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Japanese ISPs To Cut Net Access For File Sharers
modemac writes "Four major Japanese telecom organizations, which represent 'about 1,000 major and smaller' domestic ISPs, have agreed to forcibly cut the Internet connection of filesharers. They're specifically targeting users of the 'Winny' program, trading copied gaming software and music. The article states that a new set of ISP guidelines will be drawn up on how to cut off users who 'leak illegally copied material onto the Net.'"
As far as I can see from TFA, no proof except the MAFIA's say-so will be required to disconnect people. Seems no courts of law are involved at all.
You're reading this HTML file right now. Guess they'd better cut me off for sharing it with you.
Let me be the first to say *OH SHIT*
Lets hope this really happens, let hope that ISP's in Japan really are this stupid and the Japanese citizens do the only thing that is logical. Cancel their service since it is no longer of any use to them so that ISP after ISP goes tits up.
At least in holland a lot of ISP's are happy to advertise with 'download music fast' without having any music service whatsoever. Copyright infringement is one major reason to get one of the more expensive subscriptions, if everyone just went with the cheapest most minimal subscription, you know the one that is plenty for email, the web, gaming etc etc, then ISP's will really feel it in their revenue.
On the longer term, lets hope the japanese ISP's learn very quickly that they opened the flood gates. If they can monitor this, expect everyone to come out. Just block winny? Don't count on it, every P2P program will be on it, and why just P2P, why not home run MMORPG servers, why not material that the goverment doesn't want you to host. Why not check every email for illegal material? Congrats, the ISP's in japan just become the enforcer for everyone with a gripe about the internet. There is reason the old telecoms never ever wished to do that with telephone services and they claim they have to keep a line open unless they get an outside complaint even if it is bloody obvious a phone line is only used for criminal activity. You do NOT want to become the police of your customers.
Lets hope that this turns sour for the Japanese ISP's very quickly, because if this doesn't go totally wrong for the ISP's in question, we will get it elsewhere.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
I was worried that we might face more competition from Japan that we have. But now it's clear that they are taking steps to ensure that the vast majority of their citizens will never have net access. This is a great relief.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
From the article: "According to the new agreement, copyright organizations would notify providers of Internet protocol addresses used by those who repeatedly make copies illegally, using special detection software. The providers would then send warning e-mails to the users based on the IP addresses of the computers used to connect to the Internet. If contacted users did not then stop their illegal copying, the providers would temporarily disconnect them from the Internet for a specified period of time or cancel their service-provision contracts."
How long before filesharers spoof government addresses and the like to make life annoying enough for those in the public sector to have this practise abandoned ?
Why not embrace micro payment and p2p technology - Heck the artists already do, why don't the old style publishers want to do the same...
Ahh forgot the good old $$$, can't trust people to pay that when 90% of everything you release is sub standard... right ?
This is pretty much what companies in the U.S. do too. People that seed a bunch of copyrighted files often get cease and desists from their ISPs and if it keeps happening the ISP will sometimes (not always, as it's beneficial for the ISP to keep them around) cut their service off. TFA seems to claim that the majority of this is going to focus on "leakers" of copyrighted material: this means mass-seeders and probably scene groups. It's doubtful that the ISPs are going to end up cutting off many _downloaders_ of the material, but mostly focus on the _distributors_: which is pretty much precedent for ISPs at least in the U.S. and I would assume globally.
Now according to Wiki, Winny is intrinsically anonymous, and the only way the police were able to track those sharing the files was by them boasting on the Winny forums of their upload. So we probably would have heard about this earlier had Winny not been built to be as anonymous as it is now - it seems that the issue has been prompting arrests and controversy for five years or more.
Also, expect 2ch to go bananas over this in the next couple of weeks.
By these ISPs taking responsibility for the (pseudo) illegal activity happening on their network I can see this easily be pushed further and further to the point where the ISPs must play big brother on behalf of Governments and Corporations. For example now they are simply scanning for users using a specific P2P services and acting accordingly, but what will happen when Governments say ISPs should monitor for malicious hacking, fraud or illegal communications? The Safe Harbor provisions within the DMCA directly account for this and thus the reason for ISPs within the US not being held responsible for their users. With Japanese ISPs setting a trend like this I can only see legal perceptions (which can affect future laws) change for the worse.
