In August, Cox Communications filed a petition at the U.S. Supreme Court , requesting a review of a Fourth Circuit ruling that held the company liable for pirating subscribers.

The Internet provider ultimately challenges a $1 billion jury verdict in favor of major record labels, including Sony and Universal, arguing that it has far-reaching implications for Internet providers and the broader American public.

Cox wrote that, in its view, the lower court’s ruling stretches service provider liability too far and creates the “most draconian secondary-liability regime” in the country. As a result, ISPs find themselves ‘forced’ to terminate subscribers, who may have done little wrong.

Two Questions

This case is about who is responsible for Internet piracy. Is it only the users who actually share pirated material, or can ISPs be held responsible too, when they fail to properly respond to “repeat infringers”, as the DMCA prescribes?

The Fourth Circuit concluded that Cox “materially contributed” to the infringements of its subscribers because the company knew about this activity and didn’t terminate their accounts.

That leads Cox to present the following question to the Supreme Court:

“Did the Fourth Circuit err in holding that a service provider can be held liable […] merely because it knew that people were using certain accounts to infringe and did not terminate access, without proof that the service provider affirmatively fostered infringement or otherwise intended to promote it?”

The second question is indirectly related to the damages award. The jury awarded the maximum statutory damages of $150,000 per work, which is typically reserved for “willful” infringement. Cox questions whether simply knowing about subscribers’ copyright infringements is willful.

“Did the Fourth Circuit err in holding that mere knowledge of another’s direct infringement suffices to find willfulness under 17 U.S.C. § 504(c)?” the petition reads.

ISPs Back Cox

This case doesn’t only affect Cox, it has implications for all Internet providers. Yesterday, several other ISPs including Verizon, Frontier, Altice, and Lumen Technologies, filed an amicus curiae brief at the Supreme Court, backing the petition.

Several of these providers are involved in similar lawsuits, with potential damages running in the hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars. This ‘threat’ created by the lower court’s ruling creates “extortionate pressure” and invites mass terminations, they argue.

“The decision […] imperils the future of the internet. It exposes internet service providers to massive liability if they do not carry out mass internet evictions.

“The extortionate pressure such lawsuits exert is acute. And the mass terminations they encourage would harm innocent people by depriving households, schools, hospitals, and businesses of internet access.”

The ISPs note that, as things stand, they are required to terminate connections of alleged pirates that may also be used by innocent others. This is all based on third-party accusations that, in large part, rely on automated processes which are not error free.

Twitter

The amicus brief stresses that the Fourth Circuit’s decision to hold Cox liable, directly contradicts the recent Supreme Court ruling in Twitter vs Taamneh . In that case, the Supreme Court rejected the claim that Twitter aided-and-abetted terrorist activity because it didn’t “consciously and culpably” participate in the illegal activity.

According to the ISPs’ brief, the same logic applies in this case. Cox was held liable for the piracy activities of subscribers, without taking any culpable action.

A service provider’s failure to stop bad actors from misusing its platform does not qualify as culpable action. To emphasize this point, the brief cites the Supreme Court’s own words.

“Under the common law, this Court explained, ‘communication providing services’ have no ‘duty’ ‘to terminate customers after discovering that the customers were using the service for illicit ends’.

“For that reason, the Court held that the social-media companies’ continued provision of routine communication service to terrorists was ‘mere passive nonfeasance’ that did not amount to culpable aid.”

In conclusion, the ISPs urge the Supreme Court to grant Cox’s petition and overturn the Fourth Circuit’s decision, emphasizing the need to protect ISPs from excessive liability and safeguard the internet’s future.

Law Professor Chimes In

It’s no surprise that these ISPs are siding with Cox, as they have a direct interest in the outcome of the case. However, they are not the only amici; Professor Alfred Yen from Boston College Law School also wrote in.

Professor Yen urges the Supreme Court to grant certiorari (Cox’s appeal) and rectify what he perceives as a flawed interpretation of contributory copyright infringement law by the Fourth Circuit. His only interest in this case is the “orderly and logical development of the law for the benefit of society,” his brief explains.

The brief also focuses on culpable intent. The Fourth Circuit concluded that Cox was ‘culpable’ because it provided internet service to subscribers, while knowing that those subscribers could likely continue to pirate.

The court specifically stated that “supplying a product with knowledge that the recipient will use it to infringe is exactly the sort of culpable conduct sufficient for contributory infringement.”

Professor Yen believes that this is wrong, as Cox could not conclude with “substantial certainty” that infringers would continue. Especially since Cox also operated a graduated response program, aimed at stopping piracy on its network.

Electric Shock

In addition, the brief notes that ‘certainty of injury’ does not always imply intent. There are many other services that are guaranteed to lead to injury, where intent is not in question.

“For example, the operator of a railroad knows with substantial certainty that this activity will eventually cause injury to someone. The same would be true for the electric company because eventually, someone will suffer an electric shock,” Professor Yen writes.

While the Fourth Circuit’s conclusion that Cox is liable might seem superficially attractive, the professor warns of far-reaching and dangerous consequences if it holds up.

Under the same logic, many other companies could be drawn into liability battles because they provide services to individuals who may use that service to infringe, ranging from electricity providers to ink sellers.

“The Fourth Circuit’s logic makes all of these service providers culpably responsible for infringement as long as they receive the same kinds of notice sent to Petitioners and continue providing service,” Professor Yen writes.

Moving Forward

The Supreme Court took both briefs under consideration, to see if these will eventually factor into the decision to hear the case or not.

The respondents in this case, a group of major record labels including Sony and Universal, were required to file their planned opposition brief yesterday. However, they were given a month’s extension previously, so that will come in later.

—

A copy of the amicus brief filed by the Internet providers is available here (pdf) . A copy of Professor Alfred Yen’s brief can be found here (pdf)

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

In a couple of weeks the UK’s BeStreamWise anti-piracy campaign will celebrate its one-year anniversary.

