As part of a initiative cracking down on Internet piracy and counterfeiting, at the end of June U.S. Immigration and Customs and the Department of Justice took action against nine web portals suspected of linking to first-run movies. Seven sites had their domains seized – TVShack.net, Movies-Links.TV, FilesPump.com, Now-Movies.com, PlanetMoviez.com, ThePirateCity.org and ZML.com. Raids were also carried out against the popular NinjaVideo site.

But these were only the most recent steps taken by movie industry companies and their agents to take down such websites. Action against a significant number of others has been going on for some time. Several large linking websites operated by mostly U.S. citizens have been sued in recent times.

In this article we take a look at some of them, and the large damages awards ordered against operators. The summaries below are followed up with some analysis and the uneasy realization that although cases are being ‘lost’ all the time, the law remains untested.

Paramount Pictures / Universal Studios v Omegatube.com / Atomicmovies.com

These two sites were sued in December 2008. The studios got a court order and discovered the owners’ idenitities – they were Canadians. The studios could not discover any contact information for Pilippe Bruno and 9190-3864 Quebec Inc. The third defendant, Michaud, was served but did not respond to the studios’ letters or emails. Since Michaud did not reply but was served, he lost by default. In the end, the studios simply dismissed the lawsuit against all parties, most likely because the owners were not U.S. citizens.

Warner Bros. / Paramount Pictures v Movies-On-Demand.TV ( Began 2008)

Salman Haque, the owner of Movies-On-Demand.TV, entered negotiations with the studios. He pleaded guilty to contributory copyright infringement and agreed to pay 2.1 million USD to the studios. The trial ended in January 2010.

Warner Bros. / Paramount Pictures v Watch-movies-online.tv (Began 2008)

‘Vladimir Kramskoy’ lost by default, since no one was able to discover his true identity. Assumed to be in Russia. Studios did nothing, trial ends 2010.

Universal City Studios v VideoHybrid.com (Began 2007)

Defendants engaged in contributory copyright infringement and inducement of copyright infringement by identifying, organizing, and indexing on the website (www.videohybrid.com) links to infringing material, which had been posted on third-party websites. Defendant was found liable for damages of $1,075,000.

Disney v FOMDB.com (Began 2008)

Defendant found liable for damages totaling $300,000.

Universal City Studios Productions LLLP et al v. YouTVpc.com et al (Began 2007)

Defendants Billy Duran and Sam Martinez lost their case by not defending themselves. They were ordered to pay statutory damages of $875,000.00, attorneys fees of $21,100.00 and plaintiff’s costs of $6,017.17.

Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. et al v. Nabolister.com et al

Based on Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. and Disney Enterprises, Inc.’s Notice of Voluntary Dismissal, which was filed on February 22, 2010, the Court dismissed the case without prejudice. Owners were Canadians, and later closed the site.

Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. et al v. Peekvid.com et al

The MPAA hired private investigators who presented testimony in the trial. Defendant Frank Meadows represented himself, did not have a lawyer and was unable to defend his point of view. A Default Judgment was issued against Peekvid. Frank Meadows was found liable for damages totaling $2,500,000.

Disney Enterprises, Inc. et al v. 66Stage.com et al

Defendants were found liable for damages to the studios of $500,000 after a ‘consent judgment’. This meant that both parties agreed to settle without a trial.

Discussion

All lawsuits listed above called for the determination of the same question of law. Each lawsuit involved claims of “contributory copyright infringement” because the owners of the sites provide links to copyrighted TV shows or movies.

Initially, studios do not know who owns a site so they obtain a court order to find out. This is an action that cannot take more than 60-90 days. If they fail to identify and serve the owners, the lawsuit will be dismissed due to lack of prosecution. After the owners are discovered, they are added to the lawsuit.

All of the cases that had a favorable outcome for the studios involved US citizens who operated the sites in the US. The lawsuits against websites with Canadian owners were dismissed voluntarily by the studios.

In all of the cases presented, the websites lost by default judgment or they decided to settle in favor of the studios in order to avoid a lawsuit. This means that a crucial question of law remains unanswered:

Is it contributory copyright infringement to provide links to copyrighted content?

There are many facets to this question but all remain unanswered because a full trial did not take place. Among the faces and facets of this question are;

Is it infringement if:

- You link to copyrighted content but you don’t know it’s copyrighted?
- You operate a search engine which links to vast content, some copyrighted? (Google says no!)
- If you use and apply all the directions of the DMCA?

