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Anti-Piracy Firm Rightscorp Will Hijack Pirates' Browsers Until a Fine is Paid (torrentfreak.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Anti-piracy firm Rightscorp says that it's working on a next-generation technology called Scalable Copyright, under which it plans to extract cash settlements from suspected Internet pirates. The company says its new technology will lock users' browsers and prevent Internet access until they pay a fine. (Sounds familiar?) To encourage ISPs to play along, Rightscorp says the system could help to limit their copyright liability. For those unaware, Rightscorp works with copyright owners such as movie studios, music labels, and game developers, and tracks the IP addresses of people who are torrenting copyright infringing material. Sadly, the company's previous tactics haven't worked so well. The company doesn't have many clients, and it posted a net loss of $3.43m in 2015, up from the $2.85m net loss recorded in 2014.
... this is a prime example.
Installing a fucking piece of malware you fucking twits, you've literally reinvented cryptolock trojans, Slow clap for you. Not only is this not feasible (you'd have to bribe EVERY security researcher and pay to get whitelisted on EVERY AV site) unless you work a deal with the browser creators. And hey, I don't know about anyone else, but I certainly don't pay for a fucking browser, so there's no benefit from them adopting this unless having a lower userbase is something they are interested in. Here's a fucking CRAZY idea. Give us the content we want the way we want at a reasonable price. I'm 100% confident that would work, and be cheaper than whatever asshat ideas your NON ENGINEERS can dream up after a long night of doing whippits.
Nope, that's too simple. They deserve to slide into oblivion, watching their business model fall to obscurity, while they eventually get caught up in litigation for the blackmail tactics they've burned consumers with.
I want to check out their website http://www.rightscorp.com/ and it's not loading.
I keep clicking refresh over and over and over and its still not loading .....
Hmmmmmm I wonder why?
---- "Logoff! That cookie shit makes me nervous!" - A. Soprano
of the Sony rootkit fiasco, or back when the MPAA used to pay people to DOS file sharers
In the absence of some sort of legal judgement allowing these thugs to shake people down for cash, doesn't this just go by the plain old-fashioned name of "extortion"?
Wait, I've missed the bigger picture here! Apparently all the crypto-locker authors just need to make up a random crime to accuse people of, and then their ransomware becomes perfectly kosher, right?
Time to go write an "anti-piracy" app that only targets Rightscorp!
Actually ISPs need to retain those logs for years for various reasons other than copyright. IF they are released to groups like this is a grey area, but the fact remains, providers keep logs for a very long time, and very long time indeed. It has nothing to do with the lease time, it's a completely automated system. There will be a database, likely MSSQL or straight SQL containing YEARS of records, MAC to IP and the dates.
There's no honor among thieves.
Also, how on earth is this not very very illegal?
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Wow vigilante hacking with no legal burden of proof and so they can run a shakedown racket?
Sorry, this is an asshole copyright troll, who has consistently demonstrated they lie about owning copyrights, who make illegal shakedown requests, and expect to do this with zero evidentiary standard, and have ISPs put in the infrastructure to support it.
Sorry, assholes. You have no legal basis to do this, and if you do it's hard to see how this won't get you some actual criminal charges. They want to make claims for which there is no basis in law, and for which they do not have a legal right to make.
Then again, putting these clowns in jail under a RICO conviction would be awesome.
These guys can't even convince judges they're not a scam, because they are a scam. The idiots who run Rightscorp are nothing more than crooks and thieves abusing the legal process to send shakedown notices about infringements they aren't in a legal position to be pursuing.
They're lying bastards, and any ISP which lets them tie into anything is likely going to open themselves to some major legal action.
This is just delusional bullshit PR by a company who greatly overstates their legal position here.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
I think we can all agree that consumption of that intellectual property without consent is theft. It's not like driving some else's car, since in this case the original owner retains a copy; it's like taking some else's car design and using it to build your own car without their consent.
No we can't all agree on that. I don't see anything wrong with taking someone else's car design. I don't necessarily agree that intellectual property in the copyright sense has any value. While the patent system is in need of reform I do see some value there in encouraging invention. If car design does not advance the art and technology of car design in any patentable way than I see no reason at all why anyone else should be denied its use. Now if you do some actual R&D and come up with novel and improved way to do something as a result and integrate it into your design yes I would agree you should have a limited time right to license that.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
I think we can all agree that consumption of that intellectual property without consent is theft
No, it's not theft, it's copyright violation. There's no good reason to confuse the two concepts.