Launched last October, the campaign aims to deter citizens from consuming live sports from pirate IPTV services and other platforms offering illegal streams.

With the slogan “Illegal Streams Let Criminals In” companies including Sky, Premier League, FACT, and ITV, hope that consumers will weigh cheap prices against the risk of malware and fraud, before concluding that a legal subscription is the best option overall.

12 Months of Saving

For the last year, the battle for hearts-and-minds has mostly played out online. Friendly tabloids and other publications known for their considerable social media reach, have taken a real interest in the campaign; not just by amplifying the message but presenting it as a preparatory hors d’oeuvre before the main course apocalypse.

The latest phase of the campaign, reported by BeStreamWise late last week, aimed to protect pirates seeking out pirated match streams on social media.

“BeStreamWise will redirect consumers searching for illegal streams of the game this weekend to protect them from the dangers of digital piracy.

“The initiative has been arranged for the high profile north London derby, renowned for being one of the highest scoring games in the top division and famous for the long-standing rivalry between its clubs,” an announcement on the campaign site reads.

“Highlighting the risks of illegal streaming, which include identity theft, fraud, viruses and dangerous malware, BeStreamWise will target those looking to watch the game illegally for free via X and Reddit. Those who click on the link will find that instead of watching one of the most exciting clashes in this year’s football calendar, they will instead see a gentle brook babbling its way past the camera lens.”

Given that a gentle babbling brook is a type of stream , the imagery complements the main theme of the campaign perfectly. The stream on the BeStreamWise website is actually Burbage Brook in Padley Gorge in Derbyshire’s Peak District, but whether the replacement live stream displayed this particular brook is still unconfirmed.

Determined to See the Stream

Our efforts to find fake Premier League match links that led to the live brook stream were a complete failure. There was no sign of any on Reddit or X, or any sign that any had ever been posted.

A plausible explanation is that posting links publicly was never the plan; a better option would be to wait for someone to show interest or ask for a pirate link, then send the fake link via DM. That would mean no instabans from Reddit mods for spamming fake links and no chance of being instantly called out on X for watering piracy down.

Another explanation is that in our desperate quest to find the link, leading to the brook and then salvation, too much time was spent clicking links that promised Premier League matches but mostly led to phishing sites and malware. With BeStreamWise falling short of omnipresence, self-preservation offered the only chance of survival.

Beware Glossy Tweets, Underneath Evil Lurks

The image below represents a game of two halves. On our left, X.com (formerly known as Twitter) featuring a rather glossy tweet that promises an entire season of Premier League games for free. With Premier League branding and official club badges, it certainly looks promising and of course, that’s the idea.

Apparently compatible with every mainstream device, all that remains is for the user to click on the TinyURL shortlink and wait for the streams in all their glory. A much better approach is to find out where a link leads before clicking it , as demonstrated in the screenshot on the right.

Find out where links lead in advance; BeLinkWise (click to enlarge)

Redirect Checker is a useful service for anyone confronted with a shortlink, regardless of the circumstances. In this case, the shortlink (marked 1 in the first image) looks neater and offers an element of surprise by hiding the destination. In other cases, shortlinks hide trackers that undermine privacy; all should be stripped before being clicked.

Redirect Checker doesn’t discriminate; paste the URL in the box (2) and the previously obfuscated destination URL appears below (3). Once the URL is exposed, testing it on a site like VirusTotal is the recommended option for most people. Understanding the results of a scan isn’t vital since the presence of red text makes it clear not to continue.

Continue Anyway, Cautiously

For theatrical and dramatic purposes, we decided to click through regardless of the VirusTotal report, albeit with a pretty secure setup inside a virtual machine ready to be dumped if necessary.

On the left of the image below is the website that appeared after accessing the ‘final destination’ URL indicated by Redirect Checker. However, when clicking through visitors are taken to another domain (present in the white diagram) that in our case triggered a malware/riskware warning. Until this point, security software had remained silent.

More gloss, more red flags

The website seems to offer everything, but makes it quite clear that visitors MUST sign up for an account first. Pirate IPTV sites do something similar except they tend to be quite up front about a) what’s on offer and b) the need to communicate when payment takes place.

Bright Red Flags

The offer of free streams here is still hidden behind a registration wall. That’s not typical of a completely free pirate streaming service. Often reliant on ads, more eyeballs on the site is usually preferred to unnecessary, traffic-limiting restrictions.

Never, EVER, put personal details into a pirate site

Visiting VirusTotal at the first opportunity would’ve given a vital heads-up on why proceeding this far was always ill-advised and an unnecessary risk.

The benefits of checking are obvious in this case, but the same applies equally to any other site, operating in any other niche, even (or especially) links received via email. There are no big campaigns warning the public about the dangers of email, but it remains the primary route through which internet users are exposed to phishing operations that aim to empty bank accounts, with zero regard for the devastation that causes.

Malware is Real

While we had zero intention of going any further, having seen enough of these types of sites in the past, we sincerely doubt that Premier League streams were ever on offer. Insult to injury, on the other hand, most likely in plentiful supply. The price of a genuine subscription package might sting and take a large chunk of a fan’s disposable income, but it won’t take all of it and give nothing back.

The majority of people are unlikely to find themselves saved by a BeStreamWise intervention. Nor will they receive any basic security advice such as constantly running up-to-date anti-virus software and, if possible, an anti-malware solution on top.

Yet, without seeing evidence themselves, any security risks will likely find themselves waved aside by the masses in favor of free streams. Some will get away without experiencing too many problems, many others won’t be so lucky. Malware’s effect on piracy rates is more difficult to quantify; what we know is malware increases as piracy consumption goes up, make of that what you will.

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Tracking BitTorrent pirates isn’t all that hard since IP addresses are openly broadcasted. With help from Internet providers, these addresses can then be linked to account holders.

ISPs don’t hand over this data voluntarily; they typically require a subpoena or court order before taking action.

