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."

Comments

I wonder who bought him

[Anonymous Coward]

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.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[Anonymous Coward]

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.

Except them.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[LordLucless]

How typical of a politician, and ESPECIALLY one in an English-speaking nation, to insist that everyone except him has to shoulder the responsibility for everything that ever goes wrong.

FTFY

Re:I wonder who bought him

[stealth_finger]

Next he'll be saying the Highways Agency need to takes some responsibilities for bank jobs.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[Chrisq]

Next he'll be saying the Highways Agency need to takes some responsibilities for bank jobs.

I want the petrol station to be responsible for my speeding ticket!

Re:I wonder who bought him

[Anonymous Coward]

Or again typical of a politician - "Something needs to be done", "'This' is something, therefore THIS has to be done" never mind whether 'This' is the best thing to do, or even appropriate.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[Mashiki]

I want politicians to be responsible for everything.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

One step at a time... I want politicians to be responsible for anything!

Re:I wonder who bought him

[Anonymous Coward]

Because ISPs are like the roads. Are the companies that have paved the UK roads responsible for the bank job?

Re:I wonder who bought him

[Anonymous Coward]

Does that mean we should cut North Korea off the net entirely?

Wait.. Never-mind.

Does that mean we need to cut off the 3 or 4 government officials with internet?

Re:I wonder who bought him

[gl4ss]

I'm pretty sure you would find it hard to prosecute some taxi driver just because he drove some murderer around after a murder... or drove someone to a "commonly known drug location"(piratebay). by the analogy the taxi driver should have performed a search on the client for bloody knives or drugs as normal procedure - or that the isp should start banning people for using WOW update or other torrents.

anyways, it's EU wide attitude that the isp shouldn't be looking at your packets and email. it's criminal to do so, so why would another protocol be ok? you got complaints about some crime you think that happened YOU TAKE IT TO THE FUCKING POLICE and not ask some service provider to bill some random guy.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[arth1]

I want the petrol station to be responsible for my speeding ticket!

Don't give them any ideas. If they find out that it is possible to grade fuel based on how much energy it provides, and provide fuel so crappy that you cannot break the speed limit unless going downhill, I'm sure that at least one politician will demand just that, and another will pipe in with how it will make school children safer and bring jobs to the north.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[physicsphairy]

Their wielding of power requires that others are responsible. You can't pass a law against someone unless you've laid some blame at their feet. And it's not necessarily the goal to pass the law, either. Maybe just a friendly reminder that ISPs aren't making enough campaign contributions and might want to reconsider before the next legislative session comes around.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[drinkypoo]

If they find out that it is possible to grade fuel based on how much energy it provides,

They already do that. Higher-octane fuel runs in higher-compression engines that produce more HP per liter. My first car was a 1960 Dodge Dart which came with a 318ci big block with, no shit, 12:1 compression. I had to run octane booster on top of premium fuel to feed it in California. It would run OK on just premium if you kept your foot out of it, though. That bad boy made 240hp and 340lb-ft... in 1960. That was pretty great for 5.2 liters, back then. Today you'd only expect 400 and 400, or so, but the engine would have to be able to do it on 91 octane gasohol.

Of course, fuel taxes take a gigantic shit on the whole concept when unevenly applied...

Re:I wonder who bought him

[Anonymous Coward]

You're missing the part where ISPs already have systems in place to block it. They don't fucking work, because what you and other morons like you think they should be doing is several orders of magnitude more difficult than you like to pretend it is. Which is why the "roads" analogy is far closer to reflecting reality than is your retarded "getaway driver" analogy. You're either clueless or knowingly bullshitting. Which is it?

Re:I wonder who bought him

[jonnyj]

...what you and other morons like you think they should be doing is several orders of magnitude more difficult than you like to pretend it is...

Who said it was easy? I certainly didn't. It's not easy for banks to identify financial transactions that relate to criminal activity either. But they try, and, over time, get better at it. 10% enforcement is better than 0% enforcement. 20% enforcement is better than 10% enforcement. When did a cry of, 'It's too hard!' ever become a reason to give up on something? Should we stop looking for murderers who leave a scant trail of evidence, for example? Are you scared of progress?

