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UK MP Says ISPs Must Take Responsibility For Movie Leaks, Sony Eyes North Korea
An anonymous reader writes that the recent IP advisor to Prime Minister David Cameron has laid some of the blame for the recent Sony hack at the feet of ISPs. Meanwhile, it's reported that Sony is close to officially blaming North Korea. As the fallout from the Sony hack continues, who is to blame for the leak of movies including Fury, which has been downloaded a million times? According to the UK Prime Minister's former IP advisor, as 'facilitators' web-hosts and ISPs must step up and take some blame. Mike Weatherley MP, the recent IP advisor to Prime Minister David Cameron, has published several piracy reports including one earlier in the year examining the advertising revenue on pirate sites. He believes that companies with no direct connection to the hack or subsequent leaks should shoulder some blame. 'Piracy is a huge international problem. The recent cyber-attack on Sony and subsequent release of films to illegal websites is just one high-profile example of how criminals exploit others' Intellectual Property,' Weatherley writes in an email to TF. 'Unfortunately, the theft of these films – and their subsequent downloads – has been facilitated by web-hosting companies and, ultimately, ISPs who do have to step-up and take some responsibility.' Weatherley doesn't provide detail on precisely why web-hosts and ISPs should take responsibility for the work of malicious hackers (possibly state-sponsored) and all subsequent fall out from attacks. The theory is that 'something' should be done, but precisely what remains elusive."
How typical of a politician, and ESPECIALLY one in an English-speaking nation, to insist that everyone, everywhere has to shoulder the responsibility for everything that ever goes wrong.
I agree totally, we should also make sure to hold the government responsible for every road used to commit a crime, as without those roads it would have been difficult or impossible to commit some of these crimes. When are we going to have the government and road transport departments step up and take responsibility for issues that are clearly caused by their roads!
Oooo... That will make them officially guilty... I bet they're officially peeing their pants..
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
The movies were stolen? Now they're going to have to film them all over again!
I initiate a hack via social engineering over the telephone. I get ahold of some passwords and information which allows me to access super secret data, and leak it. I suppose the phone company is at fault, also?
What kind of nonsense. Politicians should not directly talk about IT related issues - but rather, allow some representative who isn't ridiculously uninformed to do so on their behalf, save them lots of face.
... Sony is about to declare war on North Korea. This should be interesting.
In other news: construction workers building and maintaining city streets and highways are now held responsible for high speed chases.
Members of Parliament and their corporate-owned hirelings shouting from the rooftops how technically ignorant and ill-advised they are, yet again. Let's lock up every bus driver, train operator staff and all the directors of London Transport, as every thief, murderer and rapist in the last 100 years used public transport at some point to "facilitate" their illegal activities!! I swear if we filled government with trained monkeys, you'd see an improvement in the way the country was run within days.
How about the movie studios taking responsibility for the movie leaks?
It's not like some random dude on the internet decided to leak the movie.
Remember that there is no legal protection for trade secrets, it is a secret only for as long as you can keep it a secret.
Same deal goes for movies, if you let them leave the studio they have been released. If you don't like it, make sure they don't get out.
Local banks are talking about how recent robberies have been facilitated by road and bridge construction crews and, ultimately, vehicle manufacturers who do have to step-up and take some responsibility for those criminals getting away with their ill gotten gains.
Bare in mind this MP has a massive conflict of interests on this subject so anything he says should be ignored as it is not anything close to impartial
Look at his parliamentary declared interests http://www.theyworkforyou.com/mp/24889/mike_weatherley/hove#register
So, when a bank is robbed and the thieves use a getaway car then he should obviously be blaming the roads, or the car companies, maybe the gas station for allowing them to be transported to the bank and away from the scene of the crime.
Why is it that the method of transport is suddenly to blame here? If we always use the car analogy to describe technology concepts then should the roadways be inspecting the contents and destination of all travellers to prevent or detect crimes?
So in this analogy we have criminals who committed the crime and the bank (Sony) where the locks were found to be insufficient and the guards were not watching the right doors. Why does the blame need to extend beyond those parties?
Of course the governments would probably jump at the chance to inspect all traffic and the contents of all vehicles on the road if they thought they could get away with it. To protect the people of course, no other reason.
I crave for a world where politicians are punished for lying and held responsible for talking about things outside their area of expertise. Show us where the studies are that prove piracy is a problem, because all I see as a game developer and publisher is the studies proving piracy is a new form of advertisement and benefits more than harms.
