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      TPB Founders Are Not Involved in the “The Pirate Bay” TV Series (Update)

      news.movim.eu / TorrentFreak • 8 April, 2023 • 4 minutes

    pirate bay logo Two years ago, reports began to surface about a new six-part TV-series on The Pirate Bay’s turbulent history.

    The project was initially scheduled to start last year but after an apparent delay, filming is now expected to begin this fall.

    Pirate Bay TV Series

    The inception and early years of The Pirate Bay are definitely a worthy subject for a series. While most pirate sites hid in the shadows, Pirate Bay’s founders were public figures, who openly taunted the entertainment industries.

    Speaking with Variety , head-writer Piotr Marciniak explains that his screenplay is based on a wealth of archive material as well as interviews with the site’s founders.

    “It’s a classic rise and fall story, a tragedy about flying too close to the sun, but also a timeless story of a generational conflict,” Marcimiak said.

    The people involved in the “The Pirate Bay” series are clearly looking forward to getting the project running. The production is in the hands of B-Reel Films , working for the Swedish broadcaster SVT, while the American distribution company Dynamic Television scooped up worldwide rights.

    Selling The Pirate Bay ‘Rights’

    Indeed, the rights to The Pirate Bay series are actively traded. The same will likely happen to pirated copies of the episodes when they’re illicitly posted to The Pirate Bay, but it’s unclear whether the rightsholders have plans to crack down on unauthorized sharing.

    It’s nonetheless interesting to read that the story about a site that rebelled against the exploitation of copyrights, is being copyrighted and sold off. Would The Pirate Bay founders approve of that? Are they even involved?

    The Pirate Bay series aims to tell the history of the notorious pirate site and co-founders Fredrik Neij, Peter Sunde, and Gottfrid Svartholm, but none appear to be actively involved.

    Founders Deny Involvement

    TorrentFreak spoke with both Sunde and Neij, who both confirm they were not interviewed for the upcoming series, even though it aims to document an important and hectic part of their lives.

    “Nope, they didn’t interview me for the TV series,” Fredrik says. “Also. I’m not sure who they bought the rights from… They didn’t pay me at least.”

    “And I know Anakata would have had nothing to do with it,” Fredrik adds, referring to co-founder Gottfrid, who prefers to live his life away from the public spotlight in recent years.


    peter and fredrik

    Pirate Bay co-founder Peter Sunde previously said that he was flattered by the idea of a Pirate Bay series, adding that it’s also a bit nerve-wracking. This week, however, Sunde confirmed that he is in no way involved either.

    Pirate Bay’s co-founder actually discussed the TV project idea with the show’s writer Piotr Marciniak a few years ago but declined to sell his story. Instead, he was, and still is, working on a potentially competing film project.

    Later on, Sunde also met with the series’ director and someone from the production company B-Reel Films, who told him that they had no one from the Pirate Bay team who wanted to cooperate. That didn’t convince him to change his mind, however.

    F*ck Off

    As mentioned earlier, the Variety piece mentions that the upcoming Pirate Bay series draws from key interviews with Sunde and Svartholm. However, the Pirate Bay co-founder says that he wasn’t interviewed for the series.

    “I have not given any deep interview, and when I met with them they said that Gottfrid had told them to fuck off. Which sounds more true to his character..,” Peter Sunde tells us.

    We also reached out to B-Reel Films to hear their side of the story, but the company didn’t immediately reply. However, based on the comments from Sunde and Neij it is safe to conclude that they are not in any way involved.

    Of course, the rightsholders of The Pirate Bay TV series are free to send some of the revenues to the founders of the site, who ultimately paid for their ideals with their freedom . Sunde doesn’t expect to get paid anytime soon, however.

    “Movie studios moved to Hollywood since they didn’t want to pay for stories. They were the original pirates,” Sunde says.

    “It’s been ironic to see them going after pirates in court for years and even more ironic to see them pirate the pirate story. Hoping it will turn out nice so I can pirate a copy of it. Maybe I’ll get sued for downloading the story about us.”

    Update April 8:

    Fredrik Heinig, founder and managing partner of B-Reel Films was kind enough to clear up that, indeed, none of the TPB founders were interviewed in detail for the series. The production team did speak to several people who were close to TPB, as well as its adversaries.

    “We interviewed more than 20 people around and in TPB, Piratbyrån, and Antipiratbyrån for our project,” Heinig says.

    “Piotr talked to Peter and I and the director Jens met and spoke to Peter in Malmö, I have also talked to him two more times on the phone, but Peter never wanted to do a deep interview, as you know has ambitions to tell his story in a film by himself. Piotr met Gottfrid and had a very short talk.”

    “We tried to reach both Gottfrid and Fredrik for longer interviews without any luck. So it’s a misunderstanding from Variety to say that our series is based on interviews with the founders, it’s based on heavy research and interviews with people around them and others.”

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

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      Z-Library Plans to Let Users Share Physical Books Through ‘Z-Points’

      news.movim.eu / TorrentFreak • 8 April, 2023 • 3 minutes

    zlib With more than 12 million books in its archive, Z-Library advertised itself as the largest repository of pirated books on the Internet.