I'm pretty sure someone breaking the law is not an excuse for you to also break the law.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
What are you talking about? A design has usefulness and therefore value just as utility patents do. If they didn't have value, there would be no reason for someone else to use it. By copying the car design, you see some value in it, and should compensate the designer appropriately, it's their design!
constitutes hacking, gross misdemeanor under a 20+ year old law, 90 days and $2000 per instance if I remember correctly.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
Sure, you can't just make everyone install a browser, but you can have a forced windows update that puts this right into the kernel. They already do it with a "punk-buster"esque anti-cheat engine and for DRM, why not add anti-piracy? Sure it won't stop the hardcore 'nix folks, but it will stop little jimmy from not paying for his music and entertainment.
I have 6 different browsers, which one will they try to block?
Not to mention, that 95% of my stuff gets downloaded automatically by uTorrent from TvRSS, no browsers involved,
By copying the car design, you see some value in it, and should compensate the designer appropriately, it's their design!
That's one way of looking at it. Alternatively, you could say that any car manufacturer can copy the other's design, just like scientists can copy each other's ideas. I'm not sure that we'd end up worse that way.
I stand corrected: From Wikipedia: Theft, meanwhile, emphasizes the potential commercial harm of infringement to copyright holders. However, copyright is a type of intellectual property, an area of law distinct from that which covers robbery or theft, offenses related only to tangible property. Not all copyright infringement results in commercial loss, and the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1985 that infringement does not easily equate with theft.
So they're going to just bypass all that pesky legal stuff like people's rights and impose punishment on people who haven't even been arrested or had their day in court? Sounds to me like vigilantism at best, or quite a bit like cybercrime or cyberterrorism at worst. Sounds to me like they're the ones who need to be arrested by the FBI, not alleged 'copyright infringers'.
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
" I think we can all agree that consumption of that intellectual property without consent is theft."
NO its is NOT THEFT. How can you have a conversation about copyright when you cant even get your terms straight. You cannot use the word theft in this context. You MUST use the word 'infringement' or you are not engaging in an honest discussion. Copyright infringement is NOT theft, come back with a proper argument.
Good-bye
I think we can all agree that consumption of that intellectual property without consent is theft
No, I don't agree with that.
Secession is the right of all sentient beings.
ISPs already have limited liability due to their status as a common carrier. The only reason ISPs might agree to this scheme is as a way to manage traffic (cutting off illegal downloaders who are heavy bandwidth users). Even then, ISPs already have ways of doing that which don't involve shady third parties like RightsCorp.
Support Right To Repair Legislation.
consumption of that intellectual property without consent is theft.
No. It's not. This is also far too broad of a definition of 'consumption without consent'. Consent is what exactly?
It's not like driving some else's car, since in this case the original owner retains a copy; it's like taking some else's car design and using it to build your own car
This is called a free market. You can't pass off your car as an original 'Chevy Malibu', but certainly all cars have 4 wheels, a steering wheel, turn signals etc.
without their consent.
Again, what, exactly, is consent here?
Now, what I disagree with in this case is two private companies arranging a punishment based on someone's illegal activities. I believe whole-heartedly that punishment can only be at the hands of the justice system
Of this I completely agree. In today's era of SJW activity it's hardly unusual.
~ People that think they are better than anyone else for any reason are the cause of all the strife in the world.
People who are at the origin of intellectual creation have to come to term with one very simple fact: they lose any kind of proprietary rights the moment they release their creation to the public (whatever it is you've made, however it inspires me, what's inside my head isn't yours). That is the very nature of such things. What society has decided is to grant them a monopoly in the reproduction rights of said work. Of course, when compared with what this right was originally, it has been abused on a scale beyond imagination (but commensurate with the wish most people have to get a rent of whatever kind forever).
That's fair enough. But if your software shows me an FBI warning for 15 seconds every time I start it, has embedded ads that cannot be skipped, only runs on certain kinds of computers "because piracy", and is not available in some countries or priced very differently there for arbitrary (not legal) reasons, then it's off to the Pirate bay for a copy that has all those stupid restrictions removed. Copyright is a privilege granted by society, and it's high time that society starts setting a few reasonable conditions of its own. Fair use, format shifting and ripping, and reasonable availability are just a few.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
So they will kill any chance they have at suing you by using illegal extortion tactics. I say go for it. They have no legal right to demand money form you without a court order.