In the United States, subpoenas are typically obtained by filing a copyright complaint in federal court against a “John Doe” who’s known only by an IP address. Most of these cases are filed against a single person, which makes it a relatively expensive process.

DMCA Shortcut

In recent years, some rightsholders have used a shortcut to bypass this costly process. Drawing inspiration from the RIAA’s early efforts to identify music pirates in the early 2000s, they use the DMCA subpoena process to obtain the personal details of suspected copyright infringers.

Unlike regular subpoenas, the DMCA equivalents are not reviewed by a judge and only require a signature from the court clerk. While several courts effectively banned the practice two decades ago, more recent attempts cite fresh interpretations and conflicting case law to support their requests.

Many courts granted these new requests, which required Internet providers to identify hundreds, if not thousands of alleged pirates.

Cox Successfully Intervenes

Most of these recent DMCA subpoenas progressed quietly, with little fanfare or pushback. That changed last year when a Cox subscriber, suspected of pirating the movie Fall , filed an objection in court.

The objection prompted Cox Communications to intervene. The Internet provider decided to challenge the use of the DMCA subpoena tool, as detailed in DMCA §512(h) . Similar to the earlier opposition against RIAA’s attempts, the ISP argued that DMCA subpoenas don’t apply to mere conduit providers, as defined under § 512(a).

Earlier this year, a district court judge in Hawaii sided with Cox. The court ruled that DMCA subpoenas don’t apply to mere conduit services, but do apply to other providers that store or link to infringing content directly. As such, the movie companies’ request for a subpoena was denied .

The rightsholders in this matter, film companies Voltage Holdings, Millennium Funding, and Capstone Studios, swiftly submitted a motion for reconsideration. Among other things, they countered that ISPs are not just ‘mere conduits’, since they can remove or disable ‘references or links’ to infringing content.

The Hawaii district court reviewed the opposition, but eventually ruled that the ‘DMCA shortcut’ will remain closed.

Movie Companies Take Case to Court of Appeals

The movie companies are not letting this issue go that easily. A few days ago, they filed a petition at the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, arguing that the district court’s interpretation of the DMCA was overly narrow and hinders their efforts to combat online piracy.

The 81-page petition presents a wide array of arguments. The movie studios argue that the district court’s interpretation, which relies on dated precedents, doesn’t reflect the realities of the modern Internet. They note that ISPs do play a role in facilitating piracy, even if indirectly, and should be subject to DMCA subpoenas.

“A careful reading of the full text of 17 U.S.C. §512 leads to the unquestionable conclusion that Congress intended for DMCA subpoenas to apply to §512(a) service providers despite the contrary conclusions of Verizon and Charter,” the petition reads.

Key Questions

The appeal touches on various DMCA nuances and how these have been interpreted by courts. Ultimately, two key questions are presented.

First, whether DMCA subpoenas can apply to residential ISPs under §512(a) and second, can ISPs be seen as information location tools. These fall under §512(d), which could make an ISP subject to DMCA subpoenas.

(1) Can a valid subpoena under 17 U.S.C. §512(h) be issued commanding a §512(a) residential Internet service provider (“ISP”) to identify subscribers that use the ISP’s service to share copies of pirated copyright protected content online to the entire world via the BitTorrent peer-to-peer network?

(2) Is a residential ISP a provider of information location tools as defined in §512(d) when it provides a subscriber with customer premise equipment (modems and/or residential gateways) and assigns the subscriber an Internet Protocol (“IP”) addresses and links other users to the subscribers’ assigned IP addresses where the subscriber shares pirated copies of copyright protected Works via the BitTorrent peer-to-peer network?

The first question zooms in on the statutory language of the DMCA which, according to the movie companies, suggests that Congress intended DMCA subpoenas to apply to ‘mere conduit’ providers too.

For example, it mentions that §512(e) of the DMCA, which applies to educational institutions, explicitly conditions that a §512(a) service provider should not receive more than two §512(c)(3)(A) notifications within three years.

The District Court, however, concluded that these notifications don’t apply to §512(a) providers because there is no material to take down. That’s a clear conflict, the movie companies note.

Alternative Angle

The second key question is whether ISPs such as Cox operate as information location tools under §512(d). That would make DMCA subpoenas a valid instrument as well. The petition argues that this applies directly to Cox.

“Cox assigns the IP addresses that are used by its subscribers to share pirated copies of Fall online. Cox links other users to the online location to obtain copies of Fall when it routes their data to and from that IP address. Accordingly, Cox is a §512(d) service provider.”

To support this angle, the rightsholders add that Cox can take technical measures in response to infringing activity.

“Cox can use measures to disable the link to the infringing material such as null routing the IP addresses, blocking the ports associated with BitTorrent activity from the subscribers’ endpoint, or filtering the BitTorrent content from the subscriber’s endpoint,” the petitions reads.

Landmark Appeal

The above is just a brief overview of some of the angles, questions, and arguments laid out in the petition. Much of it goes into great detail on the various DMCA sections, how these are linked, and what that means for the present case.

Whether the court agrees that there’s a statutory conflict has yet to be seen. However, the stakes are significant. If rightsholders can identify alleged pirates more easily, enforcement will likely ramp up.

Cox has yet to respond to the appeal. When it does, the ISP’s response will likely be mindful of the Supreme Court petition it filed in a separate copyright-related case, where a jury held the ISP liable for pirating subscribers.

—-

A copy of the petition, filed by Voltage Holdings, Millennium Funding, and Capstone Studios is available here (pdf) .

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

As Donald Trump used every available resource to ensure his tenancy at the most recognizable house in the United States was extended, some social media platforms had adopted an unorthodox approach to his accounts.

Despite receiving a number of takedown notices alleging copyright infringement in Trump’s tweets, and in some cases removing content in response to apparently valid claims, the president’s account wasn’t suspended or terminated as is often the case.