    The site has millions of regular readers who find a wealth of free knowledge and entertainment at their fingertips.

    This success was briefly interrupted late last year when the U.S. Government seized the site’s main domain names . The enforcement action also led to the arrest of two alleged Russian operators of the site, who now find themselves at the center of a criminal investigation.

    A crackdown of this magnitude usually marks the end of a pirate site, but Z-Library appears to be going in the opposite direction. The site has made a full comeback with a more ‘censorship-resistant’ setup and recently collected tens of thousands of dollars in donations.

    Next Up: Sharing Paper Books

    In a new message, posted this week, Z-Library thanks its userbase for their generous contributions, noting that it secured all the necessary funds to ensure continued development. Apparently, this includes support for offline sharing.

    In addition to offering millions of ebooks, Z-Library says that it’s working on a new service that will help users to share physical copies with each other.

    “Books you have read should not gather dust on your shelf – instead, they can get a second life in the hands of new readers! This helps to preserve the literary heritage and spread the knowledge and ideas contained in books to more people,” they write.

    Z-Points

    The book lending concept, commonly known as a library, is a few hundred years old already, but Z-Library will upgrade both scale and reach. The idea is to create a global market with dedicated pick-up points for user-donated books.

    “[W]e want to organize ‘Z-Points’ – collection and storage points for books that will be the link between those who share their books and those who need them.

    “Book owners who are willing to share them with other users can send books to the nearest Z-Point in their region. And those who need books stored in these points will be able to receive them for their use.”

    zlibrary sharing

    This sounds like a P2P competitor for traditional libraries. Interestingly, however, Z-Library believes that existing libraries are ideally suited to become Z-Points. People can also volunteer to run a Z-Point from their own homes.

    Running a book lending point will require quite a bit of storage space and organizational effort so fulfillment centers and third-party logistics services are also welcome to join in.

    By Users, For Users

    The Z-Point idea is still in the planning phase. According to Z-Library, users will be able to send books by mail. These can then be loaned by others and/or sent by mail when requested.

    This proposal is quite different from the traditional pirate ebook library Z-Library offers now. And loaning a book to someone is generally not seen as copyright infringement either unless it’s a copied ebook.

    Whether there’s a market for this plan and if it will ever come to fruition has yet to be seen, but based on the comments we’ve read so far, plenty of people seem to like it. Soon after the announcement was made public, hundreds of enthusiastic responses started rolling in.

    telegram zlibrary comments

    If anything, it shows the global scale of the site, with people suggesting Vietnam, Brazil, Portugal, Colombia, Iran, Uzbekistan, Nigeria, Spain India, Argentina, Egypt, France, Ethiopia, China, and Ghana as ideal Z-Point locations.

    Questions and Suggestions

    The announcement was posted several days after April 1st, so it appears to be serious. That said, there are plenty of questions that remain unanswered. What are the legal implications, for example, and who covers the costs?

    “The idea is good but like how would you deal with the logistics and also with cost? Especially when the team is facing legal pursuit how can you hide your identities and do it?[sic]” one commenter writes.

    Other commenters pointed out that, in many countries, people already organize free libraries to collect and donate books to local communities. Some of these are organized and promoted through the “ Little Free Library ” project.

    The Z-Library team says that it welcomes comments and suggestions. For now, there are no concrete plans, but a seed has been planted.

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

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      60-Year-Old Music Pirate Faces Prison in a Country Part-Run By Pirates

      news.movim.eu / TorrentFreak • 7 April, 2023 • 5 minutes

    piracy encrypt Rick Falkvinge founded the first Pirate Party on January 1, 2006, and then rallied the masses in Sweden six months later in the wake of the first police raid against The Pirate Bay.

    At the European Elections of 2009, Swedish Pirates won over 7% of the vote . Christian Engström went on to become the first Pirate Member of the European Parliament, with Amelia Andersdotter taking the second seat in 2011.

    When Felix Reda of the German Pirate Party was elected vice-president of the Greens/EFA group in the European Parliament in 2014, and was given the job of copyright reform rapporteur , that was a moment for the archives. It wouldn’t be the last.

    Czech Pirates and Czech Piracy

    A string of notable events in the Czech Republic, including three Pirate Party politicians taking seats in the European Parliament, culminated in 2021 when Pirates won three ministerial positions in the country’s coalition government.

    Set to a background of intense Pirate politics and the movement’s roots in file-sharing communities, news that a 60-year-old Czech Republic man is facing up to two years in prison for file-sharing feels a little out of place. Of all things that were never supposed to happen when Pirates got into power, this was one of them.

    Czech police say the man had a collection of almost 1,000 commercial music albums stored on a server, which is quite a lot. The server wasn’t protected in any way, so passing internet users could download whatever they liked. Unfortunately, those passing by included unnamed rightsholders who filed a criminal copyright complaint with the police.

