Slashdot Mirror
BT Blocks Access To Pirate Bay
Barence writes "BT and other mobile broadband providers are blocking access to The Pirate Bay as part of a 'self-regulation' scheme with the Internet Watch Foundation. BT Mobile Broadband users who attempt to access the notorious BitTorrent tracker site are met with a 'content blocked' message. The warning page states the page has been blocked in 'compliance with a new UK voluntary code.' 'This uses a barring and filtering mechanism to restrict access to all WAP and internet sites that are considered to have "over 18" status,' the warning states. It goes on to list a series of categories that are blocked, including adult/sexually explicit content, 'criminal skills,' and hacking. It's not stated which category The Pirate Bay breaches, although the site does host links to porn movies."
Anybody actually do this? How many people really would do this at this time?
What.. the... f*ck? Is the rest of the world watching China for guidance in this matter? What's happening? Seriously, this is just insane.
Tor.
Might take a bit 'til you find an exit node in China, but then you're free.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Here is how it works...
1) They tell you blocking will ONLY be used for child porn etc (they promise!)
2) Then blocking is added to terrorist material to "protect the public"
3) Then blocking is added to "violent sexual material" to "protect women"
4) ???
5) Now it is open season in the UK to block anything
Welcome to a free democracy. We're totally better than China's government, I promise ;)
....It sounds like people will have to start using Tor in the "free world."
This is my opinion. To make sure you don't steal it, it's covered by the DMCA.
I read the headline as "bit torrent" blocks pirate bay.
I'm guessing BT are targetting a particular market demographic, judging by their adverts and the pricing structure they have. For me, their service is overpriced and I can get faster speeds, a lower price and a higher (unlimited actually) data cap with other ISPs. BT seem to be going for the "bewildered middle aged computer user" market with their Home Hub and associated services.
Really then I'm not surprised that they're blocking TPB, since they're probably fairly confident that this will have little effect on the customers they're targetting, whilst it raises their reputation with watchdog groups and copyright associations.
You can advertise in this sig from as little as £99.99 a month!
Voluntary code, no right of redress, zero transparency for your own protection, we have your best interest at heart (translated: we are scared of lawyers, and are too dumb to realise that by being selective we open the doors wide for missing the odd one and being held liable) etc etc.
From the organisation that brought you Phorm (and didn't tell you), a new violation of their own service T&Cs.
Lawyers, please sharpen pencils and expense account - BT has just dropped the soap in the shower..
Insert
... I have volunteered not to use BTmb.
This is why we need net neutrality regulations. Today is TPB, tomorrow it will be something else.
Soon we will see a massive deployement of firewalls blocking everything apart from port 80 and 443. If you want to use VPN, torrents, POP email, ... pay or fuck off.
No worries hackers will find a workaround and some will be able to use the Internet the way it was meant to be.
Love many, trust a few, do harm to none.
The problem with this sort of blocking is that first its very arbitrary, and second it often catches a lot legitimate sites. We discussed this not too long ago where its not even as simple as undoing a block. http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/04/20/1239212
The musings of just another geek and his junk.
Wikipedia explains cum shots here.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cum_shot
BT want to police the internet? No problem.
Get all the CP and bomb schematics you can folks; It's BT's fault for not preventing access, now.
Finally had enough. Come see us over at https://soylentnews.org/
I just navigated to thepiratebay.org successfully from my T-mobile phone in the UK. Just an FYI for anyone who has recently become interested in changing their mobile phone / internet contract.
It's worth noting however that I have my porn filter off. You have to call your service provider and have adult content switched on for this service for some unknown reason.
"If you want a vision of the future, Winston, imagine a boot stamping on a human face forever." - George Orwell, 1984
...they won't do the same thing for MALWARE sites! You know, the places where people end up becoming part of a botnet.
Please note that the Internet Watch Foundation has subsequently told PC Pro that, although it hosts information about the filtering scheme, it has no involvement with the filtering or the creation of the blacklist. This is down to the mobile broadband providers themselves.