You can make a reasonable argument for saying that intellectual property should not be protected by the criminal law. But, for as long as that legal protection exists, it's hard to escape the irresistible conclusion that it should be supported by a legal environment that's similar to other criminal activity.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[qzzpjs]

Banks are required to have systems in place to prevent their payment services from being used for money laundering purposes. Haulage companies are required to have systems in place to prevent their lorries from being used by illegal immigrants. Fertiliser distributors are required to have systems in place to prevent their products from being used for bomb making. Munitions retailers are required to have systems in place to prevent their guns from being used by crazed psychopaths

If you go by your examples, it is Sony that should have systems in place to prevent their movies from being stolen, not the ISP. As the parent message said, the ISP is just like the roads the criminal may travel over to and from the bank. The city may be able to put up a few stop signs or traffic stops as needed, but ultimately, someone always finds another route around.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[jonnyj]

If you sat in the back of a taxi and casually wiped blood off a dripping knife, the taxi driver would probably be prosecuted as an accessory to your murder. A great deal of criminal activity on the internet is just as flagrant.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[arth1]

Thing is, with E10 (10% alcohol) they manage to increase the octane rating while providing less energy per volume of fuel.

But why stop there? Find something other than ethanol that has even lower energy, and make it mandatory. Decreased risk of cars being able to exceed the speed limit, and everyone is happy... Well, except drivers and car manufacturers, but who cares about them as long as they pay their taxes!

Speaking of speed limits ... I have noticed that they've dug down speed sensors in more and more roads now. Two tube shaped sensors about 50m apart, only covering the right hand side of the lane. So now, when speeding, make sure you ride the middle double yellow line.... Yeah, that will make the roads safer!

Re:I wonder who bought him

[anegg]

Yes, I can explain why ISPs are different. They are simply the carrier, and should not be a policy enforcement point. Government is very interested in having ISPs be a policy enforcement point, because government can control big ISPs (sort of) much better than government can control a vast number of endpoints.

Most of the businesses you reference above (banks, fertilizer distributors, munitions retailers) are not common carriers. Haulage companies are a form of common carrier, but their responsibility with respect to the load that they are carrying is to make sure that it was legally handed off to them by what appears to be a reputable company. They are not engaged in examine the content of what they haul to determine if it violates government rules/laws.

The phone company provides a service (not a product) that is widely used for criminal activity as well, but we aren't proposing that the phone company is responsible for monitoring communications content to ensure that the communications activity isn't in violation of law.

ISPs should carry traffic. Period. Not serve as a handy proxy for the government, especially when the use of them as a proxy allows the government greater control/monitoring of the communications than the government is allowed in the first place.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[Dunbal]

I think that shoe manufacturers must shoulder the responsibility for these leaks. Because it's pretty obvious that the perpetrators use shoes when they move about. And since this "crime" is committed on the backbone of shoe use, obviously those who make shoes must ensure that people who wear their shoes don't use them while breaking the law!

Re:I wonder who bought him

[DutchUncle]

The telephone company provides a service that is widely used for conversations of ALL sorts, from totally innocent to totally evil. Would you suggest having staff eavesdrop on every conversation? The postal service delivers all sorts of mail, from love letters to suspicious white powder; is it the postman's fault if you get a "Dear John" letter?

From the other side: Banks keep money in vaults; jewelry shops are required to take valuables out of window displays and secure them when the shop is closed; so why did Sony have its valuables where anyone could access them? Not blaming the victim here - theft is theft - but, paralleling your example of securing a lorry, there's a big difference between someone breaking into a locked car and hotwiring it, and someone driving away a running car with the keys in and the door actually open outside a coffee shop. (happened in our town.)

Re:I wonder who bought him

[DutchUncle]

Can you explain why money transmission should be subject to laws that require criminal use of the service to be identified, while information transmission should be exempted from any such requirement?

Can you explain why those money transmission laws have been used to take money away from totally innocent small businesses who happen, by sheer coincidence, to make a few deposits of just-under the "reporting" limit? (Which obviously means that the stated reporting limit is NOT the real reporting limit.) Can you explain, at a more basic level, why it's acceptable for banks to be reporting legal transactions to the government, when it's so much easier for a real crook to deal in cash?

Re:I wonder who bought him

[BronsCon]

There is a huge difference between knowing that your product or service is being used or will be used, by someone at some point, to facilitate criminal activity, and knowing who is using it for criminal activity and how. If they know who and how, then yes, they should either shut it down or face liability; however, your implication that they should face liability just because they know it's probably happening, with no specifics, also implies that, maybe, they should just shut down altogether to avoid liability.