    Authorities Take Matter Seriously

    According to a statement released by police in the Moravian-Silesian region, criminal investigators in the city of Karvina responded to the complaint by launching “an extensive multi-month investigation.” After establishing that the albums had been available for download from October 2013 until November 2022, police charged the man with criminal copyright infringement offenses.

    “The accused stated that he downloaded the music mainly for his own use, but also for other users to download,” the statement reads.

    “He testified that he was aware that by uploading works without the permission of the copyright owners, he was violating some legal standards, but he did everything mainly because he liked music. It is his lifelong hobby.”

    When the man was informed he’d been making copyrighted content available to the public, he began deleting the files. Police say that he has still been charged with copyright offenses under Section 270 of the Criminal Code :

    Anyone who unlawfully interferes, not insignificantly, with the legally protected rights to an author’s work, artistic performance, sound or audio-visual recording, radio or television broadcast or database, will be punished by imprisonment for up to two years, a ban on activity or confiscation of property

    A sentence of up to five years would’ve been available had the man generated any profit. Fortunately, he made nothing whatsoever, so that should run in his favor. Indeed, the record shows that making no profit helped other local pirates avoid convictions.

    Pirates Cleared of Piracy Crimes

    The operators of several piracy sites in the Czech Republic were prosecuted in 2016 after they deliberately linked to thousands of movies and TV shows. In 2017 they were cleared after a court determined they had made no money.

    “Our goal is to change the copyright monopoly law so that people are not fined millions for sharing culture with their friends. However, until we achieve that, we will fight in courts over interpretation and enforcement of the law,” the operators said at the time.

    The operators of movie download sites Tipnafilm.cz and Piratskefilmy.cz, and TV piracy site Sledujuserialy.cz, were the Czech Pirate Party. Unlike the man recently charged with music piracy offenses, these sites only linked to copyright-infringing material, rather than hosting it directly. For end users, these mechanics were mostly irrelevant.

    That Was Then, This is Now

    Given the history detailed above, it’s interesting that someone is facing prison in the Czech Republic for sharing files at a time when Pirate Party members are part of the government. In both cases, semantics over links or direct links still underpin the non-commercial use of copyrighted content. Or in Pirate Party parlance, “sharing of knowledge.”

    Given the connections, the police statement prompted a few immediate thoughts. Do the Czech Pirates still approve of non-commerical piracy? As responsible politicians, do they now reject copyright infringement on any scale? Do they even have an opinion on the topic this far into government?

    Since Pirate parties built their reputations standing up for non-commercial pirates, we asked the Czech Pirate Party if that’s still the case when a party finds itself in power.

    We also asked whether the extremely capable, tech-focused Ivan Bartoš , Czech Pirate Party leader and current Deputy Prime Minister for Digitisation and Minister of Regional Development, has an opinion on the case.

    Finally, we asked whether cracking down on non-commercial pirates is considered a priority for the Czech government. At the time of publishing, we were yet to receive a response.

    Realities of Government Meet Ideology

    Elevating questions such as these to members of a sitting government might seem trivial given the enormous challenges faced by every country in Europe today. But a general principle stands regardless of the topic.

    Should a party that makes a particular stand be held to those promises years into the future, and if so, for how long? In this specific case, should someone who followed an example set by some of those now in power, be held to account in a way they were not?

    These are just some of the quandries faced by every party operating in a democracy, and especially those in a minority coalition. It’s nobody’s fault, simply the cold reality of getting into power , struggling to stay there, and the realization that there are always much bigger issues competing for limited time.

    As Rick Falvinge wrote here on TorrentFreak more than 12 years ago, there really is nothing new under the sun .

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

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      ISPs Fail to Dismiss Filmmakers’ Piracy Liability Lawsuits

      news.movim.eu / TorrentFreak • 6 April, 2023 • 6 minutes

    pirate-flag Over the past two decades, online piracy has proven a massive challenge for the entertainment industries.

    Copyright holders have tried to go after individual pirates and pirate sites in court, but third-party intermediaries are now increasingly seen as targets as well.

    Several active lawsuits in the United States feature rightsholders accusing Internet providers of not doing enough to stop piracy. One of the main allegations is that ISPs fail to terminate the accounts of repeat infringers in ‘appropriate circumstances’ as the DMCA requires.

    These lawsuits have resulted in multi-million dollar judgments against Cox and Grande . Meanwhile, more companies at risk too, such as WideOpenWest (WOW!), which was sued by a group of smaller movie companies, including Millennium Media and Voltage Pictures.

    The filmmakers accused the Colorado-based ISP of failing to terminate the accounts of subscribers who were repeatedly flagged for sharing copyrighted material. They argue that WOW! is liable for these piracy activities and are demanding millions of dollars in damages.

    WOW! Wants ‘Troll’ Case Dismissed

    The ISP challenged the claims and filed a motion to dismiss the case. WOW! addressed the substance of the allegations and described the film companies and their anti-piracy partner Maverickeye as “copyright trolls”.