That allowed one of Trump’s team to post a tweet containing a short animation; a train sporting Trump’s campaign logo being pursued at some distance by rival Joe Biden on a railroad handcar failing to keep up. For reasons that remain unknown, the animator chose the 1982 hit ‘Electric Avenue’ by British singer-songwriter Eddy Grant as the animation’s soundtrack.

The animator didn’t ask Grant for permission and when the Trump team spotted the animation on Twitter, a decision was made to post it on Trump’s Twitter account, also without asking Grant for permission. Grant responded with a cease and desist notice and when that was ignored, Grant sued Trump and his team for copyright infringement.

Judge’s Opinion Was Just His Opinion?

In an ideal world, the failure of Trump’s motion to dismiss in September 2021 should’ve been seen as an opportunity to settle the case privately.

A very small slice of humble pie and some tea, perhaps, so that everyone could move on. Or even negotiating the terms of the settlement Grant offered in August 2020 before filing the lawsuit.

Instead, U.S. District Judge John Koeltl’s opinion and order, which painted a clear picture of how successful a fair use defense was likely to be in this matter, appears to have carried little weight with the defense. That was surprising.

Judge Koeltl had described the use of Electric Avenue as “wholesale copying” to support a political ad campaign, and noted that the defense had misunderstood “the focus of the transformative use inquiry.” The defense had also admitted that the animation was not fair use-friendly parody, but its less useful cousin, satire.

Judge Koeltl went to state that the defense had offered no justification at all for their “extensive borrowing” nor had they provided any evidence that use of the work had caused no market harm. In fact, such was the total disconnect between the use of Electric Avenue and the animation, the campaign could’ve chosen any other track, or indeed no track at all, to send the same message.

Four Year Legal Grind

What the defense were hoping to find isn’t clear but after failing to convince the court in October 2021 that Trump had “ Presidential absolute immunity ” in respect of Grant’s claims, the case dragged on for another three years, four years in total.

Exactly a year ago, September 15, 2023, the plaintiffs and defendants filed motions for summary judgment at a Manhattan federal court. The defendants informed the court that they would rely on a fair use defense, despite Grant’s legal team asserting that discovery had “revealed unequivocally” that the use of Electric Avenue was not transformative.

Fair Use Defense Fails, Defense Liable for Infringement

Judge Koeltl had formed the same opinion two years earlier and in an opinion and order dated September 13, 2024, he offers a reminder of his order handed down several years earlier.

“In an Opinion and Order dated September 28, 2021, this Court denied the defendants’ motion to dismiss. The parties have now filed cross-motions for partial summary judgment,” Judge Koeltl notes.

The Trump defendants asked the Court to dismiss part of the complaint based on their assertion that Grant lacked a valid copyright registration for the sound recording of “Electric Avenue.” The details are convoluted, but the bottom line straightforward; defendants’ motion to dismiss was denied.

The plaintiffs moved for summary judgment on the issue of liability. Oral argument was heard on September 6 and in his order, Judge Koeltl reveals that the plaintiffs’ motion is granted. The defendants are liable for damages because their fair use defense comprehensively fails.

Fair Use Analysis

“In this case, the Video has a very low degree of ‘transformativeness,’ if any at all. As this Court found in denying the defendants’ motion to dismiss, the Video ‘is best described as a wholesale copying of music to accompany a political campaign ad’,” Judge Koeltl notes, citing his opinion from 2021.

“The defendants also argue that the Video ‘transformed Grant’s original conception of Electric Avenue as a protest against social conditions into a colorful attack on the character and personality traits of a rival political figure’. Again, ‘the defendants’ argument misapprehends the focus of the transformative use inquiry.'”

The inquiry does not focus exclusively on the character of the animation, the Judge notes. Rather, “it focuses on the character of the animation’s use of Grant’s song.”

The defendants claimed that their use of the work gave them “no commercial advantage” but the Judge disagreed.

In this case, the defendants benefited commercially from using Electric Avenue without paying a licensing fee. While there was no direct profit motive, that was insufficient to overcome the lack of transformative use and the first fair use factor favoring Grant.

A Fair Use Full House For Grant

Once again citing his opinion and order from 2021, the Judge notes that the defendants conceded that Electric Avenue is a creative, published work, leading to the second factor favoring Grant.

The third fair use factor considers the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole. This inquiry was also present in the opinion from 2021; in 2024, nothing has changed and still favors Grant.

The fourth factor asks “whether, if the challenged use becomes widespread, it will adversely affect the potential market for the copyrighted work.” In this matter the Judge writes that there is no public benefit as a result of the defendants’ use of Electric Avenue; they could’ve used any song, even created their own, or used no song at all.

“The plaintiffs’ ability to license “Electric Avenue” in the market for licensed music for videos—political or otherwise—would be affected by widespread, uncompensated use. Accordingly, the last fair use factor favors the plaintiffs,” Judge Koeltl concludes.

That leaves the question of damages; Grant previously requested $300,000, but it’s likely the defense will have done their own calculations and arrived at a vastly lower sum.

Judge Koeltl’s opinion and order can be found here (pdf)

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Android-based set-top devices have saturated the market in recent years, and it’s not uncommon for households to have several; downstairs, upstairs, and probably at least one in a drawer.

These devices, including the ubiquitous Amazon Firestick, are mostly content agnostic and equally capable of streaming video from legal sources such as Netflix or BBC iPlayer, or from unlicensed IPTV platforms.

The problem for rightsholders and governments hoping to curtail consumption of pirated content, is that the devices themselves are overwhelmingly legal. It’s the presence of piracy software installed on devices and the nature of the content consumed that tips the scale one way or the other. As a result, no realistic blanket banning solution exists, although Brazil has come up with a partial solution.

Devices Illegal By Default

The set-top device situation in Brazil is relatively straightforward. Unless telecoms regulator Anatel (Agência Nacional de Telecomunicações) authorizes a device type for importation, distribution, and sale, that device cannot be used legally in Brazil.

Anatel says its conformity assessment ensures that consumers only have access to products (typically electronic devices such as cell phones, tablets, set-top boxes, routers, etc) that have been tested for quality and safety.

