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Leaks Prove MediaDefender's Deception
Who will defend the defenders? writes "Ars Technica has posted the first installment in their analysis of the leaked MediaDefender emails and found some very interesting things. Apparently, the New York Attorney General's office is working on a big anti-piracy sting and they were working on finding viable targets. It also discusses how some of the emails show MediaDefender trying to spy on their competitors, sanitize their own Wikipedia entry, deal with the hackers targeting their systems, and to quash the MiiVi story even while they were rebuilding it as Viide. Oh yes, they definitely read "techie, geek web sites where everybody already hates us" like Slashdot, too."
there are more leaks!
MediaDefender Phone Call and Gnutella Tracking Database Leaked
funny you should mention that, as it is, in fact, the other thing they do at "work"
IANAL(yet), but I believe the emails would be admissible in court. Even if the identity of the leaker was known, he/she would be protected under the laws we have regarding whistleblowing.
MediaDefender wasn't only screwing people. They were screwing their clients as well (the big labels). I read a few of their emails, and one particulary caught my attention. I think Universal asked MD to produce stats about illegal downloads after they started another wave of lawsuits to see if these lawsuits have any effect on downloading (they were hoping it goes down).
... so much for the MAFIAA's claims.
One MD scumbag then forwards this email to his lackeys and he adds: "If you want a good laugh" to the forwarded mail.
These scumbag know that what they are doing is worthless, it doesn't stop piracy, but they both piss off users and rip off their own clients.
They also received one confidential study from a think-tank in Washington DC, the nice presentation had some extremely disgusting stats: only about 17% of the piracy comes from illegal downloads, the vast majority comes from people borrowing CDs
In case someone wants to have a look, Here is a on-line mailbox with all the leaked emails
echo '[q]sa[ln0=aln80~Psnlbx]16isb572CCB9AE9DB03273snlbxq' |dc
I do find it funny that people will be paranoid about GMail now... the only reason these MediaDefender-Defender guys got in is because they knew the password. Perhaps GMail is more insecure than other email providers; however, afaik they didn't hack into his account, they just found out his password from another site and used it to log into his email. Not exactly GMail's fault.
This sort of thing echoes the Watergate tapes : there is a certain class of person that feels bigger by acting aggressively, and swearing is a socially-acceptable form of aggression.
Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.
Legally, the "fruit of the poisonous tree" doctrine applies only when there's some sort of causative link between the illegal discovery of something and the investigation into it. E.g., if a police officer breaks into your house without cause and finds your coke-cutting equipment, you're probably safe. But if your house gets broken into by a(nother) criminal while you're away, and in the course of the ensuing investigation the police find your stash ... tough luck. That's pretty much how I see this situation. The fact that the information came out because some guy's GMail got hacked pales in significance compared to the content that was disclosed, and I don't see any reason to cover my eyes just because of the source, when the source was just due to chance (or, perhaps, some sort of karma/fate/God).
Morally, these scumbags gave up any claim to anything a long time ago. Morally, they all deserve to be soundly beaten and left for dead on some island somewhere so they can learn to play nice with each other or starve. Because that's sadly illegal, pointing and laughing at their misfortune is a close second.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
MediaDefender is a company that the RIAA and MPAA hire to pollute Bittorrent trackers with fake torrents, track torrent usage, and spew false data out to torrents.
A group called "MediaDefender-Defender" got someone's password and spilled thousands of emails from within MediaDefender. Apparently some idiot forwarded all his corporate mail to Gmail, and used an easy password.
"MiiVi" was an attempt by MediaDefender to create a fake file-sharing site to entrap people. About two people fell for it, then they were exposed by Torrentfreak.
You should care because this company lied about its involvement with an attempt to "entrap" (legally, it's not entrapment, but it's still pretty morally grey). You might also care because it's another attempt by the RIAA and MPAA to screw over file-sharers. Or maybe you don't care about it. There's no assurance that you'll find everything on Slashdot interesting.
The WSJ got a 'no comment' from the NY AG ( http://www.moneyweb.co.za/mw/view/mw/en/page94?oid=161203&sn=Detail ). The AG's case was definitely related to child porn; not piracy.