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
If you mean you'd copy it the same way one car manufacturer might copy the design of another manufacturer's car, I'd say go for it. It's not like the design details are published in a read-and-reproduce format, you don't get the CNC instructions to cut the stamps and molds used in the production, you don't even have a paper with basic measurements available. You have to get your hands on the actual physical car and derive all of that yourself (and any variation thereof makes your design its own unique derivative, rather than a copy), which is every bit as much work as taking the actual designer's clay model and translating it into a real object. The only work saved, then, is that of the designer doing their day or two worth of sketches and maybe a week on a clay model; the remaining several thousand man-hours still need to be spent in measuring, documenting, tooling, testing, correcting, lather, rinse, repeat, until the copy is identical to the original. If someone would rather do all of that than come up with their own original design, well, I would welcome them to do it.
Keep in mind, before you respond, that DarkOx specifically mentioned the difference between design and utility. If my design includes something novel (and patented), like a unique mechanism for automatically-adjusting front and rear spoilers, that would be utility rather than design. You'd be welcome to copy every element of the design, including the body of the vehicle and the shape and default placement of the spoilers, but you'd have to either implement them as fixed spoilers or develop your own adjustment mechanism. Of course, I'd be happy to license my adjustment mechanism to you for a relatively small fee, with a clause in the license stipulating that you must integrate it into your own design and/or license my design (of course at a much larger fee). The difference between that contract and the social contract that is Copyright, of course, is that we'd have sat down at a table and negotiated it and I'd have your signature on paper stating that you agree not to use my design without compensation in exchange for the right to use my adjustment mechanism.
Consideration is a huge part of any contract, some would say the most important part. The consideration due the public in the social contract that is Copyright was that, after 14 years, the work would belong to the public. That consideration has been removed, rendering the contract void.
APK quotes people (including myself) without context and should not be trusted. Just thought you should know.
Seriously, with losses like that, how do they pay their employees?
and who are these employees, anyway, engineering these ingenious malwa^H^H^H^H^H property-protection products?
and hey! if this works to lock-up your system, and you hack to remove it, have you violated DMCA? liable for criminal charges?
what a fun way to make a living!
Take it easy, Charlie, I've got an Angle...
Well... if the person actually IS distributing copyrighted material that would come out in court if they decide to fight...
It may end up costing the person more in the end.
I am guessing they are relying on the old "make the cost less than that of hiring a lawyer" strategy that patent trolls use.
My eyes reflect the stars and a smile lights up my face.
Sadly, the company's previous tactics haven't worked so well. The company doesn't have many clients, and it posted a net loss of $3.43m in 2015, up from the $2.85m net loss recorded in 2014.
Why does this text begin with the word " Sadly "? It is certainly not the word that I would use.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
It isn't malware like you think it is. The ISP just redirects your web requests to Rightscorps servers until you pay the fine. Comcast already will inject HTTP into your traffic with copyright notices.
What you don't eat your DVD after watching it?
That's just it it isn't theft. I haven't taken anything away from you. You failed to provide me with a legal method to view your product and you under capitalized your selling. If you were not an idiot and properly sold your product I wouldn't have to find other means of acquiring it.
In software pirates versions are stable and more functional than the broken dem laden versions.
In movies you can't charge $50 a movie ticket and expect sales to be the same as when you charged $ 10 a ticket. Why are you charging me more for an HD version vs SD version of the same movie? You filmed it in HD the SD version cost more as it if to be cut down. But you charge more for the less work used to make the HD version.
The same goes for DVD's. Vs on demand rentals.
Piracy is an economic problem. If your product is suffering from piracy you are failing to captialize on potentional markets properly.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
So they want to bypass any proof of wrong-doing, any proper due process, and just be able to assert you infringed and you need to pay.
Sorry, but that is complete bullshit.
Rightscorp isn't in a legal position to impose "fines".
This is a shakedown racket, pure and simple, and Rightscorp wants the right to have ISPs act as the collection muscle with absolutely ZERO standard of proof.
I'm sorry, but we'd trust the assholes at Rightscorp to make these assertions without backing them up with proof, why, exactly?