Set-top boxes without a Technical Conformity Certificate are illegal regardless of the content consumed. That eliminates a lot of red tape when Anatel decides to seize well over a million devices to curtail piracy, because all seizures are carried out on straightforward health and safety grounds.

For devices that enter the local market without certification, Anatel regularly reports various actions to remove them. In 2023, Anatel revealed its new anti-piracy lab, where intelligence meets site-blocking measures to disrupt supply and consumption of pirated content.

The Anatel Anti-Piracy Lab (Image credit: Anatel )

Most famously, the regulator said it had blocked 80% of all pirate set-top boxes in Brazil during October 2023. To this background of ongoing success, Anatel is now promoting a competition where hackers can test their skills to determine who has the best non-certified pirate set-top box blocking skills in Brazil.

Anatel Teams Up With Hackathon Brasil

If any cynics out there think that the real point of the hackathon is to shore up IPTV blocking measures in Brazil with fresh ideas and techniques, Anatel isn’t even trying to hide it.

“The National Telecommunications Agency (Anatel) and the Hackathon Brasil Community will hold the first TV Box Hackathon focused on developing innovative solutions for blocking irregular [non-certified] TV Boxes,” an announcement on the government’s website reads.

“The developer marathon will take place on September 28 and 29 and represents an important project for the industry, regulated sector and academia, highlighting Anatel’s role in the state of the art of technological innovation.”

A dedicated information page on Hackathon Brazil begins by outlining the prevalence of IoT devices and growing concerns over security.

Noting that devices without certification “pose risks to consumers and to Brazil’s telecommunications infrastructure,” more specific concerns include operating system vulnerabilities, malware, spyware (hidden screenshot capture and screenshare actions), plus the ability to execute code on other devices within a LAN.

The Mission, Should You Choose to Accept It

Whether those who choose to sign up will receive more detailed instruction is unclear, but the main goal isn’t difficult to understand.

So the challenge is this: by understanding how these non-approved devices work, you must develop an approach that is capable of interrupting the exchange of data that occurs between the devices and their users.

Given the difficulties Anatel faces in tackling millions of these devices, mostly located inside people’s homes, the winners of the hackathon are unlikely to find success by physically attacking a device with wire, solder, or a modified ROM. Any solution must scale but before that, there’s the question of how to gain mass access to devices.

The masters of access at scale are those who manage to build botnets using malware that users often willingly (although unknowingly) install themselves because they believe the software does something else. Coincidentally or not, for many years Brazil has been heavily targeted by botnets running on cheap, compromised Android set-top boxes.

According to a report from cybersecurity firm ESET, malware that disproportionately targets Brazil regularly arrives disguised as legitimate or illegitimate streaming apps.

Further research shows that the dangers cited by Anatel relate directly to this type of malware , including the ability to infect other devices in a network, typically cheap IoT devices with poor security. Cybersecurity companies charge millions of dollars to solve problems smaller than this.

Winners’ Rewards

Anyone interested in registering has until September 20th to fill in their details on the official Hackathon Brasil site and for those who come out on top at the end of the event, prizes are as follows:

When converted to United States dollars, the winners receive ~US$1200, second place ~US$530, and third place ~US$350, and after reading the small print and the event regulations ( pdf ) , a few things deserve to be highlighted.

This is a team event and the minimum team size is four. So if a four-person team wins by solving what appears to be a critical problem faced by Brazil on the security side, and national and international rightsholders on the other, all members stand to pocket $300 each. Come third with a six-person team and each member will receive just under $60.00, or $30 for each day’s work.

Intellectual Property Protection

Of course, everything doesn’t always have to be about money, why can’t we all just have fun for a couple of days and just enjoy ourselves? The answer lies in a concept known as ‘intellectual property’ and the value of that property to those who create it. While the odds are stacked against, the aim here is for the winners to create an extremely valuable piece of intellectual property.

The rules for the event state that all who register for Hackathon TV Box authorize the ‘ORGANIZING COMMITTEE’ (COMISSÃO ORGANIZADORA) to “ use, edit, publish, reproduce and disclose, through newspapers, magazines, television, cinema, radio and internet, VHS and CD-ROM, or in any other means of communication, free of charge and without prior or additional authorization, their names, voices, images, projects or companies, both nationally and internationally, for a period of 10 (ten) years. ”

The committee is defined as “members and directors of the Hackathon Brasil Community and ANATEL” with a note that “the safeguarding of intellectual property rights, the ideas, arrangements and methods will be the responsibility of the project’s own design team.”

Legal statements exist for a reason and the above seems to grant permission to “use” “free of charge” “the project” “nationally and internationally” “for a period of 10 (ten) years.”

It’s probably just a reference to image/publicity rights; definitely so if the project fails to deliver. In the event a miracle plays out, who knows?

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Next Thursday, September 19, 2024, will mark the one-year anniversary of the raids on French datacenters that brought down file-hosting platform Uptobox.

Founded in 2011, Uptobox was a very popular site with over 34 million visits per month, a third of which were generated by French users. After being blocked by ISPs in mid-2023, enforcement action became more likely than not.

Around 20 police officers participated in the raids on cloud service providers Scaleway, OpCore, and OVH. Members of the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment, including Columbia, Paramount, StudioCanal, Warner Bros, Disney, Apple, and Amazon, later confirmed that their complaint triggered the raids and the subsequent seizure of Uptobox servers.

Fighting Back

Unlike some other platforms accused of piracy, Uptobox has thus far bucked the trend of disappearing in response to a lawsuit, with Dubai-based owner Genius Servers Tech FZE (Genius) fully engaged in the legal process.

In April 2024, Uptobox attempted to have the entire case thrown out, arguing it wasn’t the piracy haven the plaintiffs were describing.

In a setback for Uptobox, the attempt ultimately failed, but owner Genius still hoped to have various seizure orders, that had granted the removal of its servers back in 2023, lifted by the court.