Think of all the getaway drivers they've assisted. Christ.
I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
Who honestly cares who is responsible for a large company not having adequate security measures in place. They are externalising the underlying problem of them being slack. Don't want your movies leaked before release, don't put them on the Internet. Problem solved. I've very little sympathy for Sony here and simply do not trust the "officials" who are going to allocate blame to another country.
Sony could have easily avoided this -- send only physical media around and make sure everyone has a non-networked computer to use it on. Strongly enforce this policy by firing based on non-compliance and folks will learn. Sure it slows things down a little and costs a bit more but the chance of a leak is reduced significantly. I doubt the costs are actually significant compared to the revenue the movie will generate or even the lead actor's payments.
North Korea is the current target of the powers that be, so of course they are "responsible". Sure they aren't a nice government and I'd not want to live or even visit there, but still....
Just curious, which people is this guy representing?
ISPs are to blame to the degree that they facilitate the transfer of data between individuals, which is about the same level of involvement that oxygen has in the ignition of gunpowder. In other words, blaming ISPs for file sharing is about as sensible as blaming oxygen in shooting deaths.
That this is just politiquese to get gov taxes (us paying) to the "poor" media companies, to create a body to regulate this to employ more of their cronies, that they are peeing on their pants the old and new generations, dont give a shit to TV and cable, and to pass draconian laws regulating computer usage, and thus create a new feudal digital age, right?
Employees say Sony must take responsibility for formulaic, mundane movies; some eye Adam Sandler
North Korea, the new Russia. (ib4 sony films w/ airplanes and shit, taken down by north korean terrorists)
Doesn't that sound like people who build the road should be responsible for all accidents that happen ? Considering the roads are good. Yet it is their fault since they own the roads well being.
and Borat, hack the fuckers at Sony again. Please. They do not deserve to have any customers at all.
To all of you who are sued for filesharing, you should ask the following proofs or you are not guilty or no copyright-violation has happened at all:
1. How is the IP determined which supposedly did the violation. Ask for digitally signed and timestamped data by a unforkable authority (like e.g. publictimestamp.org) or this data is void.
2. How is the IP assigned to your connection? Ask for digitally signed and timestamped data by a unforkable authority (like e.g. publictimestamp.org) or this data is void.
3. Did real Uploads happen? Downloads are legal as you never know what you get before a download finished. Ask for digitally signed and timestamped data for each uploaded packet by a unforkable authority (like e.g. publictimestamp.org) or this data is void.
4. Which content was uploaded? Ask for digitally signed and timestamped hash-values of the data by a unforkable authority (like e.g. publictimestamp.org) or this data is void.
5. Was the upload illegal? Ask for evidence that the downloader has no rights to the data like just downloading a file he owns the DVD (e.g. if DVD is broken or if he's not at home on vacation and simply forgot to bring the DVD) and that the downloader is not a close friend and thus was no private-copy. This evidence has to be given for each single upload.
6. Value of uploaded data. Simply multiplying the supposed selling-price of each upload does not equal the lost income. Either the opposite is the case, that each x uploads relate to y more sales.
7. Who did the upload? Was it the owner of the connection or was your wlan hacked or simply free to use for everyone? Just like streets and axes, which are open to everyone, WLANs are public infrastructure and important to our society. If a street is used to commit a crime it's not the responsibility of the street-owner but the commiter. The same applies to WLANs. Ask for evidence who uploaded the files.
If a single one of these points can't be proven with valid evidence, than either it was someone else or no copyright infringement has happened at all.
Would the highway authority be blamed for facilitating a bank robbery if the thieves drove there? The only ones you should blame for a security breach if the attacker and the security admin at site for a p*ss poor setup. STOP trying to lay the foundation for taking more control over the ISPs!!!
I tried poking the intartubes, but this guy doesn't seem to have much of a professional life besides his political career (there's some typical -- and disgusting gossip, but that's it).
Who did/does this guy work for when he's not an MP? Does anyone know?
Sometimes it is embarrassing to be British. David Cameron is one of those embarrassments that the eductaed of us just ignore. Not only is he a fool for listening to the fools that surround him but an even bigger fool for choosing his own foolish advisers.
Obviously the only blame lies with Sony for being so careless. Just as it lies with the rest of the MPAA members who manage to let most movies leak through pre-lease 'screeners'. I'm a cynic so it is no surprise that perhaps I think such leaks are deliberate. Very similar to Michael o'Leary of Ryanair who manages to get publisity with his standing jokes about charging for airplane loos and developing stand-up aircraft.