This isn't a fine, it's fucking protection money which comes with it an implicit admission of guilt. No way in hell there is any legal basis for that.
Doing anything to legitimize these lying bastards is a terrible idea.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
This is EXACTLY what they are counting on. Suppose I were sued for downloading/distributing Random Movie via this method. They lock my browser (how, I have no clue) and I can't go online. Now, let's also suppose that I was innocent. Perhaps their software was flawed (I was distributing a public domain movie clip called "Just Another Random Movie") or maybe there was a typo in the IP address entry (entered .215 when they should have entered .251). In any event, they were accusing me without merit.
My recourse would be to respond to their accusation by hiring a lawyer, mounting a "Not Guilty" defense, and hoping that they didn't sway the judge with technical sounding (but ultimately false) evidence. I'd have to hope that my lawyer would work pro-bono during this case, would need to endure the media looking into my private life and labeling me some sort of hacker/pirate (and all the fallout that would cause professionally), and would need to dedicate a lot of time/effort/stress to my defense.
Or I could take a quick, relatively inexpensive settlement and avoid all that.
Sadly, most people would take the settlement so they could just get on with their lives. I know I'd be very tempted to sign it.
It's legalized Mafia tactics. "That's a nice life you have there. It'd be a shame if your reputation were dragged through the mud, you lost your job, tons of cash, and years of your life to a lawsuit. Just sign here and you'll be 'protected' against all that from happening. If not..." *knocks browser off shelf, shattering it to a million pieces to prove a point*
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
I'd go the "rip the copy you legally bought into another format" route instead of the "download from the Pirate Bay" route. The weird thing, though, is that the MPAA would consider both to be copyright violations of equal magnitude and would prosecute them the same if they could. The only thing stopping them is that it's hard to detect when a computer rips a DVD/Blu-Ray. (Especially if you don't share them and just use them for your own personal use.) It's easier to see if a computer is downloading something and automatically sharing it at the same time. If they could get a "magic ripper detector", though, I have no doubt I'd be sued for $750 - $150,000 for each legally purchased movie I ripped.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
If the RIAA/MPAA installs any software doing what they suggest, the developers and businesses should all be jailed under the US Computer Espionage and Hacking laws.
If you or I even attempted to look at their networks without written and explicit permission, we are in violation of the law. Accessing software inside their systems is at least 2 felonies.
Hold people accountable, and if the Government does not then it's time to replace people in Government.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
No we can't all agree it's theft. It's copyright infringement.
Battery is not assault.
Kidnapping is not murder.
Copyright infringement is way down. The growing entertainment glut has more to do with falling sales in particular industries.
I'm retired and I *literally* can't keep up with the entertainment options that I'm interested in (much less the entire field of entertainment).
So I start by choosing the less expensive entertainment. And voila, a lot of the expensive entertainment is inexpensive by the time I get to it... if I ever get to it.
People who used to pirate terabytes of material a decade ago don't pirate, or pirate only a few items per year now, and never even used/watched 95% of the stuff they pirated back in the day.
We are not better off with the justice system once it was bought by corporations. That's why people have lost respect for the law. Every time the copyright on Disney's snow white is extended, it makes people respect copyright law less. Disney took something from the public domain, and then did not return their own creation to the public domain for other creators to use in the future.
That's wrong.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
The same way Sony did with the rookit. Nobody went to jail for that, you know.
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
Making or downloading a copy is generally not a criminal action. Distributing a copy is the criminal action.
However downloading a copy does open you to civil lawsuits.
http://blogs.findlaw.com/blott...
Currently, copyright enforcers focus on highly active people but there is always a chance you'll be sued for being unlucky for the one download you made ever in your life.
However, the copyright enforcers have some barriers to overcome.
1) The concept that "an i.p. is the same as a fingerprint" has been killed so they have to prove it was you that did the download.
2) They need to have evidence that the data is in your possession.
3) Which means they are going to engage in an expensive legal process to have a warrant served by sheriffs who enter your house and take your computing equipment.
4) But be aware that even if it wasn't you, the file isn't on your computer, etc. etc., you could still be out thousands of dollars in legal fees.
So they mostly focus on heavy downloaders since suing a single mom for something the teenage neighbor downloaded thru their unsecured wi-fi is bad publicity
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
It's worked for Jaguar, copying Aston Martin ... save on those design and prototyping costs.