    “Plaintiffs and Maverickeye are part of a well-known web of copyright trolls. Until now, Plaintiffs’ modus operandi has been to file John Doe lawsuits in the hope of securing quick settlements and to dismiss them at the slightest resistance,” they wrote.

    Indeed, several of the plaintiff film companies have filed cases against individual file-sharers, but they have also sued hosting providers, site operators, and app developers.

    Responding to the substance of the allegations, WOW! argued that an IP address is not sufficient to prove that subscribers downloaded or shared any infringing material. And if that’s not clear, the ISP can’t be held liable either.

    Something More?

    To back this up, WOW! cites the Cobbler Nevada v. Gonzales case, where the court held that an IP-address alone is not sufficient to identify an infringer.

    In the present lawsuit, WOW argues that IP-address evidence (~30,000 piracy notices) doesn’t prove that its subscribers pirated content; it could also be someone else using the network. To build a valid case, rightsholders should have ‘something more’ than just IP-addresses.

    “Plaintiffs do not allege facts showing that any WOW subscriber committed direct copyright infringement; that WOW had knowledge of the specific alleged infringements at issue; or that WOW encouraged, induced, or profited from any alleged direct infringement,” the ISP wrote.

    “But here, Plaintiffs only identify the alleged direct infringers by IP address; there are no additional allegations demonstrating that the activity at that IP address came from a WOW subscriber, and not some other user of WOW’s network.”

    Court Refuses to Dismiss Copyright Claims

    A few days ago, Colorado District Court Judge Daniel D. Domenico ruled on the motion to dismiss and rejected most arguments. For one, the Judge doesn’t believe the “Cobbler” ruling is directly relevant here, as that was a case against an actual infringer, not an ISP.

    For this lawsuit, the provided IP-address evidence is sufficient to allege that WOW! can be held liable for the copyright infringements of its subscribers. The court doesn’t rule on the merits yet but notes that the filmmakers’ arguments are good enough to move the case forward.

    “Taking Plaintiffs’ factual allegations as true in this early stage of litigation, Plaintiffs have plausibly stated that Defendant had knowledge of its subscribers’ direct infringement, if not from the 30,000 notices, then from the correspondence between counsel.

    “It is reasonable to infer that such notices and correspondence gave Defendant enough knowledge to have done something about the alleged direct infringement,” Judge Domenico adds.

    wow

    Ability to Stop Infringements

    The court also believes that the movie companies sufficiently plead the various copyright infringement allegations. They include contributory and vicarious copyright infringement claims.

    To allege vicarious liability, for example, the filmmakers have to plead that WOW! had the right and ability to supervise the infringing activity and had a direct financial interest in the activities of pirating subscribers. According to the court, that’s the case here.

    “Plaintiffs in this case have sufficiently pleaded that Defendant’s advertisements for high download speeds and known practice of ignoring or failing to act on notices of infringement serve as a draw for subscribers.

    “Likewise, Plaintiffs sufficiently pleaded that Defendant has the legal ability to stop and limit copyright infringement by its subscribers,” Judge Dominico writes.

    Based on these and other arguments, WOW!’s motion to dismiss the copyright infringement claims is denied,

    Grande’s Motion to Dismiss also Strands

    In addition to the WOW! case, the filmmakers also lodged a complaint against Grande Communications . Grande lost a similar case against several music companies last fall but hoped to have this lawsuit dismissed.

    The motion to dismiss is largely the same as WOW!’s, which makes sense as both parties are represented by the same attorneys. Unfortunately for Grande, the ruling on the motion to dismiss is similar as well.

    In January, a Texas federal court issued a report and recommendation, concluding that the motion to dismiss the copyright claims should be denied.

    “Plaintiffs have alleged in their pleadings that Grande has received Notices about specific infringing uses of its services, but failed to take measures to prevent such uses, and failed to investigate the piracy,” Magistrate Judge Howell wrote.

    “The undersigned finds that Plaintiffs have alleged sufficient facts to state a plausible claim of contributory copyright infringement against Grande, which is all that is required at the motion to dismiss stage.”

    District Court Judge Robert Pitman adopted the recommendation last week. This means both WOW! and Grande will have to defend themselves against the piracy liability claims.

    No Pirate Site Blocking Injunctions, Yet

    The motions to dismiss weren’t denied in their entirety, however. In both cases, the filmmakers also requested pirate site-blocking injunctions, to limit piracy activity on the Internet providers’ networks.

    In addition, the movie companies requested broad injunctions requiring the ISPs to identify pirates and suspend the accounts of subscribers who receive three unique DMCA notices in 72 hours.

    The federal courts in Texas and Colorado both granted the motions to dismiss these injunction requests, as these proposed measures are remedies, not causes of action. However, they could be reintroduced at a later stage.

    “I agree and will grant Defendant’s motion to dismiss Plaintiffs’ ‘claim’ for injunctive relief. I note, however, that dismissal of this ‘claim’ does not preclude Plaintiffs’ from seeking injunctive relief if appropriate as a remedy should they prevail on the merits of one or more of their claims,” Judge Domenico writes in the WOW! case.