Fury, which has been downloaded a million times
How do they know that? I'm genuinely curious.
There is no sig.
Early life
(Snip) He is a chartered management accountant. He professes a keen interest in live music and was finance director of record producer Pete Waterman's group of businesses.[5] In 2007 he became Vice President (Europe) for the Motion Picture Licensing Company.[6]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Weatherley
You jest, but the police in this country created a massive surveillance network watching our major roads with image recognition cameras. Their favourite excuse for this not-at-all-creepy step? "Denying criminals the use of the roads." Because the criminals always use real licence plates on their getaway cars, you see.
That operation was started without initial formal debate or authorisation from MPs, but has effectively been condoned since. In fact, it has been developed further, by co-opting cameras installed for other purposes despite explicit promises that this would not be done. Fortunately no innocent people have ever been issued with automated fines for something they didn't actually do, because it would probably cost those people more to fight such tickets in court than just paying up.
Basically, looking at how the road network is handled, the people running the show here really do seem to think the way forward for our society is universal surveillance and automated mass penalties for minor infringements of laws based on dubious evidence with no cost-effective means of defending yourself if you are wrongfully accused.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
Allow me to frequently do my job. Case in point: Today I got locked out of my Microsoft Live account for 3 months for failing to provide adequate security identification. I urgently needed to download a particular Office ISO for a client as someone had managed to restore factory settings to a key piece of infrastructure.
I provided phone codes, SMS codes, and email codes, but the site is just broken and can't process the codes. I've contacted Microsoft, and they insist I need to set up a new account, link accounts to it, all on the same email address. I know if I create a new account it will say "email address already associated with an account". There is no solution here but to go somewhere like The Pirate Bay, download a legit image, and get on with life. Took over two hours dealing with MS, only 15 minutes TPB download though.
Now, if we were to remove access to these sites, we would need to put up with the incompetence of companies like Microsoft who can't even manage a web portal correctly. This isn't even to mention the benefits these technologies offer. The ISO downloaded about 4x faster than it would have from an MS site because so many people were helping. The connection burst beyond my expectations.
In then end, problem solved. But Microsoft helping licensed customers access their products? According to Microsoft, this was not an option.
I think after the whole hacking of PlayStation Online hack they would have learned to get security right. But I guess its another case of crisis management. Now let's blame the ISP's as Cameron says? Really? How about blaming who did it for once? Maybe counter attack North Korea if they are the culprits. Maybe grow a pair and stop spying on your own citizens and start going on the offensive. Otherwise, these rogue Countries will continue to use electronic warfare on us and destroy our data right before our eyes. The NSA has all kinds of ways to spy on Americans but the FBI seems like a cheap private eye when it comes to doing anything about international electronic espionage. Maybe that's because the FBI is not equipped to handle it? Sony obviously was a victim here, and maybe they did take reasonable measures to protect their data. Maybe this attack was simply that good and not much could have been done to stop or detect it. But the US needs to step up to the plate and protect its citizens, businesses and other data centers and infrastructure from these attacks. My God, two more years of Obama wimpy behavior!
and hire someone who understands what (s)he is talking about.
That's a pro net neutrality comment if I ever heard one.
UK MP is a moron.
I have no interest what people from UK or Canada have to say.
Blaming ISPs for piracy is like blaming highway operators for stolen cars.
Surely the blame lies with the "hackers" and possibly Sony's lax network security?!
In the words of Sergeant Hartman: "If it wasn't for dickheads like you, there wouldn't be any thievery in this world, would there?" Resume: It's sony's data, so they'd better protect it.
Kim could kill millions of Koreans, could cause wide hunger an poverty - we could live with it.
Kim could kidnap foreigners - we could live with it.
Heck - we could even live with Kim building atomic bomb.
But pirating movies? No! He definitely crossed the line this time. Free world can not allow it and there will be miliatary intervention!
In other news:
* Saddam bittorent logs have been finally released to public.
* Russia confirms there were pirated movies onboard MH17/MAS17 flight and Russian separatists were acting in the best interest of the free world and copyright holders
They might use cloned or fake number plates, but do they really pull over down the road from the bank to change the plates? If not, then fake or not the plates people report the getaway car having are still going to be the same plates. More problematic is that you only have a short window of time to stop the car before they abandon it somewhere quiet and transfer to a different vehicle.
So... the Bank of England gets rob and the get away vehicle is a special one time Jaguar prototype then Tata Motors must step up and take some blame...??
