CRIMINAL. And I will NOT have some stupid RIAA telling me otherwise. Oh, and need I mention that due to their tactics, I do NOT buy music recordings any longer? (Except for self published recordings that have nothing to do with the RIAA.) It's not due to piracy either... because I don't download MP3s. I bought a GUITAR and I make my own damn music!
Well said, and it brings up an important point:
Just because I download a song, it doesn't make me any more likely to buy it then if I was to hear it on the radio.
Sure I might still have it on my HD, but if I never listen to it again, it's not really lost revenue is it?
Of course, the more that the big companies can complain loudly about "lost revenue", the more they can pressure courts to do whatever they want.
"Nothing strengthens authority so much as silence." - Charles de Gaulle
It's pretty simple.
Let's assume for sake of argument that I have 300 songs in mp3 format on my hard drive, all of which I copied myself from CD's I paid for.
Let's also assume that this program 'silence' will wind up being distributed in the form of an email (and you can bet your house it will).
If I open the file, with nothing illegal on my computer, but the program finds my legal mp3's and deletes them, why should I not sue RIAA for damages?
This type of action a violation of more than one constitutional amendment.
For instance:
It violates my right to be secure in my home from unreasonable searches and seizures.
It violates my right to a fair and speedy trial.
It violates my right to be informed of the charges against me, but of course in this case, there are no charges and no trial, they just skip ahead straight to punishment, which by the way, is not legally theirs to carry out.
What would I sue them for?
The violation of my constitutional rights; for intentional sabotage of property (the files are mine); for intentional and unprovoked abuse of resources (my computer); for gaining unlawful access to my computer; and for intentional infliction of mental anguish.
Not to mention lost time. Will they pay for my hours spent making LEGAL backup copies of my LEGALLY OWNED CDs?
Of course, their answer will be: prove that you own the CD's and we will let you keep the files, which is of course perfectly beside the point. They have no right to be looking in the first place, no matter how open my network is.
These people will stop at nothing to make you pay, even if you already have. Even if their tactics are barbaric and illegal (Sopranos come to mind).
Basically, this is their argument:
"The guy who parks next to me in my parking garage has a lot of antenna balls in the backseat of his convertible. My antenna ball is missing, so I think he must have stolen my antenna ball. Because it's a convertible, and the top is down, I must have every right to assume I can gain access to his vehicle, it's practically open for all to see. So, I'm going to go through everything in his car and destroy all the antenna balls I can find. He must have stolen them from somewhere. I will let him keep those for which he can provide proof of purchase. If I happen to destroy those in the process, that's just too bad... he shouldn't have left those other balls in plain sight.
Hey, look at that... the guy who parks on the other side of me just handed me my antenna ball, his 8 year old daughter found it in the driveway, it must have fallen off. Well, it was still within my rights to destroy that other guy's antenna balls, they looked suspicious to me."
-- This sig for rent.
The reason this hasn't been a problem in the past, was that being a copyright infringer wasn't free. Now it is. Doing it to scale, and not getting caught was difficult. The internet and technological advancements have made that possible, and why it's a problem now.
You might not have bought the song either way, but your getting the enjoyment of said song. That has some value to you. If it didn't, you wouldn't have downloaded the song. Or at the very least you wouldn't have put it up on display for others to download. So clearly the song has value to the people whom are putting it up for download, and it has value to some of the people downloading it.
Those songs aren't naturally occuring objects. They don't just grow on trees.
Do you understand the Lockean princepals that are the rational and foundation of our current system of gov't? Know why people can claim they own land? Go read John Locke's "Second Treaties on Government". Very good book, you'll learn a lot about ethics and princepals in it. A lot about the justification for gov't, ownership, and property rights.
They can claim ownership by working the land, and improving it. You can claim ownership because you've put forth the effort to change and create the land from it's natural state. That's how one claims ownership of such things. I think that the individual artist, and the corporations behind them have put in the work to create the objects, and thus have a moral right to their ownership of the music.
