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RIAA/MPAA vs. xMule Author, EarthStation 5
Two bits of news in the ongoing battle between the RIAA/MPAA and the rest of the internet: One P2P company, apparently based in Palestine, has thrown down the gauntlet to the movie industry. Meanwhile, a developer of another P2P tool who unwisely chose to live in the USA has been shut down (mirror) by the RIAA.
From the website, it seems they do have their privacy ducks in a fairly neat row:
;)
ES5 #1 goal is to protect its users from intrusions to their privacy by providing encrypted traffic, random ports and IP anonymity:
ONE CLICK PROXY SERVER - Users can send connection requests through intermediary proxy servers located throughout the world so that the download destination of a file cannot be traced by any entity whatsoever. There is nothing for the user to set-up, just right click to enable the proxy server.
SSL - SECURE SOCKETS - Prevents monitoring of a user's uploading or downloading activity. Users can automatically deploy SSL by right clicking.
UDP -USER DATAGRAM PROTOCOL Using UDP makes it impossible to reliably scan a useras computer to determine if ES5 is running. Also, unlike TCP connections, UDP traffic can not be easily blocked by ISPs.
ES5 SECURITY KEY - ES5 utilizes a standard HTTP server to transmit files, but deploys a special "security key" so than only ES5 users can access your shared files.
IP ADDRESSES - ES5 does not display user IP Address information.
DYNAMIC PORTS- Each ES5 node uses a randomly chosen port (unless the user chooses a specific port themselves). Therefore, ISPs will be unable to identify file-sharing traffic based upon port numbers and unable to throttle back the users bandwidth.
USER DEFINED PORT SETTINGS- ES5 provides users with "one-click" port setting options for ES5 to use port 53 (the port used by DNS) or port 37 (the port used by time service) therefore rendering all blocking attempts hopeless.
MULTIPLE POINTS OF ENTRY - ES5 uses multiple methods for connecting to the ES5 network including IP Multicast, Usenet Articles, Web Sites, Node List Files and a several other undisclosed methods.
PENETRATING FIREWALLS - UDP allows seamless penetration of firewalls without inconvenient setting of firewall parameters. For users behind firewalls, ES5 uses UDP to request a PUSH, where the behind-the-firewall computer initiates the connection back to the requested user's computer. PGPDisk - As an additional security feature, to all P2P programs, is that ES5 integrates seamlessly with PGPDisk (which is a free program and will be provided by ES5 to its users) that lets you encrypt your disk drives to store your P2P content. No one except you will ever be able to see your files, not your kids, your spouse, your mother, your boss, the FBI, the KGB or anyone else!
So, the plot thickens. Whatever will the *AA do?
everything in moderation
And from this mans blog :
So I just tried installing ES5 on my Windows machine. The first thing
it did is attempt to connect to an IP in the Gaza Strip. The
administrator for that IP block is someone with an earthstationv.com
email address. Then my keylogger warning program popped up and
complained that the program had attempted to hook to my keyboard. I
killed it, and ran an uninstall. The uninstall failed because some of
its DLL's were still 'in use' despite no matching processes. I rebooted
and was able to do a successful uninstall manually. Afterwards, I
checked my registry and removed a fresh entry from "Intertrust," a
company that makes DRM software.
Overall, an entertaining experience.
Below is a copy of my letter to my senator, McCain, of Arizona. Feel free, indeed encouraged, to email your own senator (or even others!) and representatives. You can find their addresses at http://www.senate.gov/ and http://www.house.gov/
With respect,
Un-Thesis
=====================
Dear Senators,
Some of you have . It affected me personally on 17-Aug 03. I am the main developer of one of the few person-to-person filetrading programs for UNIX (Linux, FreeBSD, etc) machines and MacOS X.
Apparently I was struck without warning by some DMCA clause for downloading 'copyrighted material.' In other parts of the law, you need habeus corpus, search warrants, judicial review, warning, etc. With the DMCA they merely terminate you, with no warning, with no appeal, with no representation, with no pretense of jurisdiction, based upon evidence that was 100% obtained outside the framework of any noticeable governmental or 3rd-party oversight.
In short, it is an apparently open fascist policy prone to rampant abuse, supporting the rights of the Establishment over the People.
My life revolves around the marvelous information transport technologies collectively referred to as the Internet. I attend a part-time university online (www.accis.edu), near 95% of my contact with my friends and family is online, 100% of my employment is online (via rentacoder.com), and my personal hobbies (www.xmule.org) and political activities (www.fearlesszippy.com, wakeup-people.com, etc) are online.
In short, terminating my internet without warning has seriously halted my life. It is time we make the right to chat online a fundamental human right. The government should be allowed to restrict a person's movements (prohibit uploads, downloads, etc) by placing restrictions on the amount of data a 'criminal' should be able to send online in a given day or so (500KB should be sufficient for email, chat, etc). Such bandwidth caps are already implemented by teh vast majority of broadband suppliers throughout the nation adn would be just about as easy to implement and enforce as the current DMCA suspension of accounts.
I just wish there would be *some* judicial process involved in the DMCA. I should have my constitutional right to a fair trial. This is above and beyond the reasons why most people download movies. People overseas download movies and music because of artificial monopoly regulations that delay the international exportation of American media by weeks and even months.
People in America download media because they are either too poor to purchase the overpriced media, and also primarily to see if a given media is of good enough intellecutal quality to warrant purchasing, due to the unequal consumer rights 'laws' which prohibit the returning of open media.
Generally, people download not out of nefarious intent, but because they lack real alternatives to verify the intellectual quality of any given electronic Media before purchasing.
Thus, more consumer rights laws, less 'illicit' copyright infringement.
Sincerely,
Theodore R. Smith
Promote freedom; fight fascism.
Israel has never once started one of the wars that it has participated in
Sorry, I think you must have forgotten about the six day war in 1967 (OK so it was a "preemptive strike". Name a war where the first person to attack hasn't claimed that). You also seem to have overlooked the 1978 and 1982 invasions of Lebanon -- the last one being condemned even by the US. So by my counting Israel was invaded twice in the last 55 years: the 1947 independence war and the 1973 Yom Kippur war. Perhaps you were confusing Israel with Lebanon, which has never started a war but has been invaded three times in the last 30 years (by Syria in 1976, Israel in 1978 and 1982).
However, it should be noted that there has never been a strike against an unimportant figure.
I suppose that depends how you defined important figures. Even if you count any suspicious looking palestinian as "important", I don't see how you can include people like James Miller, a british reporter, or Iain Hook, a UN aid worker. Of course the Israeli army admits these were "mistakes", but does that exonerate them?
Never do you see in the news: Israel kills busload of Palestinian schoolchildren. Why?
Because the Palestinians don't have the option of sending in helicopter gunships to assassinate Israeli politicians. I'm not condoning suicide bombings, but your comparison is laughable. In a conflict, each side will naturally make use of the means at its disposal. Moreover israel's "targeted assassinations" invariably kill many more people than just those being targeted -- but obviously a 6-year-old girl who happens to live next door to a Hamas leader doesn't matter as much as a 6-year-old killed in a suicide bombing.
The author of this post asserts his moral rights.