Think about the words you are about to say before you say them.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[BronsCon]

Partly because the moment the endpoints begin using encryption, the ISP has no clue what the data is. Fix that without breaking peoples' privacy and you'll have an argument.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[Immerman]

>10% enforcement is better than 0% enforcement.

That depends entirely on the cost of enforcement. If you can stop $1,000 worth of criminal activity for a cost of $1,000,000, then everybody would be better off if you just accepted the original $1,000 as the cost of doing business and didn't wastefully extract the other $999,000 from the economy. And we're not just talking dollars here - one of the costs of your ISP becoming an enforcement agency is them doing far deeper and more invasive monitoring of their customers. Having hundreds of government-monitored security cameras on every block would help reduce crime, but the cost in money, privacy, and liberty* are too high for most people to approve of.

* consider what would have become of US independence if the Crown had ubiquitous automated surveilance of the colonies. Not only would there have never been a war, there probably never would have even been large-scale organized protests - the trouble-makers would have all been rounded up before their movement had gained even enough momentum to make them into martyrs.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[bored_engineer]

Ethanol, by itself, has an octane rating of about 129. The octane rating isn't about the energy content of the fuel, but rather its tendency to ignite under compression ("detonate") as compared to iso-octane.

Those tube-shaped sensors can probably measure a bit more than speed. I don't know what is used where you are, but I recently completed the design for a dozen automatic vehicle classification stations. They measure speed, count axles, and of course, count vehicles. I doubt that the sensors you're talking about are for speed enforcement: That's easily done with radar and photos.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[jonnyj]

>10% enforcement is better than 0% enforcement.

That depends entirely on the cost of enforcement...

Of course. So this becomes a question of pragmatism. If it can be demonstrated that the cost of enforcement is lower than the cost to society of the criminal activity, presumably you agree then that ISPs should be required to support law enforcement?

Re:I wonder who bought him

[Adriax]

ISPs should take partial responsibility if Mr. MP adviser takes partial responsibility for all the crime facilitated by the public roads and sidewalks.
1% responsibility for movie hosting vs 1% responsibility for 600+ murders a year.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[cyberchondriac]

Always. All they can do is pass laws, and laws are generally restrictive in nature. One usually assumes something is legal until a law says you can't... or must.
Whether or not the law accomplishes diddly squat, the politicians can then sit back and run their thumbs underneath their suspenders ("bracers" if you're British, bet you got a laugh out of that) and smugly say, "There, problem all fixed.. we did something about it". Which is also annoying because making legislation is often much easier then the practical execution of said legislation (whether or not it should be executed at all is a whole other matter).

Re:I wonder who bought him

[jonnyj]

Banks are common carriers of money. Most money transmission is legitimate, but all banks are required to have systems in place to detect whether any particular transaction is associated with criminal activity. If banks do not have these systems in place, their directors are subject to personal fines and possible prison sentences. The rules are rigorously enforced by the FCA.

How is an ISP's common carrier service conceptually different from what banks do?

Re:I wonder who bought him

[jonnyj]

The problem with your thinking is that if they start to monitor traffic, they'd have to disallow HTTPS. They'd have to disallow anonymising proxy use. They'd have to watch every packet to see if it might be used for any kind of illegal activity for any country worldwide.

Once you make an ISP responsible for policing for one law, they become responsible for any law breakage, which would essentially shutdown the internet entirely.

I send an e-mail with a joke that includes a rough drawing of Mohammed - boom - Islamic Radicals attack the ISP for allowing it to go through.

Your falacy would also have to be applied to all of the backbone operators globally, which would halt internet traffic in it's tracks.

There would be no need to watch every packet; there would simply be a need to put in place risk-based, technically achievable procedures that would have a reasonable chance of detecting activity that is against UK or international law. It's not against UK law to send a joke about Mohammed, so ISPs would have no responsibility for that. HTTPS is not easily inspectable at a packet level, so there would be no responsibility for that, either - although it might be reasonable to other matters associated with HTTPS traffic such as the end IP addresses and the volume of data transmitted. If you took the financial services model, backbone providers would be able to rely on measures taken by the consumer's ISP, so the internet would not be shut down.

You have identified no falacy[sic] in what I'm saying here.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[oldmac31310]

Braces, not bracers.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[I Read Good]

Which is exactly the point. What is the cost to society of piracy? Any solution like what you're proposing that would work and have a noticeable effect on piracy would cost hundreds of millions of dollars.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[I Read Good]

IANAL, but I'm calling bullshit. I'm starting to think you're a troll, shill, or simply clueless about how the internet works.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[sabri]

I doubt that the sensors you're talking about are for speed enforcement: That's easily done with radar and photos.