And if Sony weren't such dicks, maybe bad shit wouldn't happen to them.
Politicians aren't the right people to be handling this. You can legislate all the laws you want, but they don't fix the problem. It's illegal to burgle houses, but it happens all the time. Sony got burgled. Better luck next time. Buy better locks, build a more secure IT infrastructure, and be thankful that nobody died. Nobody even lost real money, as I read it, except, of course, for the costs of the cleanup.
Although the thought of all those Sony employees filling out paper forms with typewriters is kinda humorous...
I'm no fan of ISPs, especially in the US (Comcast). However, when some crooks rob a bank and get away via a high-speed chase down freeways and toll roads, then do the people who maintain and operate the roads bear any responsibility for the crime? Maybe the toll booth operators should have stopped the bad guys. If that sounds stupid, then so does blaming the ISPs.
Sine the government provides the roads murderers use to get to their victims, clearly by the same logic, David Cameron is an accessory to murder.
Also, copyright infringement is not 'theft'. Nothing is being stolen. This whole copyright maximalist agenda is just warped, sick, and perverted.
He doesn't understand how the Internet actually works.
CAN ISPs use technology and root out more casual piracy? Probably. But this kind of inspection doesn't STOP the piracy, it just makes discovery easier. It ALSO slows down their networks and requires a substantial investment in equipment and software that IN NO WAY contributes to the company's bottom line.
As such, why should the ISPs be forced to foot the bill? Especially when we get down to brass tacks, they pass it along to the customer and now people are essentially paying to be spied upon.
Had this been a PHYSICAL theft, he'd be blaming everyone who'd seen the criminal for not making an arrest, without knowing that something had been done in the first place. Every cabby, bus driver, friend or random pedestrian on the street.
The only way to get RID of piracy is to eliminate the desire to actually consume that media. But that's like trying to outlaw water because it contributes to drowning. If you eliminate the desire to consume said media, you've just cut your own throat.
As long as there's a desire to consume this content, and there's ANY form of price or availability barrier, there is GOING to be piracy. FLAT OUT. Anyone who doesn't understand this, and that trying to pursue this sort of imbecillic goal of "stamping out piracy" is chasing a fantasy.
The best that can be done is to increase viewer options until piracy becomes too much of a hassle for the majority. The best bet for that right now are streaming services like iTunes, Amazon, Google Play, and Netflix.
And we can get there all the faster without mentally stunted individuals like Cameron stirring the pot and injecting idiocy after idiocy into the debate.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Why would someone at his level be making comments on such a trivial issue? Why would he even care? Please tell me that the British system isn't as money driven as ours, and that this isn't being driven by some lobbyist?!?
Just another day in Paradise
I wonder if this what the new communism looks like. Or maybe it's just the drugs talking. Might be dementia too.
That's like blaming the phone network for telemarketers.
Mike Weatherley MP, the recent IP advisor to Prime Minister David Cameron, "... The recent cyber-attack on Sony and subsequent release of films to illegal websites..."
Can a *website* be illegal? Is that even possible? Am I giving a nutjob ideas? I understand the concept of illegal content, but I don't see how a website itself is illegal.
I mean, who on Earth still pays attention to Hollywood movies?
They're terrible!
You'd have to pay me to watch "Fury"... whatever the hell it is.
OMG someone robbed a bank. We should totally blame cars for letting them drive away.
As every politician lies endlessly, this will eventually free up a lot of bandwidth for downloading porn.
.. blaming the telephone companies for scams like where "microsoft technical support" calls you about some alleged problems on your computer.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
"Never let a good crisis go to waste..."
The postal office still transports anonymous ransom and blackmail notes.
And those are real crimes not invented ones.
ISP's are not a policing body and therefore cannot be held responsible for an individuals actions or choices. My night-shift employee insists on removing his shoes and using his socked foot to push the trash down and demands that I not use the can so the HE doesn't get trash on his foot. Same non-nonsensical argument; it's not the ISP's job to police their customers anymore than it is my job to accept responsibility for my employee's weird obsessions.
"ISPs Must Take Responsibility For Movie Leaks"
And
"Ministry of Transport Must Take Responsibility For Drug Trafficking"
And the government is responsible for all car accidents!