    All in all, the recent orders are a win for the movie companies, as they can continue with their piracy liability claims. However, there is still a long way to go before there’s a final decision on the merits of those claims.

    A copy of Judge Domenico’s order on the motion to dismiss in the WOW! lawsuit is available here (pdf) . The recently accepted report and recommendation to largely deny Grande’s motion to dismiss can be found here (pdf) .

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

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      Two Founders of Piracy Giant Zone-Telechargement Sentenced in France

      news.movim.eu / TorrentFreak • 6 April, 2023 • 3 minutes

    handcuffed For those who care to remember it, November 2016 was a dark month for communities with a penchant for sharing files. Two huge sites fell in a matter of days, both courtesy of French authorities.

    When OiNK was shut down in 2007, the world’s largest dedicated music-sharing community fell with it. Few believed that a new site could fill the pig-shaped hole left behind; some insisted it would be wrong to even try.

    What.cd not only filled that hole but did so by meeting and then surpassing all expectations. Then in November 2016, as French authorities swooped, What.cd self-destructed and disappeared into history, exactly as previously promised.

    The cybercrime unit of the French military police didn’t wait for the dust to settle. Following a two-year investigation into Zone-Telechargement, the most popular pirate download portal in France at the time, police shut down the site and arrested several people, including its alleged founders.

    Operation Gervais

    Local anti-piracy groups SACEM and ALPA filed a complaint against Zone-Telechargement in 2014. The goal was to identify financial accounts, assets, advertising agencies, and the site’s hosting servers.

    In the wake of the raid, it was claimed that Zone-Telechargement generated at least 1.5 million euros in sales per year, utilizing offshore accounts in Malta, Cyprus and Belize. The site caused an estimated 75 million euros in damages to rightsholders, rightsholders said.

    The alleged founders of Zone-Telechargement were later identified as high-school buddies Thibault Ferreira and Wilfrid Duval. The pair founded the site in 2012 but had left France and were living in Andorra when the authorities shut down their site. That didn’t prevent their arrest or the seizure of luxury cars, real estate, and at least 450,000 euros.

    Fallout Zone

    Ferreira and Duval were eventually charged with offenses related to intellectual property crime, money laundering, and operating as part of an organized criminal gang. They spent the next few months in prison before being released in March 2017 with conditions, electronic tagging included.

    In the years that followed, sites claiming to be Zone-Telechargement regularly appeared to fill the vacuum, including one that was later confirmed as being operated by an anti-piracy company.

    A site with a similar look and feel as the original was shut down in 2022 after accumulating millions of visits per month. Others still in operation today are keeping the ‘ZT’ brand alive

    Judgment in France

    The men finally went on trial in France on March 13, 2023. One local report notes that between 2014 and 2016, the pair from Toulouse earned 600,000 euros each for their work on the site.

    The Toulouse Correctional Court found that a custodial sentence of 18 months each was appropriate, with 12 months of each sentence to be considered suspended. The court also handed both Ferreira and Duval a fine of 50,000 euros but due to time served back in 2017, neither will actually be sent back to prison, according to a local report.

    There are indications that the men intend to appeal. Their lawyer, Simon Cohen, suggests that while his clients were condemned for linking to pirated content hosted elsewhere, those who hosted the infringing content they linked to haven’t entered into the equation.

    “We condemned the link, but not the database itself, whereas [Ferreira and Duval] are foreign to the database,” he said.

    “They are seen as the inventors and initiators of a fraud system. They have benefited from the flaws in the system: is this reprehensible? Penalizing intelligence is a mistake, ” he continues.

    According to a French proverb, gambling has two great pleasures; the risk of winning and the risk of losing . Since the concept of ‘making available’ doesn’t rely on the identification of a supplier of pirated content, potential gambling pleasure may have been already cut exactly in half.

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

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      Police Confirm FBI-Assisted Takedown of Piracy Release Group EVO

      news.movim.eu / TorrentFreak • 6 April, 2023 • 3 minutes

    policia-juciadaria EVO, short for EVOLUTiON, was a high-profile P2P group whose activities stood out in recent years.

    The group released a steady stream of new movie and TV show titles and gained pirates’ admiration by leaking many screeners way ahead of their official premieres.

    For several years in a row, EVO opened the “screener season” by releasing leaked copies of upcoming films. This included Oscar contenders , but also several Netflix titles that originated from festival screenings.

    EVO was also the first to release an early Blu-Ray copy of ‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’ last year, and a high-quality copy of the blockbuster “Dune” in 2021, ahead of its official U.S. premiere.

    Like many other groups, EVO posted new releases on a regular schedule but that came to an abrupt halt last November when the group suddenly went quiet . While no explanation was given at the time, many pirates feared that the group had been busted.

    National Criminal Investigation Police Take Credit

    A few weeks ago TorrentFreak was able to confirm that this was indeed the case. Anti-piracy coalition ACE informed us that it had been working with Portuguese authorities to shut the group down and arrest its alleged leader.

    This week Portual’s Polícia Judiciária publicly confirmed that enforcement action Operation “EVO 1.2” had been carried out through UNC3T, the national cybercrime unit.