The company argued on various grounds, including that the seizures weren’t warranted due to the activities of Genius, and were a “manifestly disproportionate measure” that caused damage to Genius and users of the Uptobox service.

The plaintiffs presented a laundry list of objections, all of which are detailed in the order of the Paris court linked below. Ultimately, however, the appeal would run out of steam for reasons unrelated to the merits of the case.

Time Waits For No One

The decision handed down by the Paris judicial court on Thursday was first reported by Marc Rees at l’Informé; as he explains , Genius Servers’ efforts failed after the court ruled its requests inadmissible.

In a nutshell, demands by Genius to lift the seizure order and restore the servers were declared “time-barred” because they were simply filed too late.

The seizures were authorized in eight separate orders which targeted the headquarters and premises of Scaleway, Op Core and OVH. The only timely request by Genius concerned the seizures carried out at Scaleway. Subsequent requests in February 2024 encompassed Op Core and OVH, but the deadline had long since passed, having expired in October 2023.

The failed process is an expensive one for Genius. The court instructed the Dubai-based company to pay 8,000 euros in legal costs to each of the rightsholder claimants, to a total of 70,000 euros. The main case, whatever that may hold moving forward, will now continue.

The order of the Paris judicial court is available here (pdf)

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

A few weeks before the U.S. Department of Justice announced the criminal prosecution of two alleged Z-Library operators in 2022, the French Publishers Union (SNE) had already targeted the site indirectly.

In August that year, SNE obtained an order at a Paris Court, requiring French ISPs to block more than 200 domain names .

By November 2022, the order was largely moot. U.S. authorities didn’t just call for the arrest of two people connected to the site in Argentina, the feds also seized the majority of the shadow library’s domain names.

In theory, this chain of events shouldn’t be a problem for the publishers but it ended up working against them as Z-Library didn’t fold. The site registered dozens of new domain names and continued operations after a short hiatus.

As a result, the earlier blocking victory turned out to be short-lived. The new domain names rendered the hard-fought Z-Library blockades useless and French readers continued to flock to the site.

Legally, there was no easy solution to add new domains, so SNE eventually had to go back to court, which it did this spring. Armed with a list of nearly a hundred new domain names, supported by the earlier win, there was little doubt that the Paris Court would rule in favor of an expansion.

Court Grants New Z-Library Blockades

Yesterday, Marc Rees at L’informé reported that the Tribunal Judiciaire de Paris signed a new blocking order on SNE’s request. The action targets 98 domain names in total, which were found to be predominantly copyright infringing.

As is often the case in these blocking procedures, the rightsholders supplied the necessary evidence. In this case, they presented analyses from anti-piracy outfit LeakID, which found that in a sample of 500 works listed on Z-Library, 83% were from SNE publishers.

“SNE established in a sufficiently convincing manner that the disputed site, which is aimed at a French-speaking audience, allows Internet users […] to download protected works from links without having the authorization of the rights holders, which constitutes copyright infringement,” the court concluded.

Bittersweet

The publishers will be pleased that the court granted their extended Z-Library blocking request. However, this is yet another bittersweet victory; perhaps more bitter than sweet.

Firstly, Z-Library can circumvent the blocking measures without much effort by registering new domain names. The court recognized the ‘dynamic’ nature of the problem but the order doesn’t allow the publishers to add new domains on their own accord.

If SNE wants to block additional domain names in the future, it must go back to court. This update process can take weeks, if not months, after which the same cycle can start all over again.

Blocking Seized Domains

The second ‘bittersweet’ element is related to this blocking lag. SNE submitted its recent blocking request on May 21st this year, just a few days before the FBI carried out its latest round of Z-Library domain seizures .

As a result, the majority of the Z-Library domain names listed in the latest court order no longer pose a threat. Put differently, French ISPs have been ordered to block dozens of domain names that have a prominent seizure banner, and are no longer controlled by Z-Library.

These seized domains include go-to-zlibrary.se, singlelogin.se, booksc.eu, zlibrary-fr.se, zlibrary-redirect.se, z-library.se, go-to-zlibrary.se and many others (full list here ).

Other ‘blocked’ domain names have expired in recent months and become available for registration again. That applies to frenchbooks.se, greek-books.se, korean-books.se, and many more. A few other domains appear to be parked.

This means that, of the 98 domain names targeted in the latest court order, only nine are still active today. The others haven’t been available for weeks and Z-Library has put up several replacement domains, which are not covered by the blocking order.

It’s not difficult to see how this whole process must be a massive source of frustration for the publishers. If they go back to court, this will likely serve as an example of why more ‘flexible’ blocking measures are needed.

At the same time, it begs the question of why the Paris court grants a new blocking order for domain names that no longer link to any infringing material, as well as domains that have expired.

—

The court order, as published by L’informé, lists the following 98 domain names that ISPs are required to block:

– go-to-zlibrary.se (seized)
– singlelogin.se (seized)
– booksc.eu (seized)
– cn1lib.is (not loading)
– zlibrary-africa.se (parked)
– zlibrary-es.se (seized)
– afrikaans-books.se (expired)
– arabic-books.se (expired)
– azerbaijani-books.sk
– bengali-books.se (expired)
– bulgarian-books.se (expired)
– catalan-books.se (expired)
– croatian-books.se (expired)
– frenchbooks.se (expired)
– german-books.se (expired)
– go-to-zlibrary.se (seized)
– greek-books.se (expired)
– hebrew-books.se (expired)
– hindi-books.se (expired)
– hungarian-books.se (expired)
– indonesian-books.se (expired)
– italian-books.se (expired)
– japanese-books.se (expired)
– kazakh-books.sk
– korean-books.se (expired)
– latin-books.sk
– latvian-books.se (expired)
– portuguese-books.se (expired)
– russian-books.se (expired)
– serbian-books.se (expired)
– singlelogin.re
– slovak-books.sk
– spanish-books.se (expired)
– swedish-books.se (expired)
– turkish-books.se (expired)
– ukrainian-books.se (expired)
– urdu-books.sk
– z-library.se (seized)
– zlibrary-ae.se (seized)
– zlibrary-ar.se (seized)
– zlibrary-sg.se (seized)
– zlibrary-sk.se (seized)
– zlibrary-sng.se (seized)
– zlibrary-th.se (seized)
– zlibrary-tr.se (seized)
– zlibrary-tw.se (seized)
– zlibrary-ua.se (seized)
– zlibrary-vn.se (seized)
– zlibrary-za.se (seized)
– lithuanian-books.se (expired
– malayalam-books.sk
– pashto-books.sk
– polish-books.se (expired)
– zlibrary-asia.se
– zlibrary-at.se (seized)
– zlibrary-au.se (seized)
– zlibrary-be.se (seized)
– zlibrary-bg.se (seized)
– zlibrary-bl.se (seized)
– zlibrary-br.se (seized)
– zlibrary-by.se (seized)
– zlibrary-ca.se (seized)
– zlibrary-ch.se (seized)
– zlibrary-china.se (parked)
– zlibrary-cl.se (seized)
– zlibrary-cz.se (seized)
– zlibrary-de.se (seized)
– zlibrary-east.se (parked)
– zlibrary-eg.se (seized)
– zlibrary-es.se (seized)
– zlibrary-et.se (seized)
– zlibrary-fr.se (seized)
– zlibrary-fr.se (seized)
– zlibrary-global.se (seized)
– zlibrary-gr.se (seized)
– zlibrary-hk.se (seized)
– zlibrary-hu.se (seized)
– zlibrary-id.se (seized)
– zlibrary-in.se (seized)
– zlibrary-ir.se(seized)
– zlibrary-it.se (seized)
– zlibrary-jp.se (seized)
– zlibrary-kp.se (seized)
– zlibrary-kr.se (seized)
– zlibrary-lk.se (seized)
– zlibrary-ma.se (seized)
– zlibrary-my.se (seized)
– zlibrary-ng.se (seized)
– zlibrary-nl.se (seized)
– zlibrary-nz.se (seized)
– zlibrary-pb.se (seized)
– zlibrary-ph.se (seized)
– zlibrary-pk.se (seized)
– zlibrary-pl.se (seized)
– zlibrary-pt.se (seized)
– zlibrary-redirect.se (seized)
– zlibrary-ru.se (seized)
– zlibrary-sa.se (seized)

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Supported by almost constant life-or-death messaging, one has to wonder whether Serie A’s seemingly endless financial problems really are insurmountable.

Yet for reasons that aren’t easily understood, let alone explained, every week matches go ahead as planned. With decaying stadiums at some clubs and billions of euros in persistent overall debt, companies in other industries would’ve stopped spending beyond their means long ago, or at least succumbed to financial pressure while refusing to do so.

Serie A clubs have done neither, nor has the position changed on how to get finances back on track. In a recent interview with Serie A CEO Luigi De Siervo published by Il Mattino (paywall), most of the league’s problems have a habit of circling back to the usual suspect; rampant IPTV piracy.

Cops and Robbers

Conflicting statements can have a tendency to unnerve creditors and if the launch of the Piracy Shield system earlier this year is any example, here’s another big one. After months of heaping praise on what was billed as the savior of Italian football, today the goal posts of opinion appear to have shifted.

“It’s like in ‘Cops and Robbers,’ we are always chasing,” said De Siervo per Il Mattino’s report. “As soon as we catch them, they move to another server.”

What that means in practical terms is unclear but after less than eight months of constantly tampering with Italy’s DNS servers, current data reveals that 5,018 IP addresses and 16,523 domain names have already been blocked with no obviously positive results.

The true scale of blocking in Italy is significantly higher. When the system began breaking down and agreed limits were exceeded recently, an unknown number of IP addresses and/or domains were removed from the system so that new ones could be added at the start of the new season. At the same time, De Siervo could be found defending the cost of season tickets, describing the price as appropriate for such a high quality product.

Take People’s Money or Pirates Will

In the UK, meanwhile, Serie A fans were unable to buy whole season passes to watch Serie A on streaming platform ‘ One Football .’ Four games into the season, they still can’t.

They currently face the prospect of paying £5 for each match rather than an up-front £100 commitment for the whole season. Some pirate services, meanwhile, will accept £3 right now for an entire month of every conceivable channel, and in the time it takes to read this article, Serie A matches will be open for viewing.

Instances like these may not be typical or overly numerous, but they are more damaging than some might expect. While hardcore pirates have no qualms about resorting to piracy, the same isn’t true of those who ordinarily pay for content.

Forbidden Fruit, Not Even Once

Failing to supply legal content can provide justification for piracy and if that persists long enough for former customers to hand over a relatively small sum for an annual pirate subscription, they’re gone for at least a year.

Serie A’s strategy for converting pirates into customers seems unwavering. With assistance from the government and its prosecutors, Serie A believes that legal action is the only option, despite the inherent risks of treating all pirates the same, regardless of the circumstances.

“There is a thread of Ariadne that connects the hacker [IPTV service] with the client’s terminal: now we have to trace the end user and sanction him. The rules are there,” De Siervo said.

“A true fan does not watch a pirated match, because then he causes damage to his club. But it is a cultural issue, not linked to the price of season tickets.”

Unwavering on Piracy, Unmovable on the Solution

The statement above is likely to have zero effect on hardcore pirates; they’re regularly told they’re going to prison for their habit and not even that moves the needle of deterrence. The big question is how those with a more sensitive disposition might react, along with those currently on the fence, considering their return to legal services.

Pretending that the attraction of pirate IPTV services is always about better service would be a mistake. People who can afford to subscribe to legal services use them, just as much as those who cannot. Perhaps the former aren’t true fans while the latter desperately want to be fans but have been priced out by a sport that can’t even manage its own money. But here we are and money has to come from somewhere.

