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This is How We Catch You Downloading

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the line-and-worm dept.

marto writes "All over Europe thousands of people are being threatened with court action for allegedly sharing games like Dream Pinball 3D on P2P networks. Now, documents obtained by TorrentFreak show details of the anti-piracy company's techniques for identifying alleged file-sharers on the internet and the gathering of claimed 'forensic quality' evidence for use in court cases."

24 of 308 comments (clear)

  1. Good thing you can't mask your IP address by beavis88 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Or these guys would be SOL.

    Oh, wait...

  2. Automated lawsuits by ConfusedSelfHating · · Score: 5, Interesting

    They seem to be very sure that an ISP keeps accurate IP address records. Why do I feel that this will result in a semi-technical employee of the ISP pulling up who the IP Address is currently leased to? I feel sorry for all of the people with a wireless network using a SSID of "Linksys". Expect a letter tommorrow.

    Does anyone else feel that it doesn't matter to the RIAA/MPAA if their lawsuits are accurate or not? If you send intimidating letters to people, some of them will settle even if they are innocent. You can then claim X number of settlements and declare victory.

    This is a great scam for someone who wants to commit fraud on a national scale. Send people letters claiming that they breached copyright law and demand a settlement. Offer an opportunity for settlement for $2000. If they get a lawyer, drop any claim. If they ignore it, write it off. If it costs you a dollar per letter and 0.1% of people accept your "offer", a million letters will net you a million dollars. Maybe this is the new business model for big media.

    1. Re:Automated lawsuits by mgv · · Score: 4, Interesting

      This is a great scam for someone who wants to commit fraud on a national scale. Send people letters claiming that they breached copyright law and demand a settlement. Offer an opportunity for settlement for $2000. If they get a lawyer, drop any claim. If they ignore it, write it off. If it costs you a dollar per letter and 0.1% of people accept your "offer", a million letters will net you a million dollars. Maybe this is the new business model for big media.

      I'm not sure what the law says in Australia, although vexatious claim comes to mind. In the USA, people seem to use the term racketeering, although I don't know enough about US law to know if this is correct.

      Michael

      --
      There is no cryptographic solution to the problem where the intended receiver and the attacker are the same entity.
    2. Re:Automated lawsuits by ScrewMaster · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It's not illegal to offer a settlement if you do have cause.

      True, but on the other hand if you're going to be suing people on the scale that the RIAA has been suing people, your evidence had better be pretty solid or you're treading on thin ice. Judges are starting to wake up to what the RIAA is doing, and I hope that trend continues.

      All of these defenses rely on evidence you bring yourself, there's no official log anywhere to back you up.

      Also true, but there's no "official" evidence to back up their claims either, which is the crux of the matter. And no, the information ISPs record hardly qualifies as an official log. Those are typically for provisioning, diagnostic and statistical use, and are not intended to serve as evidence against their own customers. Nor does a screenshot from Kazaa showing a list of IP addresses count as strong evidence.

      The chain of evidence is pretty weak, given that they're depending upon data that was not recorded with the intent of being used in court, isn't particularly reliable anyway, and is subject to human mishandling outside any forensic chain established by the courts, and isn't guaranteed to point to the actual "criminal" in any event! The problem here is the (unfortunate) human tendency to accept information generated by a machine that you don't understand as being valid, when there's a substantial chance that it isn't.

      That effect is very real ... in my years as a software contractor I saw it all the time. I would imagine that judges are just as subject to it as anyone else. I had to tell my customers repeatedly that they can't trust the software until they've done end-to-end on it and know that the results are valid. Mistakes get made, people (even me!) screw up on occasion. As far as I'm concerned, log files spit out by a router or DSLAM shouldn't be admissible in court, certainly not as the primary evidence against someone. I wouldn't want my future dependent upon a few magnetic domains on a hard disk somewhere. Let the RIAA collect some actual evidence (say, a picture of me at my computer doing something illegal) and take me to court. ISP logs are a joke at best, or would be a joke if their use weren't unfairly injuring lot of people.