In many countries fixed-base speed traps are built using inductive loop detectors (the pneumatic ones aren't that good). One of the reasons is that radar-detectors won't work...

Re:I wonder who bought him

[bored_engineer]

Thanks. Why wouldn't radar work? Mountainous roads?

Re:I wonder who bought him

[cyberchondriac]

Oops.. thanks. Well crap, I can't go brush up on effingpot.com, the domain is for sale.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[interval1066]

How typical of a politician...to insist that everyone, everywhere has to shoulder the responsibility for everything that ever goes wrong.

Not everything, just the things that prevent the 1% from making money.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[sabri]

Thanks. Why wouldn't radar work? Mountainous roads?

Radar will work, but radar-detectors won't. So a speeder can not rely on his companion-in-crime...

Re:I wonder who bought him

[Caesar Tjalbo]

- theft is theft -

It wasn't theft.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[Immerman]

Quite so. However, to date I've never heard any solid evidence that piracy costs society, or even publishers, anything at all. Presumably it carries some costs, but certainly nothing even remotely close to the "every copy would have be bought at full opening-day prices" numbers trotted out by the publishers.

Meanwhile, even ignoring the costs of enforcement implementation, I would rank the costs in privacy and liberty as higher than the purely economic costs of piracy. Even if we were to use the publisher's own laughably over-inflated numbers.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[david_thornley]

Why should an ISP necessarily shut down a connection used for illegal activity? The illegal activity may be a small part of its use, and may be a temporary theft of service or something. The ISP should perhaps alert the authorities about illegal activity, but the authorities might prefer that the ISP keep the account open and monitored.

Not to mention that knowing who is using it for criminal activity isn't easy. There are plenty of legal torrents out there. File names are not necessarily representative of their contents. I download lots of copyrighted stuff myself, and it isn't going to be obvious to an ISP which stuff was free to download and which I actually paid for and which I am doing illegally. We don't want private companies to be required to serve as judge, jury, and executioner.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[BronsCon]

I was making a point to the poster I was replying to, and no, the connections shouldn't be shut down by the ISP for any reason other than nonpayment, customer request, or a court order; but I wasn't about to start two separate arguments with that poster.

Re:I wonder who bought him

[beastofburdon]

I agree, throw them all in prison for life.

Agreed!

[Anonymous Coward]

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!

Re:Agreed!

[hedgemage]

You're not thinking this through, we're talking about computers here.
These crimes used computers, and these computer use software, the software companies are to blame for aiding and abetting these hackers and pirates!
And those computers also use power which is generated by utility companies who need to step up and accept their responsibility for this criminal behavior!
Heaven help the soft-drink company that makes whatever beverage these criminal masterminds used to quench their thirst during their reign of terror! Hopefully they will have the moral rectitude to admit that they must also shoulder the blame!

Re:Agreed!

[mwvdlee]

Look, without the movie companies making movies, we wouldn't have movie leaks.
It's clear the movie companies themselves are to blame.

Re:Agreed!

[POPE Mad Mitch]

More so, if a bank robbers getaway vehicle went on a toll road then the roads operator should be charged with profiting from the proceeds of crime, they clearly facilitated the crime.

Re:Agreed!

[Anonymous Coward]

You know that governments tend to think that way, don't you? It's upon us to prevent that, not encourage it. If you allow the government to "accept that responsibility", they will gladly take that opportunity and install a fascist police state. (I'm using future tense for nostalgic reasons.)

Re:Agreed!

[gnasher719]

More so, if a bank robbers getaway vehicle went on a toll road then the roads operator should be charged with profiting from the proceeds of crime, they clearly facilitated the crime.

Actually, the QE2 bridge / Dartford tunnel in Essex, England are the perfect spot to catch criminals in a car and have been used that way. Close the toll booths and there is just no way to escape. Bit inconvenient for everyone else.

Re:Agreed!

[DoofusOfDeath]

We should hold ISP's responsible for lies told by politicians. If a politician is caught lying three times, ISP's should refuse to carry any internet traffic involving their campaign ads.

Re:Agreed!

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, the QE2 bridge / Dartford tunnel in Essex, England are the perfect spot to catch criminals in a car and have been used that way. Close the toll booths and there is just no way to escape. Bit inconvenient for everyone else.