So, instead of having a $200k Aston, you get an $80k Jag.
The chief designer at Jaguar is Ian Callum, who previously designed for Aston Martin.
RR
Who cares if you are guilty or not, they clearly don't. Actually this type of hacking would very easily fall under the Computer Fraud act. Whoever at rightcorp did it would be in risk of jail time.
The lawsuits would be damn near immediate, look at how much Sony paid for the trojan they deployed on music CD's and it arguably did less damage.
"Slide into oblivion?" In this case, more like firebombing their offices and making good use of our Second Amendment rights.
We have always wanted to know where to find a ransom ware operator, and now we have one who self-identifies.
For everyone screaming "How will that work?! That's illegal! It's hacking!" they are not planning to "h[ij]ack your browser."
They want ISPs' cooperation to hijack and futz with browser traffic and insert popups and warnings and the like.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
I'd go the "rip the copy you legally bought into another format" route
That's the one problem in the US. The DMCA makes that illegal too.
After all, why would you just assume that you can use those ideas without compensating their "owners"?
Because those were protected by patents rather than copyright, and the protection has expired.
Your argument it twisted beyond all reason.
While true that the GPL makes use of copyright law to have power behind it, the purpose of the license is to be a bullwark against the kind of madness that Rightscorp and pals are up to.
Also, with software the potential to completely rebrand the code under a completely new name and claim it as new and proprietary exists. THAT is what the GPL is out to stop. Not small scale redistribution. Last I checked, music pirates arent out taking EG, Madonna's album backlog and reselling them wholesale under a fake artists name and claiming them as original works. The closest you are going to find in that vein is the "club mix" scene. The club mixers are a tiny minority of "music pirates" though, and NOT who rightscorp and their ilk are targeting here.
Like most copyright shills you fail to see the forest for the trees.
The GPL exists because of copyright bullshit, for the purposes of preventing software freedoms from being trampled on.
Without copyright bullshit, there would be no need for it, and free software makers would use BSD license instead.
Back in the 80's I wouldn't hire anyone who hadn't been arrested for civil disobedience in the 50's, 60's or 70's...
Take up a job in a field where people have the same ideals as you. Fly the "Pirate" flag as a badge of honor. There are even political parties that do so... Ninja the lawsuit and use it to promote a go-fund-me to promote the root-kit practices of evil copyright profiteers.
Fear is only as powerful as you let it be.
I wonder why the feds aren't pursuing RICO charges. This is racketeering plain and simple.
Oh wait, follow the money.
"Frequently wrong, never in doubt."
Subpoenas count as "required by law."
What part of "shall not be infringed" is so hard to understand?
The US has a similar law. This would absolutely be "tampering with the normal operation of a computer". The point here is that no matter whether or not the owner/user of the computer had provably committed copyright theft [which we still have no transparent way of evaluating] then the act of tampering with that computer constitutes a completely separate criminal act. A Federal crime in the US, no less. This is one of those "Two Wrongs Don't Make a Right" scenarios...
There is likely not going to be any trojan involved. How would you make someone install it anyway? "I am Rightscorp, please install the enclosed trojan on your PC so we can hijack your browser?"
That's something we had to very slowly and in very simple terms get into the skulls of our politicians over here: Infecting a specific computer with a targeted attack is VERY hard to pull off and it is virtually impossible to avoid collateral damage. So you better immediately forget using trojans against terrorists.
What they will instead most likely do is get the ISPs to filter any and all of the alleged culprit's traffic through a proxy that redirects all requests to their "we are Rightscorp, resistance is futile" server.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
This is EXACTLY what they are counting on. Suppose I were sued for downloading/distributing Random Movie via this method. They lock my browser (how, I have no clue) and I can't go online. Now, let's also suppose that I was innocent. Perhaps their software was flawed (I was distributing a public domain movie clip called "Just Another Random Movie") or maybe there was a typo in the IP address entry (entered .215 when they should have entered .251). In any event, they were accusing me without merit.
My recourse would be to respond to their accusation by hiring a lawyer, mounting a "Not Guilty" defense, and hoping that they didn't sway the judge with technical sounding (but ultimately false) evidence. I'd have to hope that my lawyer would work pro-bono during this case, would need to endure the media looking into my private life and labeling me some sort of hacker/pirate (and all the fallout that would cause professionally), and would need to dedicate a lot of time/effort/stress to my defense.