      It's not as if there's some official Federal standard in place for ISP data monitoring that would be guaranteed to hold up in court so long as the ISP could be shown to be upholding the standard. I can guarantee that ISPs wouldn't want such a standard because it would cost them a fortune.

      --
      The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
    3. Re:Automated lawsuits by Deorus · · Score: 5, Funny

      > I feel sorry for all of the people with a wireless network using a SSID of "Linksys".

      Aren't Linksys and Default free wireless broadband ISPs?

  3. Why don't we ... by Sod75 · · Score: 5, Funny

    put the entire internet behind a NAT router ? :)

    1. Re:Why don't we ... by maxwell+demon · · Score: 5, Funny

      Because a 15 year old might decide to shutdown the internet with a single email?

      No need for email, there's a convenient web interface available.
      --
      The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
    2. Re:Why don't we ... by digitalhermit · · Score: 5, Funny

      OK, I just reconfigured my Linksys by switching the LAN and WAN ports. Please use 192.168.0.1 as your gateway and it should work.

  4. To quote... by galenoftheshadows · · Score: 5, Interesting

    In an age of Wintel-virus created bot-farms, spoofs, and easily cracked WEP encrypted wireless home networks (among other easy hacks), the only tech-savvy response to such . . . an accusation . . . is, "You've got to be kidding."

    'Nuff said. And thanks to Merl Ledford III. (Pardon my edit, by the way.)

    I find it so hard to believe that these companies continue in the thought that they can make these cases work.

    --
    Galen
    In your face, and always right!
  5. Not that foolproof by mgv · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Couple of problems with their system:

    1. It doesn't download the whole file from your system. Which means that they can't really show that you have the file, just that you say that you have it. Some anti-piracy systems are known for responding to any search request with a positive result but full of junk or ads.

    2. It doesn't really prove it was you, it just logs it to an IP address (even if it was your IP, you are running a wireless network, right?)

    3. It currently doesn't do bit torrent, just other P2P systems.

    And probably alot of other problems - just did a quick scan of TFA to produce this post.

    Michael

    --
    There is no cryptographic solution to the problem where the intended receiver and the attacker are the same entity.
    1. Re:Not that foolproof by EsbenMoseHansen · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Couple of problems with their system:
      2. It doesn't really prove it was you, it just logs it to an IP address (even if it was your IP, you are running a wireless network, right?)

      Exactly. I never illegally downloaded file in my adult life (and likely not before, given that 2400 baud was fast back then), yet I have a wireless (FON) router open to everyone who are near. It's pretty open, you could even print if my printer happens to be turned on. Security doesn't worry me as there is only linux machines on that network, and the internet connection is decently firewalled. But conceivable, someone could drive by, and download the latest Beatles-modern-equivalent file, and I could receive such a letter --- my IP is fixed, so no discussion there. But still, if any ISP is innocent, so am I.

      In other words, they have to prove not only what IP did it, but what person. How do you do that? This sounds very much like the naughty-phone-bills case. They had to prove that it was a resident above 18(or 16?) that had called, and if they were unable to (as they were in most cases) they were kicked from court.

      --
      Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful.
    2. Re:Not that foolproof by EsbenMoseHansen · · Score: 5, Interesting

      very Utopian of you. I'm sure you'd be just fine if someone used your open connection to download child porn.

      It will bother me no more and no less than if they'd used any other connection. What's next? Not borrowing a screwdriver out because it might be used for a break-in? I will not let a few deviants destroy all that is good and beautiful about this world, and neither should you. I share my connection freely within reasonable limits.

      --
      Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful.
    3. Re:Not that foolproof by countach · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I don't see why the private contractual arrangments between you and your ISP would affect whether you are an ISP according to the DMCA. A few problems with your persoanl contractual arrangments wouldn't usually affect something like that. (Someone who's read the DMCA prove me wrong).

      As for forbidding "resharing", how on earth can they ask for that? Can I share with my wife? Kids? Friends? Boarders? Relatives? Guests? That's a ridiculous clause if such things exist.