“Modern football is maintained by selling matches. We are also attacking search engines that in some ways are complicit,” De Siervo continued.

“There are, I repeat, 300 million euros of lost revenue, or 30 percent of the value of TV rights [lost to piracy]. Football is being killed like this, because there are no longer the patrons of the past who lose money, what comes in is spent.”

Serie A seems determined to reclaim this revenue by force and in many ways, targeting those who undermine a business at such scale should expect a significant response, especially if they don’t jump to a new server quickly enough, or so the reporting goes.

“We have the football we deserve and this parasitic system that doesn’t pay to watch matches must be blown up,” De Siervo insists. “Otherwise football will blow up. It’s either them or us.”

‘Us’ has to mean more than Serie A and its clubs. If this war pans out as suggested, fighting on one front while starting a war with fans on another will not end well. Fans need to played onside, like yesterday.

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Formerly known as Svenska Antipiratbyrån (Swedish Anti-Piracy Agency), in one form or another, Rights Alliance has been on the front lines of Sweden’s war against piracy for almost 25 years.

Most famously, the formation of Antipiratbyrån around 2001 triggered the formation of Piratbyrån (Piracy Agency), the pro-piracy activist group behind the launch of The Pirate Bay.

Antipiratbyrån dissolved then reemerged as Rättighetsalliansen (Rights Alliance) in 2011 and today, 13 years after its rebranding and 23 years since its inception, the anti-piracy group has a new nemesis and perhaps the greatest challenge it has ever faced.

The New Nemesis: Pirate IPTV

More complex and difficult to counter than The Pirate Bay, pirate IPTV services are causing headaches everywhere, not just in Sweden. Rights Alliance, which represents local and international film and TV companies, including the studios of the MPA, has several successful IPTV prosecutions to its name and late last week, reported that another is underway.

“A man from Malmö is now being prosecuted for running the illegal IPTV service Ghostfarmer,” Rights Alliance informed us via email Friday.

“The case was initiated after a notification from the Rights Alliance in 2023. Both TV channels and a large selection of films and series were made available on the service.”

After building a case against suspects, Rights Alliance shares whatever it has learned with police, hoping to prompt a criminal investigation and the arrest of any suspects. Success in a state prosecution opens up the possibility of a prison sentence for the offender. Considered a valuable deterrent, a criminal conviction often includes damages, which can return at least some of the alleged losses.

Confidence in Ghost Farmer Prosecution

In the Ghost Farmer prosecution, the suspect is accused of administering a website and an IPTV panel, providing customer support (presumably on Telegram where a channel still exists today), and transferring money to his own account and crypto exchanges.

“The police investigation shows that there is a lot of evidence against the man, both of a financial and digital nature. There have been raids on the man’s home and the police have also carried out remote searches, including the Telegram chat application. The fact that the police are now allowed to carry out remote searches is a good and long-awaited tool, which was made possible by a relatively recent change in the law,” the anti-piracy group explains.

A Tiny Drop in a Huge Ocean

Rights Alliance says that the suspect has confessed, but whether that means a custodial sentence and/or an award for damages will depend on the circumstances. From the description, it seems likely that the suspect was reselling subscriptions, not running a video platform of his own. Rights Alliance says the service was marketed via email and from the ‘marketing’ we’ve seen independently, also by posting on sites like Reddit.

“[I]t can be suspected that the man ran more illegal services,” Rights Alliance adds.

While to us this seems to confirm that the man was indeed reselling subscriptions, the terminology is a little ambiguous. In general, determining the importance of those prosecuted to the overall ecosystem isn’t always straightforward, which can make overall progress difficult to gauge.

As far as alleged subscription sales to the public are concerned, some of those convicted in Sweden had thousands of customers, a significant amount in financial terms. However, since only those at the top of the supply chain are critical to the survival of a pirate service, the removal of a reseller won’t affect overall content availability.

Letters to Government

Actions that have a real effect on IPTV supply are rare and this isn’t just a problem for Sweden. Those who subscribe to these services may view this as a positive but for major rightsholders, doing nothing is rarely an option. That may explain why rightsholders in Sweden appear to be considering controversial measures targeting the other end of the supply chain.

Rights Alliance highlights a letter ( 1 ) sent to Minister for Justice Gunnar Strömmer by Social Democratic politician Lars Mejern Larsson, asking what the government intends to do to about rising consumption of pirated content.

Records held at the Riksdag (parliament) reveal that Larsson sent the same letter to Minister of Culture Parisa Liljestrand ( 2 ) and Minister of Finance Elisabeth Svantesson ( 3 ) . Larsson speaks about the negative effects on the film industry and points out that criminals are also stealing from the government.

“Piracy of film and television content damages the rights holder financially and thus affects the possibility of – and the desire for – new production. It is a major threat to a viable Swedish film industry,” the letter notes.

“The Swedish Tax Agency has also said that Sweden stands out with the highest percentage of the population that buys illegal television, and this is estimated at around 600,000 people. The market has a turnover of SEK 550,000,000 [~US$53.1m].”

Targeting Pirate IPTV Subscribers

The main message in Larsson’s letter ends with the suggestion that while criminals make off without paying taxes, ultimately the finger of blame can be pointed at those who give them money.

“Somewhat harshly, anyone who downloads films illegally contributes to organized economic crime,” Larsson notes.

In his response, Minister of Justice Gunnar Strömmer says that the government is aware of the effects on rightsholders and society in general. He notes that a change to the law in 2020 enabling stiffer sentences and greater damages awards has already produced results and more prosecutions are in the pipeline.

Strömmer says that an investigation by the tax authorities will lead to criminal charges in the majority of cases. When combined with the government’s “extensive measures” to target combat organized crime generally, the above should have an effect on the illegal provision and consumption of pirated content.

These measures should be given time to exert the necessary pressure before taking direct action against those who consume content from illicit sources. For Rights Alliance, more needs to be done, sooner rather than later. But it’s not difficult to see where this could end up if all else fails.

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.