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Newzbin Usenet Indexer Liable For Copyright Infringement
An anonymous reader writes "The world's most popular Usenet indexing site, Newzbin, has been trounced in London's High Court by the movie studios. Held liable for the infringements of its users, later this week Newzbin will be subjected to an injunction which will force it to filter out illegal copies of movies from its NZB index. From the article: 'Newzbin’s help guides were referred to in the decision. They state that the site can help people find what they're looking for, "whether that be obscure music, tv shows, games or movies. Think of us as a TV guide, but we're a guide that applies to Usenet." ... Newzbin has members called "editors" who help to compile reports on material to be found on Usenet. Newzbin's own documentation was used to show that the site encouraged editors to post links to movies. The verdict notes that to assist editors useful links to IMDb and VCDQuality are provided, the latter being useful to provide information about "screeners."'"
1) will they get a copy of users search history (complete with creditcard logs linking them to the account)? (and no, I've never been a member)
This was posted on Newzbin a while back:
Server logs and user activity Some subscribers are a little concerned about privacy in the light of the current litigation so to put their minds at rest we thought we would explain what the privacy implications are of our logs. We are currently keeping webserver logs for a period which is sufficient to allow us to defend ourselves against web attacks. However we cannot tell from our logs what NZBs you have downloaded. At all. If we can't do this then neither can any complainant with access to our logs. Furthermore we rotate old logs so that they are deleted. No request has been made for our logs during the discovery phase of litigation and due to the nature of the legal process that request would have to have been made a long time ago: it wasn't. They cannot now, legally, have it; and moreover they dont actually seem that interested either. The fact is this: they are gunning for Newzbin not you. Bottom line: We cannot tell anyone what NZBs you have been using whether those are for Linux distros, porn or just embarrassing lawful material. Don't worry.
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I switched to a paid Usenet service because it was more "private" than torrent. Does this mean I'm going to have to back to BitchX and CLI to get movies?
No, this is only an indexer of .nzb files, which are analogous to .torrent files; it was also a pay site, there are others out there that are free or automated with ssl connections, so I hear.
You may want to upgrade to an SSL connection though if you are worried, the ISP logs will still show you connecting to a usenet provider, but what you are downloading will not be discernible.
ISPs aren't and never have been common carriers. This is a widespread falsity spread around by Slashdotters.
If they succeed in making this indexer "play ball", does this not set the precedence for all other indexers? I don't use Newzbin so this currently doesn't affect me but could it possibly down the line?
Thanks for the SSL recommendation BTW, I will check that today.
Newzbin is unique (as far as I know) in that it has people (editors) create the "reports" which indicate which files are what. Other services that exist don't use people and use an AI to try to determine what each file/post is. It appears it's Newzbin's help documentation for the editors that got them in trouble.
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Because file transfers aren't absolutely reliable. With small file sizes, most of the parts make it from server to server, and people already have a bunch of ways of dealing with a little bit of missing data (use more than 1 provider, par2, etc.).
I imagine the fact that a change would favor new users and irritate (some/many?) established users is also a factor.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
This may be true for the specific "common carrier" legal status used in the US. In Europe quite a few countries employ similar principles, though I believe the term "mere conduit" is more frequently used than "common carrier". I'm not completely sure what the EU directives say about it, but ISPs here are generally very skeptical to filtering content precisely because they don't want to be made liable for what they carry, and from the leaks about ACTA it appears one of the main objections from the EU is that they don't want to make ISPs responsible for what users do.
One exception is the United Kingdom, which more or less seems to have volunteered to beta test Orwellian stuff before the US deploys it. Even there, however, the ISPs have recently cried foul at government plans to implement copyright enforcement on the ISP level.