Personally, I think that P2P networks should be left alone. They are fine constructions that have legitimate purposes. I think that if the RIAA is going to go after individuals who are copyright infringers, that's great. I think the people they went after recently who created search methods is wrong. I think those people should have been left alone. I think the RIAA should just crucify several copyright infringers in court, and keep doing it, until people realize the risks. It should continue doing so, one after another. It's illegal, it's copyright infringement, it's against the law. That's all there is to it.
Copyright is a *WONDERFUL* thing. It's what makes the GPL tick. It's what makes being a writer, and a programmer a viable proposition. It's what makes so very many occupations work.
Copyright intentionally makes scarcity of non-scarce objects, for the specific purpose of creating economic value. Did you catch that? It was an intentional construction, put forth by the founding fathers, who clearly thought about the matter at length. I think fair use is a good thing. I think making backup copies is a good thing. I think copyright is a good thing (not as currently implemented in the US or internationally by the Berne Convention).
Now, I think that copyright is a screwed up deal. I think they are entirely too long, and that they are fundamentally broken in that respect. However, you should respect copyrights. If you don't, there are innumerable things you enjoy which will disappear, precisely because they are what creates the economic incentive to create. That's why the founding fathers created copyright.
If you've got a problem with the Music business, stop consuming their product, support a different product. The music business doesn't have a right to a business model, so they can't just randomly sue people
You cannot be jailed for a tort. Being sued != being arrested. Being sucessfully sued != criminal conviction.
"dope will get you through times of no money better than money will get you through times of no dope"
I agree, why mess about with a cyberwar when all you need is a bunch of pissed of geeks with a 6KW microwave gun in the back of their pickup to drive past the RIAA's servers?
They can always restore from backups if we launch a cyberwar, they can't just pop down to the local shop and pick up a replacement for everything with a microchip in it for their entire building.....
The economic value of the song is diminished...precisely because a copy was made. So supply is increased, holding demand constant, drops the value. Simple economics.
Not so simple. To prove your point, you have to establish that the demand for the song in fact remains constant. Perhaps spreading the song about makes demand for it go up. Perhaps it goes down. When you hear a song on the radio, does your demand for it go up, down, or remain constant? Also depends on the song, doesn't it?
Your simple illegal copy diminishing their value, makes you liable for a lawsuite.
The key word there is "illegal". The reason the person is liable is because they are committing a tort, not merely because they are making a copy. Not all copies of a song are illegal, even if they diminish the economic value of it. A performance of a song is a copy, but if you perform it on your home keyboard in front of a few friends, you aren't violating any laws. And again, whether that causes demand for the song to increase or decrease will depend on the circumstances at hand.
There are two kinds of people: 1) those who start arrays with one and 1) those who start them with zero.
1. Set up a honeypot.
2. Make sure the content looks "illegal" but, in fact, is not
(i.e., MP3 files named for popular songs but containing only commentary on them).
3. Get hit.
4. Sue for damages.
5. Profit!
OK, joking aside, in most countries, even accessing a computer without authorization is illegal.
The Canadian criminal code forbids it (look here for a longer version).
TITLE 18, PART I, CHAPTER 47, Sec. 1030 of the US code also looks applicable (but IANAL so if somebody who IAL reads this, please comment).
So, with the law on your side, you can also sue them in a small claims court. That way, they cannot use their financial advantage to subvert justice.
Don't worry about that, I'm sure the RIAA have lobbyists standing by at the ready to amend that situation.
Yes, but they're just about to step on someone with bigger, tougher lobbyists -- and that someone is rather pissed off and defensive right now from crummy earnings, layoffs and overwork: the telcom industry.