...if there's a viable alternative. If changing ISP isn't possible or practical, it will modify behaviours of neither users nor the ISPs. It'll simply result in unstable service and unstable customer bases, helping no-one but (because it's distributed across all ISPs) hurting no-one who can make any difference.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Share and Perfect Dark are where it's at.
I don't know what your comment is referring to exactly, but I might as well raise the question of how people in Japan use the Internet anyway. On the Soulseek network with the Nicotine client and geolocation based on IP, I don't think I've ever come across a file-sharer from Japan. Perhaps Japanese share files in their own isolated Internet communities? Since they appear to provide very little to the international community, news of restrictions on file-sharing in Japanese shouldn't trouble us as much as similar reports from North America or Europe.
I am not using filesharing copyright infringing material at all, so my major concern is how it would affect me as a user of a legal filesharing? How do they detect if a customer is using winny or bittorrents?
In US there were reports that customers are cut off just because of the sheer volume of the data they are uploading or downloading. At least Japan is not doing that...
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
the more files will slip through your obstructions
Words to men, as air to birds.
The main target for this act is to stop a file sharing program / network called Winny. Winny is one of the top File sharing program / network in Japan.
Many Japanese anime fansub groups get their original copy of the show via this network. I am sure there are tons of other stuff being shared on Winny, judging from the fact that they have a Software Download board where copyrighted materials are shared.
The creator is facing similar claims to that of the Bittorrent creator, where he has created a tool that can be used to share files with the advantage of being anonymous.
Simple enough, if 99.9999% of the traffic is for "illegal" sharing, then make it legal and collect a tax. Pay off the media producers and problem solved. Everyone wins.
Views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the author.
Also, aside question: how can a copy be illegal? I get that it can be illegal to create and to posses, but how can the copy itself be illegal? If it's made on a USB stick and then thrown out (ownership of the copy has ceased), the copy by virtue of not having changed is still illegal. Who do you sue, the USB stick?
(I figure they mean illegally possessed copies, but imprecise language like this bugs me a bit.) Two years ago, a major Internet provider tried to introduce a measure to disconnect users from the Internet whenever the company detected the use of Winny or other file-sharing software.
However, the provider abandoned the idea after receiving a warning from the Internal Affairs and Communications Ministry that such an approach was regarded as Internet snooping and might violate the right to privacy in communications.
According to the new agreement, copyright organizations would notify providers of Internet protocol addresses used by those who repeatedly make copies illegally, using special detection software. I can't imagine how "special detection software" might reliable determine whether copyright infringement is going on without looking at the transmitted data. Isn't it then obvious that the copyright organizations are doing "Internet snooping and might violate the right to privacy in communications"?
North side, east side
... ;~)
Little Winny, Winny wears the crown,
P2Ps the king around town
Downloads, uploads
Winny drives them silly with its
file sharing shimmy shuffle down
Way past one, and feeling allright
'Cos with little Winny round
they can last all night
Hey down, stay down, stay down down
'Cos little Winny, Winny won't go
But you can't push Winny round, Winny won't go,
try tellin' everybody but, oh no
Little Winny, Winny won't go
Words to men, as air to birds.
All they will do is give some piracy friendly ISP more customers and ability to grow as well as making it harder to catch them. Whenever I hear about some torrent site getting shut down I always imagine a hammer crashing a box. All the pieces fly around, but like the terminator the pieces will regroup again. This time smaller and harder to hit without much damaged done to the pirates.
Japan has always worked this way.
It doesn't help that Winny was created for anonymous file sharing I suppose. But it's rather strange, I thought most people migrated to Share when the creator of Winny was arrested, and are now starting to move on to Perfect Dark now that anonymous file sharing isn't possible in Share. I'd think the latter two users would be targeted as well.
Signed for truth.
+5, Truth
I never really liked Winny anyway. Perfect Dark and Share are much better, and hopefully they'll be populated with even more quality piratables after this info gets out.
Yes. I went there. Unabashed declaration of intention to steal shit.
Friend: "The NIC is misconfigured..." Me: "No prob, I'll just telnet in and fix it." *Silence*
Death.
And no, i don't mean the people sharing the files, or the corporations, but the people running them. Instant, no mercy death. After 1 or 2, i think they will get the hint.