    The criminal investigation into EVO started early last year, following a complaint from Disney Enterprises, Paramount Pictures, Universal City Studios, Columbia Pictures, Warner Bros., Netflix, and Amazon. These are all members of the Motion Picture Association (MPA) and related anti-piracy coalition ACE.

    Polícia Judiciária reports that EVO’s movie and TV show leaks caused significant losses, exceeding €1,000,000. The group operated internationally, but its home base was in Portugal.

    FBI Involvement

    After documenting how the group operated, several home searches were carried out in Portugal. The authorities also located EVO’s servers in the United States. These were taken down with help from the FBI, Portugeuse police confirm.

    “In Portugal, house searches were carried out and various computer equipment was seized. Three defendants were held under suspicion of belonging to the criminal group.

    “In collaboration with the FBI, the inactivation of the criminal group’s servers was also achieved,” Polícia Judiciária adds.

    The authorities used these initial investigations to pinpoint the alleged leader of EVO, who was arrested and had his house searched in Portugal. This presumably took place last fall, around the time when the group stopped releasing new content.

    Various Criminal Charges

    According to the press release , the criminal charges include unauthorized access to the victims’ servers, computer fraud, money laundering, tax fraud, copyright infringement, and taking part in a criminal organization.

    The first interrogation of the main suspect was concluded earlier and EVO’s alleged leader was subjected to restrictive measures. Among other things, he is not allowed to communicate with the other defendants or use any computer equipment.

    The status of the other three defendants is unclear and details on the progress of the prosecution are scarce. TorrentFreak contacted the authorities to request further information, but we have yet to hear back.

    When EVO disappeared in 2022, another prominent release group called iFT also went quiet. Whether this is connected to the EVO prosecution remains unknown for now.

    Finally, it is worth noting that for the first time in decades, perhaps ever, no awards screeners leaked online before the most recent Oscars. Given EVO’s prominent role in these leaks in recent years, that’s likely no coincidence.

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

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      Take-Two Dismisses Claims Against Lead Defendants in GTA Mods Lawsuit

      news.movim.eu / TorrentFreak • 5 April, 2023 • 3 minutes

    gta In 2021, a group of Grand Theft Auto enthusiast programmers released ‘re3’ and ‘reVC’, a pair of reverse-engineered modifications for GTA 3 and Vice City.

    These projects breathed new life into games that while still fantastic, benefited greatly from significant enhancements that helped to wind back the years. Fans loved ‘re3’ and ‘reVC’ but Take-Two and Rockstar Games most definitely did not.

    The companies’ first move was to file a DMCA notice that ordered GitHub to take the projects down . The programmers’ response came via a DMCA counternotice which restored their projects on GitHub but left them exposed to a potential legal response by Take-Two.

    Take-Two Files Copyright Lawsuit

    In September 2021, Take-Two filed a lawsuit against the programmers, claiming that the aim of the projects was to create and distribute pirated versions of GTA 3 and Vice City.

    The company’s claims included damages for “willful and malicious” copyright infringement due to the illegal copying, adaption and distribution of GTA source code and other protected content. For good measure, Take-Two also demanded damages for alleged misrepresentations in the defendants’ DMCA counternotices.

    The lawsuit listed 14 defendants, just four of which were named: Angelo Papenhoff (aap), Theo Morra, Eray Orçunus, and Adrian Graber. In their November 2021 answer to the complaint, the four men denied the copyright infringement allegations and cited fair use among other affirmative defenses.

    One Year Later, Limited Visible Progress

    The first five months of 2022 were relatively uneventful, at least based on information made available to the public. The parties did participate in an ADR (Alternative Dispute Resolution) session but according to the mediator’s report early May, the case did not settle.

    No further entries appeared on the docket until December 2022, when the parties informed the court that since disclosure and discovery in the lawsuit was likely to involve the production of confidential, proprietary, or private information, special protection from public disclosure may be warranted. The court had no problem with granting the request.

    As part of this process, Take-Two served an expert report on November 17, 2022, leaving a deadline of December 15 for Papenhoff, Morra, Orçunus, and Graber to disclose their rebuttal expert witness. What followed was a series of requests for time extensions and a note to the court on February 6, 2023, indicating that a settlement had been agreed in principle.

    Take-Two Dismisses Claims Against Four Named Defendants

    Following the news of the potential settlement, the court granted a 30-day extension until March 19. When that date disappeared into history with no further docket activity, the court issued an order for the parties to file a status report by April 3. The parties responded on the day of the deadline with a joint stipulation of dismissal.

    “In accordance with Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 41(a)(1)(A)(ii) , by and between the
    undersigned counsel for the Plaintiff, Take Two Interactive Software, Inc., and counsel for Defendants Angelo Papenhoff, Theo Morra, Eray Orçunus, and Adrian Graber that all claims asserted in the above-referenced action against the Named Defendants are dismissed with prejudice,” the parties informed the court.