Or I could take a quick, relatively inexpensive settlement and avoid all that.
Sadly, most people would take the settlement so they could just get on with their lives. I know I'd be very tempted to sign it.
It's legalized Mafia tactics. "That's a nice life you have there. It'd be a shame if your reputation were dragged through the mud, you lost your job, tons of cash, and years of your life to a lawsuit. Just sign here and you'll be 'protected' against all that from happening. If not..." *knocks browser off shelf, shattering it to a million pieces to prove a point*
It's funny - the older I get, the more tempted I am, should this happen to me, of taking matters in my own hands and solving a whole lot of other people's problems - if you catch my drift. I mean, if they're gonna fuck up my life beyond repair, and I've only got a decade or so left anyway, why not go out with a bunch of folks grateful for what I did to get justice? I might die, I might end up in prison for a few years before I croak. I can't be the only one who feels this way.
"Well... if the person actually IS distributing copyrighted material that would come out in court if they decide to fight..."
No, what you do is file criminal charges with the DA for violation of the CFAA, Hacking, and Extortion. They won't be able to use copyright as a defense as copyright is not an affirmative defense against the elements of the crime under any of those crimes listed. You can easily prove those elements of the crime (your computer is all the evidence you need) and their ass is sunk. Their copyright claim won't matter for shit, because they'll be too busy defending themselves against the massive onslaught of criminal suits.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Sounds like they need an offshore shell corporation to do the hacking for them.
I keep trying, but every time I microwave a DVD it catches fire.
It is not theft, it is infringement.
Theft prevents their enjoyment of their goods and services. In no way is someone deprived of their work by copying a file using your own resources onto your own media with your own time.
What they might not do is profit from that work. Fair enough. And that's why the law exists, to allow that to be captured for a limited time.
But make no mistake, if the law did not exist, someone making a copy of what I happen to own, using their own time and materials, would not be an offense and happens in many ways even today. That's because you making a copy of my car doesn't keep me from using my car. It might cut the business for my taxi service in half, if two people in my town now have cars, but that is an entirely separate story. You could additionally argue that a town would be better served by having more than one taxi available, which serves a societal purpose which is higher than letting me become obscenely rich by being the only one allowed to have a car.
Of course, I can't condone the practice of not paying for software that someone else wrote. After all, I do derive my living from software sales.
Nevertheless, I wouldn't consider that to be theft. Instead, it would be more like a disincentive for me to produce more software. If that is the case, then the "pirates" hurt themselves in the process by removing people from the software industry that might give them what they want.
I don't think software copyright infringement is worth people losing serious civil rights over. I think there are enough adults in the world who will buy software because they know that it supports the creators and they want the support or the game titles to keep coming. I have little sympathy for a Sony or another company who needs to lay the smackdown on some kid or his parents somewhere so they can make that much more money on a game they already made millions on.
Yes, you must protect and defend your copyright and trademarks, but we're talking about preventing something like widespread distribution of your software under a different name while you did nothing about it. Nothing about copyright defense requires that you go to the levels suggested by Rightscorp.
And I have an enormous problem with the idea of breaking someone else's computer purposely, as that comes closer to actual theft than any sort of copyright infringement ever has. As laughable as the idea of "locking your browser" is, even considering that line of attack as a valid one puts these people squarely in the same vein of black hats who run data ransom scams. It shows the level of ridiculousness that the line of thought that infringement == theft leads one to.
It goes way beyond "malware." In my State, it is a felony.
(3) Any person who knowingly and without authorization alters, damages or destroys any computer, computer system, computer network, or any computer software, program, documentation or data contained in such computer, computer system or computer network, commits computer crime.
... ...
(5)(a) A violation of the provisions of subsection (2) or (3) of this section shall be a Class C felony.
There is no exception for, "I thought he committed a civil tort against me." Even if they sue you for copyright infringement and win, they still can't alter your computer without a very specific court order.
Until the copyright cartel get a narrow law passed stating that things that would otherwise be a CFAA violation or hacking or whatever aren't in fact illegal if they are being done in connection with enforcing copyrights.
*whistles innocently*
http://john.bitsurge.net/publi...
(Add that to your blocklist - set to automatically update.)
"So long and thanks for all the fish."