With the Wikipedia block and Internet archive blocks in recent months I couldn't help but think the IWF was testing the water for a general power grab, trying to move far beyond their remit of producing a black list of child porn sites.
I just found this FTA:
http://www.iwf.org.uk/public/page.113.243.htm
So it's true, the IWF has decided it has to be the moral crusader of society and should now start censoring all that it feels like.
Bets on how long they try to extend this voluntary code which covers all the UK's main mobile providers to hardwired, static internet connections?
The problem here isn't BT, it's not The Pirate Bay. It's the fucking IWF again.
Time they're disbanded, the problems they cause now go far, far beyond any benefit they can ever provide.
block "adult" content by default, but will remove the block once you've proved you're over 18, usually by supplying a valid credit card number. T-Mobile even included Facebook in the block a year or two back. Dunno if they still do.
So you can't get to the website. What about just using Google that will normally find a lot of TPB torrents. Can you still connect to the tracker? My guess is you probably can.
If information wants to be free, why does my internet connection cost so much?
You could theoretically make excuses for the cameras, but, man, when the British are blocking porn, you know that island nation has hit a rough patch in its history.
This is my sig.
Come on, BT? For the 92% of the planet who don't live in the U.K. BT means bittorrent.
Caveat Utilitor
When I was with them (worst service or connection ever, high prices but locked into a year contract) I discovered they run an unannounced yet quite decent 200 day retention nntp.
There will come a day (not too far off), when all the big torrent sites will be blocked by every major broadband provider in the U.S. and E.U. (along with any proxy list or other site designed to help circumvent the block).
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Sorry... I've never actually gone onto Pirate Bay, but here's a question: is there some legal content which can be downloaded from Pirate Bay? (eg: Linux distributions or some new musical artist who's voluntarily uploaded their music?)
If so, then I'm tempted to go to Pirate Bay just to download legal stuff so I can practice getting myself in a upset dander when my ISP eventually blocks it.
Kinda missed an important bit of that article there, didn't you? "BT's warning message advises customers to contact customer services if they want the block on the site to be lifted." You still get to choose.
They came first for napster, And I didn't speak up because I wasn't into music. And then they came for wikileaks, And I didn't speak up because I wasn't into politics. And then they came for the pirate bay, And I didn't speak up because I wasn't into free stuff. And then . . . they came for me . . . And by that time there was nothing left to do anyway.
Why don't you go there and find out for yourself?
It would surprise me if it's not.
In any case it's only criminals that have criminal skills, so obviously real people are not affected by this.
Unless you are the extremely rare person who is not a criminal yet still have criminal skills, in which case you should be viewed with utter suspicion and as a criminal in all but name.
Self Regulation is usually the last resort of an interest group that is seeking to avoid the hassle and constrictions of government legislation. Its usually a stalling tactic but it sometimes works. I believe its how the MPAA was formed since its not a government organizations (If it was it'd likely fall under the wing of the FCC).
How is this implemented?
DNS?
OpenDNS' IPs are 208.67.222.222 and 208.67.220.220
DPI?
https://thepiratebay.org/
-jX
Don't you just love politics? It's like a comedy of errors.
Yup - there is.
http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/4582957/slackware-12.2-dvd-iso
The latest Slackware 12.2 Linux distro.
Check the md5 sum though, just to be safe.
ftp://ftp.slackware.com/pub/slackware/slackware-12.2-iso/slackware-12.2-install-dvd.iso.md5
These harsh restrictive laws are coming for all of us. It's just a matter of time.
What we need right now, is to plan the ways of defeating this sort of rubbish, and circulating that information while the net is still relatively free.
We really do, we fight on their behalf by signing secret deals with Phorm to spy on their traffic for their own good, we use our lawyers to dodge any legal fallout from those trials to ensure our customers continue to be spied on for an affordable price, as any fine would be passed onto them. We continue to work with Phorm. We now block some content we know our customers would prefer wasn't online at all and urge other ISPs to follow suit. Among our plans for the future are blocking gambling sites in conjunction with hefty donations from brick and mortar gambling establishments.
Yours,
The Sarcastic & Totally Bougus BT Management.