    In these circumstances, the dismissal does not require the court to issue an order, since the signatures of the parties who have appeared in the case will suffice. Take-Two and the developers will bear their own costs, expenses, and attorneys’ fees.

    What prompted this meeting of minds and subsequent agreement isn’t mentioned, but for the four men, the lawsuit is over and cannot be refiled in the future.

    On Monday, the lawsuit appeared set to continue against the remaining defendants – Doe 1 (a/k/a Ash R. and ASH_735) plus Does 2 through 10 inclusive – whoever (and wherever) they might be. An update filed Tuesday clarified the position.

    “Plaintiff, Take Two Interactive Software, Inc., hereby voluntarily dismisses Defendants Doe 1 a/k/a ASH R. and ASH_735 and Does 2-10, without prejudice,” the company informed the court.

    It’s possible that a fresh lawsuit will be filed in the future but, realistically, not anytime soon.

    The joint stipulation of dismissal can be found here ( pdf )

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

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      Music Labels Win Legal Battle Against Youtube-dl’s Hosting Provider

      news.movim.eu / TorrentFreak • 4 April, 2023 • 4 minutes

    uberspace The major record labels don’t want the public to download music from YouTube, which is common practice for millions of people.

    To stop this, the music industry titans deployed a variety of legal tactics around the world. They obtained site-blocking orders, for example, and have taken on stream-ripping sites such as 2Conv and Yout.com directly in court.

    Youtube-dl Takedown Battle

    In late 2020, the open-source software youtube-dl was added to the list of targets. The tool is used by many stream-ripping sites and was freely available on GitHub. The RIAA asked the developer platform to take youtube-dl offline , arguing that it violates the DMCA’s anti-circumvention provision.

    GitHub initially complied with the takedown request but after public outrage and involvement from digital rights groups including the EFF, the decision was eventually reversed . GitHub went on to put $1 million into a takedown defense fund .

    ytdl

    While this series of events represented a setback, the record labels didn’t back off. Instead, they set their sights on youtube-dl’s website hosting provider Uberspace .

    The RIAA had already sent cease-and-desist orders to the hosting company in 2020, before it approached GitHub. Uberspace didn’t take any action at the time; the youtube-dl website it hosted was not the host of the youtube-dl software. The website carried links to the software and that was hosted elsewhere.

    Labels Sue Uberspace in Germany

    Last year, Sony Entertainment, Warner Music Group and Universal Music escalated the matter by taking it to court in Germany. Their complaint alleged that youtube-dl aids copyright infringement by circumventing YouTube’s technical protection measures.

    The hosting company clearly disagreed and said that an overbroad lawsuit threatened freedom of information. In its defense , the company was assisted by the German Society for Civil Rights ( GFF ), which pointed out that youtube-dl has plenty of legal uses.

    “The youtube-dl software can be used for countless purposes. Journalists, scientists, law enforcement agencies and human rights organizations regularly use youtube-dl, for example for the purpose of documentation and preservation of evidence.

    “Amnesty International explicitly recommends the use of youtube-dl to document human rights violations on the Internet, as platforms such as YouTube, Facebook or Twitter remove these videos,” the defense added.

    Court Sides With Music Companies

    After hearing both sides, the district court of Hamburg ruled on the matter last week, handing a clear win to the music companies. The verdict wasn’t immediately made available to the public but the music companies were quick to claim the win in a press release, stating that Uberspace must take youtube-dl’s website offline.

    According to Frances Moore, CEO of the global music industry group IFPI, the court’s decision once again confirms that stream-ripping software is illegal.

    “YouTube-DL’s services have enabled users to stream rip and download copyrighted music without paying. The Hamburg Regional Court’s decision builds on a precedent already set in Germany and underscores once again that hosting stream-ripping software of this type is illegal.

    “We continue to work globally to address the problem of stream ripping, which is draining revenue from those who invest in and create music,” Moore adds .

    Interestingly, the open source youtube-dl code remains available on the Microsoft-owned developer platform GitHub. Whether the music companies have any plans to target the problem at this source is unknown.

    ‘Concerning Blanket Ban’

    Uberspace’s legal representative GFF informs TorrentFreak that the decision doesn’t come as a total surprise since the court already declared YouTube’s “rolling cipher” to be an effective technical protection measure in an earlier case.

    That said, the defense believes that the order, which effectively amounts to a blanket ban on youtube-dl, failed to take the software’s potentially legitimate uses into account.

    “The court did not take into account that youtube-dl also supports the download of audiovisual content from more than 1000 other websites and that is an essential tool for legal purposes such as preservation of evidence, citations in journalistic productions or artistic remixes and mash-ups,” GFF says, commenting on the verdict.

    In addition, GFF believes that the court’s decision severely restricts the hosting provider’s freedom to operate.

    “If web hosts have to delete an entire website on demand of the rightsholders even in complex situations with no legal precedent, this poses a threat to the business model of web hosts and ultimately to the free flow of information on the Internet.”

    Uberspace Will Appeal

    The recent ruling isn’t the end of the legal battle just yet. Uberspace informs TorrentFreak that it will appeal the judgment and GFF is confident that the hosting provider will ultimately prevail.

