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CloudFlare Can Be Ordered To Disclose Science Piracy Website Owner Details (thestack.com)
An anonymous reader writes: A New York judge has ruled that CDN provider Cloudflare can be compelled to disclose customer details for the domains libgen.io and bookfi.org, both of which are alleged to provide pirated access to scientific and technical papers, infringing the rights of controversial academic publisher Elsevier. Judge Robert Sweet ruled 'The evidence set forth...demonstrates that Elsevier (publisher who filed the lawsuit) is unable to identify the operators of libgen.org or bookfi.org, or the true location of the computer servers upon which those websites are hosted, absent the ability to take discovery from Cloudflare.' Sweet's ruling refers to 'absent identifying information' necessitating an injunction for Cloudflare to surrender details intended to begin an investigative financial trail to the domain registrants. This information could have been provided by British company TLD Registrar Solutions, who registered libgen.org in 2012 -- and hardly seems likely to retrench under pressure, given the oft-criticised transparency of legal process between the U.S. and the United Kingdom. ICANN and WHOIS also seem like obvious first points of enquiry (however ICANN's secession from control by the United States government at the end of September may have complicated using it as a legal resource), but apparently, neither can help.
I had never heard of those sites.
It's nice of them to make all that knowledge available.
Piracy: providing a public service distribution since at least when the floppy disk was invented.
In the pursuit of scientific knowledge, no one should be restricted due to their current wealth status.
Stealing.
Thomas Jefferson engaged in economic espionage against the Italians.
Which is pretty ballsy given that the Italians were rumored to assassinate your ass for that kind of behavior.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
UK Data Protection laws would prevent the disclosure of a British domain name owner's data to a non-EU law process, yes.
But a valid UK court's request for the same would be accepted.
Why haven't they tried to compel a UK court to agree to disclose that information for the purposes of law enforcement?
If they have, and they've been denied, I'd be very interested in the reasoning because there's not much reason to refuse if it's got to the stage of a cross-border copyright infringement. So I'd guess that they haven't tried, or tried hard enough.
If you're against something you shouldn't make it sound so cool.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Sci-Hub: removing barriers in the way of science
And they don't understand that more will follow...
Somebody mirror those sites! Can't risk to lose it all.
Libgen.org was registered using a proxy service (Whois Privacy Corp, based in the Bahamas), so that explains why Elsevier hasn't pursued records from TLD Registrar Solutions. http://pageadviser.com/www.lib... Elsevier is aware of this, as one of their lawyers notes in this filing: http://www.stephenmclaughlin.n...
I don't even understand what "science piracy" might mean. The whole reason for scientific work to exist, is to be disseminated. Paywalled scientific journals are exactly the antithesis of what science is, which is openness, exposure, universal access.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
Focus on the word 'apparently'.
We either have rule of law, or we don't. These scientific paper copyright infringers violate current law. If they don't like the law, they can lobby to change it. They have no right to violate the rights of others anonymously.
Cloudflare isn't a CDN company, they're tracking company disguised as a CDN. Notice that they force the content to go via their domains, which means they can put cookies that can be tracked across multiple sites.
Fuck cloudflare.
whois and traceroute gvie you nice clues. The servers are called NS1.COLLEGEFUN.ORG and NS2.COLLEGEFUN.ORG. The address is New Providence, Bahamas. The phone number is +1.5163872248. You can reach the server admins via email: 54a8a84baktx64vi@5225b4d0pi3627q9.whoisprivacycorp.com .
I'm sure if you emailed them, telling them that you think that they broke the law in some fashion, (or that you want to sue them), and all they have to do is identify themselves so that you can sue them properly, they will give you some kind of reply. I have to say, the entire lawsuit looks like a fishing trip: "we think you might have something that belongs to us, or at least might have something that we would like to own and will not hesitate to sue you over whether we actually own it or not. We're having a hard time raiding your offices and harassing you. Give us a sign."
How can someone be guilty of "pirating" something that THEIR TAXES paid for in the first place?
The first and foremost reason that the scientific articles are not pirated is because most of them were paid for with public tax dollars. Elsevier is profiting by privatizing publicly owned content.
The second reason that the articles are not pirated is because they don't involve kidnapping, robbery, or murder on the high seas.
Proof reading, experts to look over the work, an index and publication all transmute that raw gov funded data into pure private sector profit.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Just once I want to run a website via a foreign country and have someone come looking to me to force me to give up info. I want to send them a color copy of my ass so I accurately direct them as to what component to kiss.