    4. Re:Not that foolproof by rucs_hack · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Oh I wish we did live in such a world, really, I'm not kidding, it would be great.

      However you could find yourself arrested, your equipment seized, and stories in the newspaper before anyone had time to believe that is wasn't you who did it, if they ever did.

      Sharing is a good thing, but unconditional sharing a net connection without checks of any kind is asking for your generosity to be abused.

    5. Re:Not that foolproof by EsbenMoseHansen · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Oh I wish we did live in such a world, really, I'm not kidding, it would be great.

      However you could find yourself arrested, your equipment seized, and stories in the newspaper before anyone had time to believe that is wasn't you who did it, if they ever did.

      Those things could happen no matter what I do. It happens to the people dealing with children occasionally, unfortunately, but fortunately the police are usually adamant about being very sure before they go around arresting people for such crimes until they are reasonable sure. For a mathematician such as I, I find it unlikely. If my IP did show up in a log, the local police might visit me for a chat, I'd show him what I could show (which would be a likely timestamp, maybe) and he would be on his way.

      Sharing is a good thing, but unconditional sharing a net connection without checks of any kind is asking for your generosity to be abused.

      Really? I think you fear your fate too much. In fact, my very open network has only ever been used by one person, and that person is me. What I do is legal, makes the world a bit nicer, harms noone, and the chance of mishaps are small. I'd be a coward for not doing it.

      Let me put the risk in perspective for you. The police claims that they monitor several child porn sites. And that lots of lots of people tune in and stays there for more than 1 minute. Yet, charges are rare. Doesn't that tell you something?

      --
      Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful.
  6. "foolproof"? by mqj · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The claim is that the "File Sharing Monitor" is totally foolproof


    Wow. That sounds like a challenge. Seems like somebody ignored the saying "It's hard to make a program foolproof because fools are so ingenious."
  7. Use an alternate P2P by hjf · · Score: 5, Insightful

    www.freenetproject.org

  8. Dream Pinball 3D huh? by stratjakt · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I thought they were sharing stuff like Final Fantasy XII, Quake 4, and other top tier titles.

    Why minimize the initial act? Thousands of people are not being threatened over "dream pinball 3d".

    --
    I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
  9. Juicy bits pulled from server to prevent /.'ing by carpe_noctem · · Score: 4, Funny

    -Link to PDF temporarily removed, will return later-

    What, no .torrent file?!

    --
    "Quoting famous computer scientists out of context is the root of all evil (or at least most of it) in programming." - K
  10. Re:How? by Fred_A · · Score: 5, Funny

    Simple :
    ifconfig eth0 127.0.0.1

    Now they'll never find me ! Hahahaha !

    Eh, wait...

    --

    May contain traces of nut.
    Made from the freshest electrons.
  11. Re:How? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny
    ifconfig eth0 127.0.0.1

    Now they'll never find me ! Hahahaha !


    That's what you say! I can see your ssh port open, and I'm already in! Count down to "rm -rf /": five, four, three, two...

  12. Good thing you can't block them by TheSpoom · · Score: 4, Informative

    Oh wait...

    --
    It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
    - E. Debs
  13. Why isn't this a DMCA Violation? by pacalis · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Section 1201 makes it illegal to (1) "circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work" Seriously, couldn't a modification of Shareza effectively be construded as a DMCA violation? In this case, they are associating additional information with the work, which is an effective change in access to the work.

  14. Re:How? by didde · · Score: 4, Informative


    You can easily use a (open) proxy or similar to mask your HTTP traffic. But if you'd like to take it one step further, Relakks (based out of Sweden - also accepts foreign users) uses VPN to route all packets from your machine out onto the Internets. You can check their legal FAQ to read about their restrictive policy regarding your personal information. It'd take a subpoena from the Swedish gov't to for them to hand out your originating IP address. This is rarely done - and as I understand it copyright violations are not considered "serious" enough.

    Works like a charm and the performance drop is insignificant. You could easily saturate even a 100 Mbps link using this service.