O2 are my mobile service provider (owned by BT) and I just navigated to thepiratebay.org with absolutely no issues.
I was using GPRS to do this rather than 3G though, so maybe that it... although that makes almost no sense.
Unless we only want to stop children downloading porn at high speed?
What kind of sense does it make to have to verify you're over 18 to access content with your G3 connection? Do a lot of people 17 and under have credit cards, their own laptop and a G3 card + service? Isn't one of the provisions of getting service being of legal age since you must sign a service contract? I'm so glad companies and governments are taking it upon themselves to be my conscience.
Today TPB, tomorrow its your server. ...
Time to learn about networks, wireless, how to use other connections.
Time to become very smart and invisible.
Time to become Anonymous and say
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Some months ago, when a bunch of stories starting coming up of large ISPs starting up voluntary schemes and trials and whatnot I actually left BT and moved to a smaller, friendlier ISP exactly with the expectation that this sort of thing would come to be.
*big pat on the back*
Shameless plug for my current ISP, ADSL 24 - cheaper (for the typical user), just as fast (maybe even faster), no traffic shaping, no blocking, no bullshit. Never got any problem with them.
By the way, last I checked, the ISPs to avoid at all costs in the UK (with regards to things like blocking and traffic shaping) where BT, Virgin and Tiscalli.
Perhaps, but a bit further down the line, there will be a time when bandwidth will be so cheap that networks of steganographically disguised friends-only darknets will totally undercut any attempts to prevent content distribution. People will also be able to "accidentally" forget stamp-sized memory chips in public places which could contain the current contents of the entire iTunes catalog.
I wonder how big media is going to prevent copyright infringement, then.
There's plenty of legal stuff available on BT in general, and from TPB in particular. Linux distributions, patches for games and programs (be careful about them, though, sometimes malware disguises as such), indie movies, share- and freeware (same warning applies, careful about malware)... it's fun to browse through their selection.
You can spend literally terabytes of traffic on BT without even touching a single illegal file.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Just to clarify - what you refer to is the IWF blocking system that applies to all (home and mobile) systems, covers 95% of users. It cannot be removed by the user, and as you note, the Government have pressured ISPs to do this, and it's all rather worrying.
But this article is about a separate system. It covers a much wide range of material, but the upside is you can remove it. It's unclear if the IWF have any connection to this.
Another difference is that this system evidently tells the user, where as the IWF system fakes a 404 on most ISPs.
For the record, a mate of mine & I just tried 2 UK 3G networks (Vodafone - the same backbone as BT - and O2). Could access TPB and (as representative of adult content) 4Chan, no problem.
May simply be someone got paranoid, or tried to access same without having their account confirmed as adult. I do believe Vodafone set block-as-standard, but unlock on proof of age (i.e. by credit card).
I am no fan of net censorship - but perhaps we should save our wrath for when it actually occurs, yes?
Blocking does not work. The only people who think blocking works do not know how the Internet works (parents, teachers, politicians, middle mannagers).
Walk into any school computer lab that has blocked sites with a fist full of cash. Offer $50 to any student who can access the sites. You will be broke by the end of the day.
Undetectable Steganography? Yep, there's an app fo
I just checked and O2 Mobile Broadband (post-pay) does not block The Pirate Bay.
Does anyone remember the end of Metal Gear Solid 2? The Patriots may be a work of sci-fi, but what it represented, a product of of the lawmakers and leaders failed designs, is an all too real nameless beast that will be the end of us all.
O2 are my mobile service provider (owned by BT)
Telefonica Europe
Doesn't this mean that they're voluntarily giving up common carrier status?
The old defense being that they were like phone companies, they had no responsibility in what their users did.
Well, BT just announced that they are, in some small way, taking responsibility for what their users look at.
So what happens when FOX releases yet another Summer Bomb in the theaters and decides to use Piracy on the Internet as an excuse? Well, BT banned TPB, that means since they DIDN'T ban the other sites this is partially their fault, right?