    GFF intends to release a full statement to the press tomorrow and Uberspace reserves further comment until then. The press release will likely include a redacted copy of the court order and we will update this article accordingly when that’s available.

    At the time of writing, the youtube-dl website is still online as well. The site expressly thanks Uberspace for its continued support, a message that’s likely to be updated if the order is enforced.

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

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      ‘Pirate’ Site Admins Arrested in 2015, Now Acquitted For a Second Time

      news.movim.eu / TorrentFreak • 4 April, 2023 • 4 minutes

    series-ly-logo In 2014, David Tardà, Andreu Caritg, and Oriol Solé were hard at work in Spain developing Tviso , a service with a goal to unify legal streaming services into a centrally-accessed discovery hub.

    Tviso was a new venture for the Spaniards, although not an entirely unfamiliar one. At the same time, the men were also the operators of Series.ly, a then-four-year-old “social television” download site that aimed to blend the benefits of free access to premium TV series and movies with a walled-garden social network of entertainment media fans.

    With a reported four million users, Series.ly was a success. It reportedly generated over 638,000 euros in the three years leading up to 2015, after which new legislation in Spain would render its activities illegal.

    Police Raid Operators of Series.ly

    Following a complaint from a local trade industry group representing U.S. rightsholders, and six months after the introduction of reformed intellectual property law in Spain, local authorities were ready to take action.

    An investigation carried out by the Anti-Piracy Group of the Central Computer Security Brigade, with assistance from the Provincial Judicial Police Brigade of Barcelona, had linked Series.ly to a company operated by Tardà, Caritg, and Solé.

    In the summer of 2015, Policía Nacional officers raided the company’s offices in search of evidence related to the operation of Series.ly. That included details of revenue generated by advertising and premium account sales to customers all over Europe, Switzerland, United States, Mexico, Chile and beyond.

    The three men were arrested and subsequently charged with intellectual property crimes. It would be another seven years before they had their day in court.

    Rightsholders Demand Four Years in Prison

    Local police labeled Tardà, Caritg, and Solé a “criminal organization”. Rightsholders represented by the Association of National Videographic Distributors and Importers (ADIVAN), described the conduct of Series.ly’s operators as straightforward theft, for which four years in prison would be an appropriate sentence.

    Still, a decision handed down by Criminal Court No. 1 of Sabadell in October 2022 found the men had committed no crimes. Before the new law came into force in Spain, linking to copyrighted content was not considered a crime. Indeed, the new law was introduced with this and other types of infringement in mind.

    The defendants knew all about the change in legislation. In December 2014, Series.ly announced that due to the imminent arrival of the new law, the site would continue to exist strictly as a social network. All links that would violate the new law would be removed before it came into force to ensure the site was in full compliance.

    “The fact that the legislator has expressly added the conduct [linking] that is the subject of this procedure, subsequently, indicates, as the defense stated, that, previously, said conduct was not typically criminal,” the judge noted .

    Linking to copyrighted content had been established as “a new crime” under the new legislation and there was agreement the past conduct of the defendants would fit perfectly. The problem for the prosecution was that the new law wasn’t retrospective, and when it did come into force, the defendants had already stopped linking.

    Rightsholders Appeal, Appeal Fails

    After rightsholders represented by the Association of National Videographic Distributors and Importers (ADIVAN) appealed the decision, last week the Provincial Court of Barcelona acquitted the three men once again.

    While he didn’t mention the case directly, defense lawyer David Bravo took to Twitter on Friday to announce a big win that had been eight years in the making.

    According to Bravo, the prosecution knew there was evidence to show that Series.ly’s operators had stopped allowing links to external content, because police had obtained it during the raid in 2015.

    “It is paradoxical that the ‘enter and search’ that was so publicized in the press as a ‘blow against piracy’ has nevertheless been the main evidence for the acquittal,” Bravo told ElDiario .

    “The seized documents were legal opinions from their lawyer to maintain their activities legally, emails with the producers to eliminate the links that were reported to them, and even internal emails between the administrators who said they had to adapt to the new laws ‘however retrograde they are’.”

    Other evidence seized from the men included internal conversations about a system to reward users who linked to legal services including Netflix.

    “Not even I, as a defense counsel, could have provided more conclusive evidence,” Bravo added.

    Rightsholders May Not Give Up

    When local news outlet ElDiario requested comment from ADIVAN General Manager Santiago Mediano, he declined to comment, via a comment that made his group’s position clear.

    “We at ADIVAN have the habit of not giving an opinion on cases that have not ended, like this one,” he said.

    This implies that the Supreme Court may be asked to take on the case, but how that would help in the fight against piracy today is unclear. Two courts have already determined that the defendants stopped their activities eight years ago, so are no longer a piracy threat. Those courts also determined that the men committed no crimes.

    Yet hundreds of sites are currently doing what the defendants never did, every single day, while legal resources are spent on a case that won’t reduce piracy in any measurable way, no matter who wins.

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