If anything which has value to someone, and which can be taken away from that person can be stolen, then yes... it definitely qualifies. The fact that what might be getting taken away from the authorized person or persons in this case has no physical representation does not diminish the value that it was legally declared to be The fact that the person who might take it would not gain the same value out of it as the value that the person who took it lost by having it taken does not diminish its value either, any more than the fact that one could steal somebody's money to burn in a campfire does not reduce the value of the money that they stole to that of kindling. Although this factor can easily keep many people from recognizing that value, or respecting it. Once faced with that fact, they will either have to give up piracy, or else more commonly admit that they believe the entire notion of copyright to be an unfair mechanism designed to artificially create exclusivity. The problem with the latter conclusion is that even with all of its problems, copyright is still vastly better system for providing exclusivity than censorship, including self-censorship, which is the only really viable ultimate alternative. Much of the best content that would be publicly available in such a situation would be lost in an endless sea of mediocre tripe that nobody cared enough about to want exclusivity on in the first place.
Of course, you could also just try reprogramming the entire human race to not be greedy or to desire any kind of exclusivity in the first place, but I strongly suspect that you won't accomplish that.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
All I know about this story is "blah blah blah Sony blah blah something bad happened to Sony" and my reaction is, good, fuck Sony, anything bad that happens to Sony is good for the world. I won't be paying attention any more. Call me back when a person or company who isn't evil has something bad happen to them.
because, hey, the killers took them once.
grow up, man. learn something. it's not too late.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
I'm no lover of Sony (even though I do play EQ2), but if this B-grade flick is so annoying to the Dear Butterball, the widest possible distribution of the film certainly seems worthwhile. Like Spengler said about the Nazis, "When one has the opportunity to annoy these people, one should do so."
Scruting the inscrutable for over 50 years.
Karma, karma, karma, karma, karma, Ko-ree-a
Payback's a bitch
Payback's a bi-i-i-itch
"Piracy is a huge international problem"
Yes piracy is a problem. Oh, you mean copyright infringement, and not actual piracy?
After all by providing a link into the building where the content was stored they enabled the theft to happen.
just tell Google to forget about these files. problem solved, right?
I wonder if the government itself will share some of this blame.
Without some type of government backing surely the ISP's wouldn't have been able to deploy the infrastructure to allow all this piracy. I mean there are right of way issues, permits and applications, procurements and all sorts of other stuff these ISP's have had to deal with the government to be able to deliver that service.
ISPs should take responsibility for the actions of their users as soon as politicians take responsibility for the actions of their constituents, or maybe even responsibility for their own actions.
the above is my personal opinion and does not necessarily reflect that of the little voices in my head
That's like saying Staples, OfficeWorks, etc. should assume responsibility for people printing leaked government documents because they enabled the printing by selling printers. If movies aren't available for download then they can't be downloaded, i.e.: how about Sony and friend fix their own fucking security so these leaks just don't happen in the first place?
Also worth noting: There has been at least one documented example in the past where a "leaked" movie was actually leaked by the movie studio to drum up business ahead of release, e.g.: Sony Pictures Admits Hacking, Film ‘Leaks’ Were Marketing Stunt. And there have been many other "leaks" to promo movies, e.g.: Gary Oldman admits studio leaked their own RoboCop 'spy’ photos. Maybe it's a regular thing.
It doesn't qualify. Nothing was removed. When I steal your bike, you can't ride it anymore. Are you saying Sony can't release the movies anymore now they're 'stolen'? Get a clue on copyrights; rights holders wouldn't want to trade it for normal property.
"I'm not much interested in interoperability. I want substitutability. I want to be able to throw your software out."
What is being "stolen" is the exclusive rights of the copyright holder, which are assigned by virtue of the copyright, to dictate who may copy the work. Exclusive means that nobody else gets to do it, so by the very definition of the term, a copyright infringer is depriving the copyright holder of their exclusivity in that regard.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Fine. In your logic, after a copyright infringement, the right holder doesn't have the exclusive right anymore because it's stolen. Have fun explaining that to the copyright holders, see if they're willing to embrace your explanation.
FYI: copyrights are very strong and versatile rights, covered by many laws and treaties which contain criminal penalties and financial damages for infringement. And theft is something different altogether.
The only thing a copyright holder wants is that you feel the indignation associated with the theft of physical goods. A real equation of copyright infringement with theft would be a huge disservice to rights holders.
"I'm not much interested in interoperability. I want substitutability. I want to be able to throw your software out."
Actually, that's exactly right... they DON'T have exclusivity when somebody else infringes... Obviously, for any single act of infringement, a relatively small percentage of the overall exclusivity is lost, but it is still lost nevertheless.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
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