So they are going to determine what files you are sharing first, or are they just cutting off anyone that uses the client, regardless of what they are doing?
All debates aside about IP, there millions of files shared like this with ZERO question of the legitimacy of doing so.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
So, this begs the question, how do they know what the user is downloading? Is there a vulnerability in WinNY that allows identities to be traced, or do they just assume that any WinNY user is filesharing?
According to a 2006 report by the Recording Industry Association of Japan, upwards of three million people had tried Winny, and it has alternated with WinMX as the most popular file-sharing program in Japan...Critics of Kaneko have stated that the main purpose of Winny is to violate copyright law, unlike Freenet, another peer-to-peer system that Winny is often compared to, which claims to protect freedom of speech. These critics also claim that 2ch's Download Software board, where the software was first announced, is a haven for copyright violators, and that Kaneko himself had said that the aim of development of Winny is to push the tide towards a world filled with copyright infringement, quoting several posts from 2ch.So, this is a curious question. Is WinNY being singled out because its developer is promoting copyright infringement, because of its popularity, or because of its anonymity? I'm curious how this would affect other p2p technologies in Japan.
The decision of the Japanese authorities to cut off Japanese people from file sharing may be more of aspect of Japanese culture than a legal decision. File sharing is the fastest growing way of distributing cultural works (yes, even Brittany Spears pop tunes are cultural works) from outside Japan to Japan. This may be a sign that the Japanese authorities have come to believe that non-Japanese culture has become too prevalent in Japanese society.
Japan has never been a democracy. It has always been a rigid authoritarian culture. When the authorities decide to act, they simply announce their decision and everyone obeys. Japan did close themselves off from the west before for centuries between the late 1600s until the 1850s. This happened after the authorities decided that Western ways were becoming too powerful and were beginning to threaten their power. It may be happening again.
And, of course, it may be a total clusterfuck by a group of totally clueless bullies who have no idea of what they are fooling with. But then again, for young Japanese, what's the difference?
Ahoy all ye pirates, here be wisdom.
Pirates can only operate on the fringes of civilization. Too far out and the prey be too scarce to keep a pirate in booty. And ye be wanting enough civilization to have ports to put in for supplies, to spend de booty on grog and whores and such. The Spanish Main was an all too brief time, when booty was plentiful for the takin' but the Navy wasn't. The good times came to and end, but not before bold men made their fortunes.
This here Intarnet tube thing was a new frontier for a bit and some good times were had, sharing da booty. But civilization is quickly catchin up here and the good times of sharing yer booty like a drunken slut with anybody who can manage to hail ya just ain't gonna remain viable.
So remember back (or ask the old pirate rascals how a Commodore 'Users Group' worked) how it was done in the old days. Swap only with folk ye know to be good and true pirates. Never underestimate the bandwidth of a portable hard drive. Small interlocking networks of scp servers where only folk ye have meet and looked in thar eyes have access to yer booty.
Democrat delenda est
If that happened here, we would just see even more Darknets spring up. What a waste of everybody's time.
of why we urgently need to build a robust wireless mesh.
What?
Ah! Oh, boy! MAN DENIS! BIG DENNACE. Now, listen here. One time I was cockin' maximum on gnutella, and suddenly a Japanese user downloaded some file from me. I think it was an IOSYS mp3.
I live in the UK.
My point is, Japanese people can and do use the same filesharing networks as the rest of the world. MENIS FENIS BENIS GENIS DENNACE.
It's called SHARE. Go get it, and then a nodelist, and be bewildered as you download from a single person, at line speed.
Oh how I'm jealous of Japanese 100/100 mbit lines.
Actually, the Japanese tend to use a P2P called "Winny", which is loosely based off of the now defunct WinMX program. I haven't seen many of them on any of the other P2P programs much.
This is about ISP guidelines changing so they obide to requests of copyright holders concerning illegal sharing of their material, and, only on Winny. And this is actually already done in larger scale in the US, and hence the outcry, and the retraction of some actions. This story is more symbolic than anything. Those with a clue have already switched to the latest platform, and they are in the clear. This is more of a PR move to get people to think p2p is bad and banned and to not even try it. This works to some extent, and looking at how even some people in the US think p2p is now illegal in Japan, it shows how the gullible news agencies are willing open to manipulation for an excuse to print something outrageous.