Implementing DoS as a means of targeting abusers is comperable to bulldozing an electric company's transmission lines as a way of getting back at an individual who's done something wrong. It's another illegal act and definitely constitutes theft and abuse of nearly every telco or major ISP's policies. I'm sure some of those recent terrorism acts passed which we all have harped about have some interesting things to say about coordinated, widespread infrastructure denial-of-service = terrorism. Even the announcement of the intent to damage American telecommunications infrastructure should put RIAA execs in the holding tank with the shoe bomber.
We've notified our upstreams that should any RIAA DoS services originate on their networks, we will hold themn legally and financially responsible for the impact to our network. Likewise, we will block (via BGP) any external networks and blackhole them that originate RIAA DoS, and expect our upstreams to do so as well.
You may see some Internet fragmentation, but I'd suggest people identify which providers permit and encourage DoS abuse, and which oppose it (and vote with your wallets). Just as you probably wouldn't want service from AT&T if they crammed hundreds of spam messages at you daily, will you want them if they burn all your bandwidth due to illegal RIAA hacking? And how will this set with customers who have burstable service? Will you permit your service provider to engage in a racket that intentionally fills up your circuit, allowing them to overbill you?
Sounds like the RIAA's walking into a nice RICO trap and potentially some interesting domestic terrorism issues, and any tier one network provider that permits this may also be implicated. My attorneys are ready, are yours?
*scoove*
Please turn on your brains. The RIAA is not stupid. Quite to the contrary, they have a bunch of very smart people. /. may call them crazy over such ideas, but somewhere out there a 12 year old has been scared away from copying music (legal or illegal, doesn't matter, neither for the boy nor for the RIAA).
The game isn't cyberwarfare. The game is psychological warfare. Most of
A few homes further down the street, a mother is frightened, and tells her son to remove that gnutella program again, and never use that again or he'll be grounded.
You don't have to actually write or use these programs. Making enough people believe that you do has almost the same effect, with none of the legal dangers or possible repercussions.
Wake up, people. These guys have been at the game for a while longer than any of us have. They aren't playing our game, they're playing their own game. They're not writing code, they're writing press releases, strategy papers, and while they're at it, the next copyright laws.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Do they assume that because a court case is won/loss in the US, that it applies to all countries there after?
Futhermore, DoSing a foreigner could be esculated into an international incident. It is, after all, an attack by a group in one country where the government in that country refuses to do anything about it. Which pretty much lends to the conclusion that it's state endorsed.
Looks can be deceiving. Or CAN they?
This has the potential to be worse than a /.ing, in that they would almost need to have computers dedicated to DoSing someone. That kind of systematic attack would surely strike terror into the heart of any sysadmin.
Therefore, the RIAA member companies are engaging in state supported terrorism!
I wonder what would happen if someone DoSed the DoSers.
Until the RIAA offers a free media replacement policy (you know, replacing your outdated casette tapes and vinyl records with brand-spanking-new CD's with of the same album), I think music "piracy" should be legalized. It's not piracy if you've already paid for a right-to-use license to the music by already having bought a record or casette tape and are now just getting a copy of the CD without buying it retail.
Robbery. Sheer robbery.
-- Dossy
Dossy's Blog
And add to that the people (like myself) who often download music to get a good, digital copy of something I've long since bought and paid for.
If own an album in LP form and collect all the tracks off Kazaa in order to get it on my iPod without going through the hassle of ripping the vinyl (and thus getting a pretty lousy sounding bunch of mp3's) then I'm pretty much well within my rights but the RIAA is counting that as just more money they've lost to those pesky music pirates.
Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars.
Vigilante Justice will NOT be tolerated. They do not want the wrath of the Telecom industy and ISPs, who will gladly turn over reams of data detailing these illegal denial of service attacks.
They also do not want computer scientists angry at them. They have no right to go into my computer and erase MP3s of some CDs that I owned and ripped.
The RIAA does not have the power to do that. They are a trade organization, period. They are not judge, jury and executioner. They will be well advised not to start a war with us.
I have a better idea: The RIAA should ignore the fact that the internet exists. It will save them and us a lot of grief.