Yep... E.g. "The Catholic Orangemen of Togo" by Craig Murray, which he made available for online distribution after his publisher caved to threats of a libel lawsuit by the notorious mercenary Tim Spicer.
I use Friend/Foe + mod-point modifiers as a karma/reputation system.
Just checked piratebay from my iPhone. No problems.
I'm sorry you got modded down... that's so incredibly poignant that I feel like a moderator should be wooshed.
Boot Windows, Linux, and ESX over the network for free.
This is plain censorship.
The site was not convicted, some of the owners were. (yet no end in sight for appeals etc)
Complain where you can.
Boycott if you can.
Can anybody here confirm the story? What about the other four providers that are mentioned on the IWF site?
We need to keep the pressure on them though and let both companies know WHY we're upset!
Who says TPB does not host porn? http://thepiratebay.org/browse/500 Just look for yourselves. W
... people pirating content and porn. This means that the network is functional. Attempting to prevent this from happening is futile.
ISPs will never have a magical world where their only customers are people over the age of 30 who never stream video, download (or, god forbid seed) torrents or buy music, video, books and games online. The only thing they can do is throttle heavy users, make them pay per MB or upgrade their pipes.
You've sold people a network. Let them use it and charge them for it.
Many Belgian ISP's are currently blocking sites such as http://www.stopkinderporno.nl/ which exposes the addresses of pedophiles.
This leaves the door wide open to implement a government based blacklist of sites "The Great Belgian Firewall".
ISP's are inserting fake DNS zones for these site which point to the Federal Computer Crime Unit site, which can be bypassed by using OpenDNS.
A certain web filtering solution did label wikipedia as adult once. The customers were pissed off, even when they were told they could override it themselves. Seems they want their users to be blocked from adult content as long as it's not useful for other stuff.
Create an account and login in. There's porn. They just don't turn it on if you don't have an account.
Tim Smith - Ramblings from Nerd Land
Hello Slashdot,
I am representing the Internet Watch Foundation. The IWF strives to make the internet [free from information which undermines government policy] safe for the most vulnerable people in society [(except for paedophiles, because they don't really count as people)].
Did you know that [a small number of] over 6 million children are used in the creation of [erotically posed images] horrific images of sexual abuse each year? When you oppose the regulation of the internet, YOU are [standing up for your civil liberties] encouraging the violent sexual abuse of children. You must all be [a concern for the government] sick, evil paedophiles.
The Pirate Bay is uncensored and must therefore be used for distributing [music, games and DVDs which cost our entertainment industry millions of pounds] obscene material. The IWF therefore seeks to protect our [entertainment industry] children by blocking it.
The IWF is also concerned about the use of a proksy called "Torproject". Anyone who uses this "Torproject" must clearly be [concerned about privacy and civil liberties] distributing evil sick obscene material. Why are you trying to [circumvent the iron grip of our state] access illegal material? What do you have to hide?
Think of the [government] CHILDREN (in a non-sexual way), you sick bastards!
Sincerely,
John Notfreeman,
The Internet Watch Foundation
You know, if I bought an Internet access contract and they blocked anything at all, I'd sue them for false advertising.
Interestingly, the article says you can regain full access from your phone on request by contacting BT.
I can't wait for this voluntary blocking to come to the USA. My ISP supports third party candidates, so they'll happily block the web sites of both the republican and democratic parties candidates. This will be great for the general population, because they will no longer have to be exposed to the criminal activities, sexual misadventures, and immoral actions of the candidates and their families.
It's a great precedent for telephone companies to block political parties, charities and competing businesses too! Finally, my phone will stop ringing when non-telco approved callers want to reach me. ...Or we could tell the ISPs to stick their blocks up their respective orifices.
Can You Say Linux? I Knew That You Could.
O2 aren't owned by British Telecom anymore, but for the record, I tried www.thepiratebay.org from O2 using 3G and it worked just fine.
British Telecom used to own Cellnet, which became O2, which was demerged in 2001 into an independent company which later got bought by the Spanish telco Telefonica.
(Still with me?)
British Telecom later set up their own in-house mobile service "BT Mobile" which piggybacks on their previous competitor, Vodafone.