On yahoo the title of their featured story was "Japan to ban file sharers". This made my friend think file sharing became illegal by law in Japan. The original article is titled "Japanese ISPs to ban file sharers", which changes the scope completely. But even this is overblown, because ISPs aren't really making the move, the Associations are. So complaining to your ISP is like complaining to the writer who was forced to go on strike. There is a huge difference.
In Japan, copyright enforcement is far stronger. Selling illegal copies of Gundam DVDs on an auction site will not only get you arrested, but it will get you on the 6 o'clock news. Counterfit merchandise is illegal to bring into the country, and will get confiscated at customs if you are caught. So the fact that the Associations have to create their own rules might be a sign of weakness on their part, as it implies they failed to get the necessary laws created to get the police to enforce an outright ban.
There is also the background of Winny. The author has already been arrested and charged, and that is probably the prime reason the Associations feel they can take the extra leap against that specific platform. There have also already been arrests regarding file sharers on Winny. Winny is also nutorious for viruses and spyware. What's worse is many of the public Winny servers (initial nodes) keep changing, meaning Winny is a broken platform at this point, although it does seem some updates have been made since I last checked.
Although I am not sure if those that get banned won't be arrested, if they don't, then I am sure they would prefer the disconnection over an arrest. The Associations may just be looking for an easier alternative before calling the cops.
Human civilization can and will devour itself trying to bring this sort of thing to a halt. Why? Because it's always gone on, on some level or another, and always will go on, on some level or another.
Prostitution is more illegal than file-sharing is. There are always efforts in most places in the world to stop it, but the best those efforts are ever able to do is slow it down a little. We're talking tens of thousands of YEARS here, people, and it hasn't been stamped out -- and never will be either.
Want to really stop it, and everything else society at large deems "unacceptable"? Then you need the ability to mass-erase an idea from people's minds all at once, along with every material reference to said idea, because you can't kill an idea: You can't stop the signal, Mal. Ah, but there's a problem there, too, isn't there? If any government or individual had that sort of power over people, then we're living in a world that makes 1984 look like amateur night -- and from there the human race would likely last about another two generations, tops, before completely dying out.
Want another example of what I'm talking about? Drugs. The world, for all of recorded human history and beyond, I'm sure, has had a problem with intoxicants of all kinds. Every culture does or has, at one time or another, tried to stamp them out. They all failed, didn't they, and for the most part our own efforts here in the U.S. are largely a waste of time, money, and resources; none of those efforts have or can really do much of anything to affect the idea of intoxicants. Remember Prohibition? Yeah, that worked real well, didn't it?
As I see it we, as a race, have three directions we can go to address this class of issue:
1) We can stop fighting it, accept it, and try to develop ways to work with it so that it doesn't necessarily have to be a zero-sum game all the time.
2) We can fight it tooth and nail to the last, hoping that it's actually possible to erase an idea from human consciousness.
3) We can continue the cat-and-mouse games that this class of things has always been surrounded by and interwoven with, and the people who get caught at them pay the penalty for being careless.
Where we are now is #3. What I WANT to see is #1 -- but I don't think we're evolved enough to get there yet. Where some authorities and most corporations want to go is #2 -- and they're ice-skating uphill if they try.
They show up on torrents when I'm dling anime raws. Actually they tend to be more than 50% of the swarm.
For the record Norwegian chicks are phenomenal in the bedroom
You win the Most Pathetic Fallacy of the Day Award!
plenty of japanese porn is done via bittorrent. not that I watch that filth, some guy told me about it. yeah, what a pervert.
Eyh, din kukksuger, han er Finsk. - Jævla same, ass...
Japanese use domestic anonymous software almost exclusively. After Winny came Share, attempting to solve the security issues of its predecessor, but Share's security system was cracked by some anti-file sharing organisation. Currently under heavy development is perfect dark, but there aren't many regular users of this software yet.
It's more than just their networks. They don't particularly like anything outside their own or whatever they have suborned as their own and "Japanesed" it. Some things are for the better (electronics) and some for the worse (western style dress shirts ... jp quality is crap in that area).
no sharing of hentai videos
No. Britney Spears and etc. will be just as available in Japan as always—for purchase in retail stores. There is absolutely no shortage of foreign culture in Japan, and given the relatively small net-savvy population I'd say this would have little-to-no isolationist effect.