Except the toll booths are being removed ...

Re:Agreed!

[ArcadeMan]

Look, without envy, people wouldn't be downloading movies illegally.
It's clear God himself is to blame.

Re:Agreed!

[meta-monkey]

I don't know how the monsters who make Mountain Dew can sleep at night.

Re:Agreed!

[dgatwood]

It's clear the movie companies themselves are to blame.

You joke, but IMO, they are largely responsible—a lot more so than ISPs who merely failed to prevent the normal use of their networks by people doing nefarious things. After all, these movies were stolen off of the movie studios' machines, which means they clearly didn't take security seriously enough.

close to officially blaming North Korea

[fustakrakich]

Oooo... That will make them officially guilty... I bet they're officially peeing their pants..

Oh, no.

[Anonymous Coward]

The movies were stolen? Now they're going to have to film them all over again!

Re:Oh, no.

[ZeRu]

The movies were stolen? Now they're going to have to film them all over again!

I wouldn't steal a car, but I would download it.

So, lets say...

[Rick in China]

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.

Re:So, lets say...

[idji]

Neither phone companies nor post offices can inspect every analog message coming through. but ISPs could inspect digital content, and that is the difference. You can make your analogies that ISPs are indenpendent conduits and hence not responsible for content - but you need to consider the analog/digital divide.

Re:So, lets say...

[Rick in China]

Are you implying that phone companies don't have the capability to record or analyze phone calls?

Re:So, lets say...

[Neil Boekend]

Post offices and phone companies aren't even ALLOWED to inspect the content, bar a few very specific cases. For postal companies this means: undeliverable and without return adress.

And neither should ISP's be. They are no different so why should they be allowed to inspect the contents of a package?

Re:So, lets say...

[Anonymous Coward]

Why would they do this?
Most of the public is just as uninformed as they are. By presenting such "solutions" to them they get more votes, not less.

Re:So, lets say...

[Rick in China]

You really think anyone that doesn't work for the movie/music industry is going to be voting in favour of this kind of political fluff talk?

Really?

Re:So, lets say...

[Anonymous Coward]

Post offices and phone companies aren't even ALLOWED to inspect the content, bar a few very specific cases. For postal companies this means: undeliverable and without return adress.

In the UK, as the article discusses?

As many people here are Americans, for one example, the US Postal Service X-rays many things... or many other inspections that do not involve opening the package. And only a few of their services have this protection that you speak of.

Re:So, lets say...

[Anonymous Coward]

Neither phone companies nor post offices can inspect every analog message coming through. but ISPs could inspect digital content, and that is the difference. You can make your analogies that ISPs are indenpendent conduits and hence not responsible for content - but you need to consider the analog/digital divide.

You base that point on the incorrect assumption that post offices can't inspect every analog message.
They can easily inspect every message but it comes with a cost. That is however not the reason they don't. The reason they don't inspect every message is because there are rules set in place by an older generation that remember what happens when the government can monitor all communication and what happens when they go bad.
We don't want a nation like that to rise again, anywhere.

Re:So, lets say...

[idji]

There are "should" and "could" and "cost" arguments here. Most Slashdotters say Should>Could. I am saying "could" exists and politicians play in that gray space between "could" and "should" and are willing to bend the rules to get their own gain, and spend someone else's money to make it happen. Your idealistic should>could is nice, but the political reality is they are going to get as much "could" as they can with the "cost" budget they have - and if they lose some "should" but get some votes, then they will - because we all know they are spineless parasites.

Re:So, lets say...

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

You really think anyone that doesn't work for the movie/music industry is going to be voting in favour of this kind of political fluff talk?

No, but some people will always vote for a candidate with a stronger, better-funded campaign, and where does that funding come from?

Re:So, lets say...

[king neckbeard]

Yeah, only a few services like first class mail, the overwhelming bulk of non-spam mail.

Re:So, lets say...

[DutchUncle]

Are you suggesting it would be a *better* situation if the phone company and/or post office were inspecting all of your messages? Because I certainly don't want them inspecting mine without due process. And no, the analog/digital divide doesn't matter; I'm sure the Stasi could hire enough people to listen in *all* *day*.

Nice...

[Feral Nerd]

... Sony is about to declare war on North Korea. This should be interesting.

Re:Nice...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, but who is more evil?

Re:Nice...

[Cederic]

We can only hope it turns nuclear.