Andrew Oakley - www.aoakley.com
Shouldnt that be tagged informative?
- iammani
If you have a webserver, block 193.129.101.0/26 - Internet Watch Foundation (IWF). They use automated scrips to check for content that they dont like. I HATE censorship.
I would hope IWF has learned it's lesson to not block wipedia.
Actually, I hope it didn't learn it's lesson. The only way for them to die is to keep pissing people off by blocking mainstream stuff.
1984 was not supposed to be an instruction manual.
Only thing surprising me about this is how surprised everyone seems. You may also be surprised why BT only blocked TPB for their mobile customers - they're mostly locked into contracts, while their home ISP hasn't blocked them, since they can switch providers without penalty.
Meanwhile, BT is getting lots of free publicity out of this, and I can't imagine someone actually getting upset about not being able to rock torrents on their cel. It will also get non-BT cel clients to try it. Another bullshit boondoggle designed to accomplish nothing but to seem productive.
War as we knew it was obsolete
Nothing could beat complete denial
- Emily Haines
An interesting read. Thank you, sir.
BT's warning message advises customers to contact customer services if they want the block on the site to be lifted.
Are BT just trying to get loads of complaints, so they prove they tried to stop piracy and discovered it wasn't commercially viable? Either way, I'd recommend calling up and complaining, even if it means waiting on hold for an hour. Threaten to change your service provider. Enough people do that, I'm sure they'll sit up and listen.
You'll need to get ur selves an offshore ssh tunnel :)
Problem solved
I say it is time we - users - start to build our own independent and separate network, to do with as we deem fit!
From theory: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireless_mesh_network
To actual implementation: http://wiki.freifunk.net/Kategorie:English
But then, they may start jamming the Wireless frequencies...
Just wanted to point out this only on BT's Mobile Broadband offering, not their home product.
It's understandable that providers might want to block access to torrent sites on mobile solutions - bandwidth tends to be more limited on them anyway and they're likely to be paying third-party carriers for access if you're not using a BT Openzone hotspot.
BT aren't likely to want torrent downloading hogging all of their hotspot bandwidth and they're certainly not going to want to pay Vodafone for 3G/GPRS coverage to download it. Add to that the extra hassle of potentially having to track down mobile users if asked to following a copyright infringement case and you can see why it's not worth the hassle.
So they're blocking everyone, including people "over 18," from accessing so-called "over 18" websites?
Oh, right, it's the U.K.. They've been treating all of their subjects as children for decades now...
Liberty in your lifetime
These no longer exist
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LokiTorrent
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TorrentSpy
If my mobile provider did this (not that I'd ever access TPB on my mobile), I would INSTANTLY call them and unsubscribe my service and tell them the reason why.
Unless they start losing revenue they're going to keep doing shit like this. Once they find users will stand for having their rights trampled on they'll just keep doing it and doing it.
Send a message the only way they'll understand.
I'm on BT and I'm not getting these messages when I access thepiratebay.org ?
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
Not to actually cite authority or anything, but American ISPs are not common carriers and really haven't been since Brand X when the Supreme Court said the FCC was free to consider broadband providers as "information service providers" rather than "telecommunications service providers." The FCC did so and deemed cable and DSL both as information service providers. As a telecom service provider, they would be subject to common carrier rules. As information service providers, they're not common carriers, but the FCC can still regulate them a little if they want to through their ancillary authority. Mostly, Brand X stands for a general move to deregulate broadband. Or open it up to regulation outside the FCC, not that other agencies have done a lot to take them up on that.
That is what the title should read now that BT owns the keys to knowledge. I would be worried in a democratic society that a voluntary committee is used to decide what knowledge is appropriate in society.
Isn't democracy about the people deciding and not some secret circle of anointed priests of the Internet? Do they wear robes?
I guess websites get to wear a scarlet letter for being naughty now that we have someone to tell us what is appropriate to consume.
As Nelson from the Simpson's would say, "Ha! Ha!"
Its a little known fact that the GNAA is actually a club for people with very small dicks, so small they need a magnifying glas to see them.