I know it's pointless to ask things like this of the /. "editors", but the summary of this story is almost completely useless to anyone who is coming to the story cold (like me).
Related Stories[+] Your Rights Online: MediaDefender Denies Entrapment Accusations 104 comments
Ortega-Starfire writes "We've previously discussed the subject of MediaDefender setting up a site to catch movie pirates. Ars Technica covers the response from MediaDefender, which basically states the entire thing was a mistake and was only an internal site they forgot to password protect, and that they were not using this with the MPAA. The article asks: 'If this is true, why did MediaDefender immediately remove all contact information from the whois registry for the domain? Saaf said that after everything hit the fan, the company decided to take everything on the site down because it was afraid of a hacker attack or "people sending us spam." Yes, spam. The MPAA's Elizabeth Kaltman also chimed in to say that they had no involvement with MiiVi: "The MediaDefender story is false. We have no relationship with that company at all," she told Ars.'"
[-] IT: Internal Emails of An RIAA Attack Dog Leaked 412 comments
qubezz writes "The company MediaDefender works with the RIAA and MPAA against piracy, setting up fake torrents and trackers and disrupting p2p traffic. Previously, the TorrentFreak site accused them of setting up a fake internet video download site designed to catch and bust users. MediaDefender denied the entrapment charges. Now 700MB of MediaDefender's internal emails from the last 6 months have been leaked onto BitTorrent trackers. The emails detail their entire plan, including how they intended to distance themselves from the fake company they set up and future strategies. Other pieces of company information were included in the emails such as logins and passwords, wage negotiations, and numerous other aspect of their internal business."
You can't take the sky from me...
Wikipedia is clear that it is AGAINST policy to self-edit. Read the Code of Conduct.
Just because they don't have a very effective police force preventing rude, deceptive bullcrap does mpt mean it is acceptable behavior.
And YES, changing what OTHER people wrote about you without admitting who you are IS an indication of guilt. When I defend myself from something I do NOT do it anonymously.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
As MediaDefender is not a Health Care provider HIPAA does not apply.
...he/she would be protected under the laws we have regarding whistleblowing. Wait, how? IANAL (ever), but according to Wikipedia, the legal protections for whistleblowers appear to extend only to employees. My admittedly limited understanding is that MediaDefender-Defender was not an employee or group of employees but someone who claims to have 'infiltrated' the Gmail account in question. I'm not at all sure how that qualifies for whistleblower protection.Even if we all want to cheer MD-D, it remains that what they did was very likely a violation of a number of user policy agreements (Gmail, their ISP, etc.) and possibly illegal. Let's not start adorning them with medals yet.
So you can laugh all you want to...
i wonder from a legal point of view can these emails constitute as evidence in a court,
The provenance of them is not verifiable, so their value as evidence is questionable, but if it came to a court case the originals could be subpoenaed in discovery. Whether they'd be available depends on their email retention plan, existence of backups, etc. but some of it would be, from them or gmail.
-- Alastair
"Casual mailing" of SSNs can (theoretically) get a company in trouble under federal HIPAA laws
Let me preface this by saying that I handle the HIPAA and non-HIPAA EDI data feeds, archiving, and processing for a pharmaceuticals services company (processing the data on behalf of a variety of 1st and 3rd parties). I am not an expert on the subject, but I do have to deal with it every day...
Thinking that any potentially confidential information given to a service provider is HIPAA protected is a common misconception. SSN is not HIPAA Data unless it was part of a HIPAA form - if you don't have to show the HIPAA policy before getting the information, then you don't have to treat it as HIPAA data and it's not eligible under the HIPAA laws.
But not to despair...
There is PHI - protected healthcare information - these laws are a lot more broad than HIPAA, but again they refer only to medical care records. (so not necessarily relevant here, either)
And even beyond all that - the bottom line is we don't NEED any special laws to make divulging a customer's SSN a crime. There are very real and applicable fraud and privacy laws that protect this information even if it has nothing to do with healthcare... the main problem with privacy breaches is if the state doesn't have mandatory disclosure laws, it's nigh impossible to even know that your rights have been violated, much less prove it in court...