Back on topic: As noted by another poster, Mike Weatherley has a conflict of interest on this topic.

I would say that he's corrupt, taking bribes and betraying his constituents but as that could be libellous I shall merely state that he's a Conservative MP.

Roads

[darkain]

In other news: construction workers building and maintaining city streets and highways are now held responsible for high speed chases.

Re:Roads

[PaddyM]

and car manufacturers. and tire makers. and big oil. and movies like fast and furious. doubly so when leaked early.

but only you, darkain, can prevent forest fires.

Trumpeting their ignorance for the world to hear

[ArithonUK]

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.

MPs conflict of interests

[Anonymous Coward]

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

Re:MPs conflict of interests

[gsslay]

I'd rather not bare this MP at all, in mind or otherwise.

But I'll bear your suggestion in mind.

Re:MPs conflict of interests

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

I've already posted so can't moderate, but the parent AC post is something everyone reading this discussion should know, so I hope others will upvote it accordingly.

Re:MPs conflict of interests

[king neckbeard]

In all fairness, at this point, it kind of goes without saying that anyone spouting idiotic garbage like this is obviously a shill, especially since it's regarding copyright.

Re:MPs conflict of interests

[AmiMoJo]

We shouldn't ignore him, we should publicise his conflict of interest as much as possible.

Re:MPs conflict of interests

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

I would agree that ideally it should be something everyone considers, but I think we both know that not everyone will unless it's pointed out front and centre...

Blame the roads for bank heist

[Que_Ball]

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.

We need to hold these road builders to account

[Maritz]

Think of all the getaway drivers they've assisted. Christ.

WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

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....

Re:WTF?

[dwpro]

I agree with nearly all of your comment, but I take issue with the North Korean bit, particularly the statement "aren't a nice government." That is a tremendous understatement and an injustice to the human rights travesty that is North Korea. I _hate_ Sony and have little tolerance for this sort of governmental overreach, if this helps the plight of the average North Korean it would give me pause.

The involvement of ISPs

[kruach aum]

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.

Do you understand

[ruir]

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?

Re:Do you understand

[gl4ss]

it wouldn't be so sad if in living in the west already didn't mean paying taxes to the media companies on stuff like recordable media based on the assumption that you're going to do something illegal with it. like, in some western countries there's an assumption that a photocopier is used to copy pages from books so you need to pay per page if the copier is in an institution. it's fucking ridiculous. if I'm living in the west I'm already shilling out so much to whoever is the top radio play for the year that I should be fucking allowed to copy what I want at my own leisure.

like, first the artist representatives want a cut of my money I use to buy hard drives and then they fucking bitch that Spotify doesn't pay them for one listener as much as a radio play to 10 000 people pays. fucking dickwads unable to do maths when it doesn't suite them and always wanting more free money while every year they have thousands of more recording artists to split the money with - how the fuck would the money per artist go up when the number of artists explodes? as per movies, am I supposed to watch more and more movies per year too?!?

In related news ...

[Krishnoid]

Employees say Sony must take responsibility for formulaic, mundane movies; some eye Adam Sandler

People change, companies don't

[Tsolias]

North Korea, the new Russia. (ib4 sony films w/ airplanes and shit, taken down by north korean terrorists)

Please Russia, Korea, Santa Claus

[ruir]

and Borat, hack the fuckers at Sony again. Please. They do not deserve to have any customers at all.

Re:Please Russia, Korea, Santa Claus

[coofercat]

I saw the bits of "The Interview" that were on the news because apparently NK are upset about it. "intellectual property" seems a bit strong ;-)

Re:chain of evidence

[namgge]

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:[...]

The claimant does not have to prove anything to you they merely have to persuade a judge that, on the balance of probability, they are more likely to be telling the truth than you.

"downloaded a million times"

[Strange Quark Star]

Fury, which has been downloaded a million times

How do they know that? I'm genuinely curious.

Re:"downloaded a million times"

[K. S. Kyosuke]

Their agents provocateurs downloaded it a million times through multiple IP addresses.

Mike Weatherley,MP Accountant to Music Ind.

[Anonymous Coward]

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

Yes, make it work like the roads, we say!

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

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.

Re:Yes, make it work like the roads, we say!

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

For serious crimes it might well be a stolen vehicle anyway, so the plates won't help no matter how many cameras see them, unless as you say the vehicle used can be identified and tracked fast enough for actual police officers to catch up with it while the perps are still inside.

Meanwhile, the concern with cloned plates is not only the escape of the guilty party but also the innocent person whose plates were cloned, who is probably about to get numerous automated penalties for speeding, not paying congestion charges, parking violations, etc. There is a real problem with the level of such charges and the lack of compensation to the wrongly accused for losses they incur defending themselves. For many people, it simply won't be cost-effective to take time off work and/or retain legal counsel to travel to court and fight the charge, because you'd wind up spending more to clear your name than the original fine on the ticket even if you win.

Re:Yes, make it work like the roads, we say!

[Anonymous Coward]

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.

This is happening to me at the moment. I was accused of speeding by a mobile speed trap operator, but fortunately I have an in-car camera that shows I was not. I send images to the police and they can barely be bothered to investigate - their attitude is that you pay the fine and shut up or go to court. Well, I'm going to court.

It will cost me, but it's a point of principal. If/when I win, I'll have to claim costs back from the police, and take them to Small Claims Court if they refuse to pay. The system is carefully stacked against the innocent, and the police have absolutely no interest in justice.

Re:Yes, make it work like the roads, we say!

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

I'm sorry to hear that. I've never been in that position, but I've been in court as an independent witness after I saw a car crash. What the person being prosecuted (and ultimately found not guilty) went through, and for how long before the case was finally resolved, was absurdly disproportionate to the offence they were charged with. As far as I can tell, under our current system you also don't get any sort of automatic compensation for all the time spent and distress suffered, even if you do eventually win your case and you might be able to claim back at least some of the actual costs involved.

In any case, I admire your principled stand, and I wish you the best of luck in your case and in finding a way to get fair compensation afterwards.

These so called 'illegal sites'...

[Anonymous Coward]

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.

Re:These so called 'illegal sites'...

[ledow]

It's not really much of an argument.

Maybe if you had no recourse but for Microsoft to fix their stuff, maybe they'd have to... you know... fix it?

I don't buy the "it's better / quicker from the illegal sites" argument in terms of software, movies, etc. The problem is not the speed or ease of access as much as the ease of licensing. When you can't buy a movie in a certain country, or on a certain date, or by a certain vendor, it's almost always a licensing problem. Fix the licensing and the problem solves itself.

Justifying illegal copies floating round PirateBay by the fact that you might use them if your legit copy is unavailable (Sorry, a "key piece of infrastructure" and you don't have the original install disks or a system backup? I judge you and your backup procedures, not Microsoft) is like justifying counterfeit notes as being an acceptable substitute if your local ATM isn't working.

No, it's not. Shout at Microsoft, that company you're presumably paying for the service, otherwise it will never get fixed. And I've had the occasional glitch with MS VLSC... once they had hand-typed in my administrator@domain.com email address as the primary logon and managed to spell administrator wrong (the only things I submitted were electronic, so they must have hand-typed somewhere along the road). You shout at them until they resolve it.

But, then, all my workplaces had every original server, windows and office CD of any volume licensed content anyway. Usually several versions slipstreamed to quicken installation but increasingly now just a plain PXE-deployable image of a clean version of whatever is relevant. Beyond that, I have a Zalman storage device that you can put every ISO on and it "emulates" a bootable USB CD drive with the ISO contents.

But "MS wasn't working" (and I'm guessing it's the security on their VL accounts, which I've also run into but - again - not enough to worry about the waiting time while they send me new logins etc.) isn't an excuse. Especially in business.

Did you check hashes at least? You have no damn clue what you've just installed on your "key piece of infrastructure".

Re:These so called 'illegal sites'...

[david_thornley]

Note the word "client". Clients are notorious for wanting to use Microsoft software, and it's very difficult to do business without them.

Re:These so called 'illegal sites'...

[ruir]

I have been working in the last 15 years well for clients, and I am most sought because I deal with Unix/Linux...

Re:chain of evidence

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

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.

Just in case anyone here might mistake the above wishful thinking for, you know, law... It is not even close to what the law actually says or how courts actually work in this country.

In England, copyright infringement is usually a civil rather than criminal matter, so the standard of proof required is merely the balance of probabilities.

See also the Top 10 Copyright Myths page from the UK Copyright Service.

Probably Sony's unlocked footlocker caused it

[TehStitch]

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.

Re:For the people by the people

[oobayly]

That's an outrageous accusation - how dare you suggest that he's not supporting the organisation he's a director for (the Motion Picture Licensing Co - MPLC)

Re:David Cameron

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

Obviously the only blame lies with Sony for being so careless.

Sure it does, the same way the only blame for the theft lies with the homeowner who installed a defective lock on their front door, and the only blame for the rape lies with the pretty girl in the short skirt who was asking for it.

Oh, no, wait, maybe the blame for a crime lies with the people who committed the crime.

"The theory is that 'something' should be done"

[Peter Simpson]

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...

Re:"The theory is that 'something' should be done"

[coofercat]

It's okay though - GCHQ watched the whole thing happening, and have totally figured out who did it. Those people will be rounded up and dealt with very soon. Yeah right.

Okay, David Cameron is a Luddite and a moron.

[Chas]

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.

Re:Okay, David Cameron is a Luddite and a moron.

[asylumx]

a substantial investment in equipment and software that IN NO WAY contributes to the company's bottom line.

I agree with your post, however this line is probably not true -- if the ISP does this at the behest of a politician (or any government TLA) then there is probably either a tax break or some other kind of financial boon for doing so, if not a penalty for not cooperating -- which means this almost certainly will hit their bottom line one way or another.

Also, the ISP cooperating here could give them a boost with that politician and perhaps their party when having future unrelated discussions -- for example, around net neutrality.

Re:Okay, David Cameron is a Luddite and a moron.

[Chas]

Basically this structure is all finacial-penalty for the the ISP.

It's in their interests to minimize their cost outlays.

In this case, it's cheaper to grease political palms to be left alone than actually invest in a surveillance system.

Re:Okay, David Cameron is a Luddite and a moron.

[Chas]

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

As long as there's a motive there is going to be crime, therefore we should give up on policing crime but focus on removing motives for crime instead.

What's the weather like in cloud cuckoo land tonight?

Try actually READING what I said.

Nowhere did I say we should give up on policing crime.

But I draw the line at forcing people to pay to surveil themselves.
Or forcing ISPs into law enforcement, unpaid, when THAT IS NOT THEIR JOB.

My comment about piracy always being a factor is simple recognition of human nature.

Re:chain of evidence

[scotts13]

See, all that would be hard, and could take a while. Also, "criminals" tend to be mobile and surreptitious. An ISP, on the other hand, is visible and stationary. If you can just shift the blame to someone you can actually reach, "doing something" becomes much easier.

Why?

[dcw3]

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?!?

Failed logic.

[diodeus]

That's like blaming the phone network for telemarketers.

orly?

[slashmydots]

OMG someone robbed a bank. We should totally blame cars for letting them drive away.

Oh, I like this one

[keysdisease]

As every politician lies endlessly, this will eventually free up a lot of bandwidth for downloading porn.

Re:Oh, I like this one

[asylumx]

Porn is cleaner and more wholesome than political ads, so as a result our society would greatly improve!

(Not sarcasm...)

Blaming an ISP for movie leaks is like.....

[mark-t]

.. blaming the telephone companies for scams like where "microsoft technical support" calls you about some alleged problems on your computer.

Bummer

[nospam007]

The postal office still transports anonymous ransom and blackmail notes.
And those are real crimes not invented ones.

Re:By same logic, Cameron is to blame for murders.

[mark-t]

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.

Sony

[CauseBy]

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.

and the tube and roads are responsible for murders

[swschrad]

because, hey, the killers took them once.

grow up, man. learn something. it's not too late.

Dear Leader

[some old guy]

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."

Re:chain of evidence

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

That may all be true, but the information on the pages I linked to generally seems to be accurate and it's certainly much better than the wishful thinking nonsense posted by the AC I was replying to.

Maybe an ISP is at fault

[CanadianMacFan]

After all by providing a link into the building where the content was stored they enabled the theft to happen.

right to be forgotten

[PaddyM]

just tell Google to forget about these files. problem solved, right?

Live by your own words!

[zentigger]

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.

Re:By same logic, Cameron is to blame for murders.

[Caesar Tjalbo]

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.

Re:By same logic, Cameron is to blame for murders.

[mark-t]

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.

Re:By same logic, Cameron is to blame for murders.

[Caesar Tjalbo]

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.

Re:By same logic, Cameron is to blame for murders.

[mark-t]

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.

See how Hollywood donated to him (link)

[Timo_UK]

Donations made by Motion Picture Licensing Co Ltd to Mike Weatherley http://searchthemoney.com/prof...