Furthermore, how do the safe harbors for Search Engines apply in such cases? (see OCCILA)

The problem is very complex and we still have no answer even in the US, the most litigious country and the spearhead of copyright/intellectual property law. Instead, new questions have to be answered.

How are ICE/US Customs able to seize domain names when there is no legal precedent and no judgment (even in the US) on the legality of such websites? This seems more like an abuse of power. Also, why is a taxpayer-funded institution serving the interests of private industry and studios?

An interesting side note is that the UK site TV-Links.co.uk was sued in UK and won it’s lengthy trial. This would set a precedent at least in the UK/European Union that in some conditions, these website owners do not do anything illegal. In relation to Section 17 of the European Commerce Directive 2000, TV-Links was a conduit of information and was afforded a complete defense in criminal proceedings for linking to other websites.

Despite extensive legal action, the question of legality of linking websites in the United States still remains unanswered.

This was a guest post from Searchfreek, a keen observer of developing linking sites and law. Editing by TorrentFreak.

Article from: TorrentFreak.

After Vuze and uTorrent, the BitTorrent Mainline client is the third most-used BitTorrent client in the western world based on the number of active users. Those who use it will see that it looks much like a rebranded version of uTorrent. Although we can’t look under the hood, it is safe to assume that much of the code is exactly the same.

Due to its similarities with uTorrent, this smaller brother makes an ideal platform for testing new features in the wild – features that will eventually appear in uTorrent as well. Thus far this opportunity hasn’t really been put to use as most of the Mainline features have been lagging behind uTorrent. Today, however, this changes as BitTorrent Inc. has decided to first launch the ‘Apps’ platform in the release candidate of the Mainline 7.1 client.

BitTorrent Apps is a web-based extensions framework to add new functionality without compromising the lightness of the core BitTorrent client. Similar to other apps, addons and extensions in today’s web browsers and phones, the Javascript-based Apps will allow 3rd party developers to create applications that will integrate seamlessly with the client. They can be added to the client with a single click and are displayed using an embedded browser window.

Thus far the Apps have only been available to a relatively small group of uTorrent users, those who downloaded the experimental ‘Griffin‘ client. This means that today’s release will be the first real test for the platform, as it will open up to an audience of more than twelve million users. It is likely that BitTorrent Inc. chose Mainline for the initial release as a final test before the Apps are added to the regular uTorrent client which has over 50 million users.

The Apps ‘store’ launches with 11 Apps that are featured in the client, but developers can make their own apps available on external sites as well. While the platform is open, BitTorrent Inc. is curating the Apps that will be featured in the client. Most likely this means that Apps which promote copyright infringement will be barred from being featured.

The word ‘store’ might not be the best term to describe the Apps section today, but this might change. All the Apps promoted in the client are currently free, but BitTorrent Inc. isn’t ruling out the possibility of paid Apps.

“We can’t rule out someday creating an official commerce platform for developers to use if they choose, however, with many in-app payment systems available to developers today, it’s not the priority. The priority is to create a truly unique and integrated experience so our users can add awesome new functionality,” BitTorrent Inc. told TorrentFreak.

For BitTorrent Inc. the Apps platform opens up some interesting possibilities to generate additional revenue. Commercial affiliate deals and potentially paid Apps could become a significant revenue stream aside from the toolbar installs the company makes most of its income from now.

At this point, however, it is hard to see where the Apps platform will go. With only 11 available Apps there is not much value yet. The success of the platform will therefore depend on what developers come up with, and how useful these Apps will be to BitTorrent users. Time will tell.

Starting today the first release candidate of BitTorrent Mainline 7.1, including the Apps, is available for download on BitTorrent.com. The final version is expected to be released in a week or two.

Article from: TorrentFreak.

The road to curtailing the Swiss activities of Logistep has been a long one and although it ended in Switzerland, the complaints began in France.

Back in 2007, Razorback, the non-profit group which previously administered the well known Razorback eDonkey server, alerted data protection authority Préposé fédéral à la protection des données et à la transparence (PFPDT) about the activities of Logistep.

Logistep works in a particularly controversial area of anti-piracy action. It collects the IP addresses of those it believes are sharing its clients’ media on the Internet and that data is then used to identify them through the courts. Once found, they receive cash demands to make lawsuits go away.

The company’s work came to light in France when hundreds of file-sharers received letters accusing them of sharing the game Call of Juarez. For Elizabeth Martin, the lawyer who did Logistep’s work in France, the experience was not a happy one.

As originally reported by Numerama, The Commission Nationale Informatique et Libertés (French Commission of Freedom and Computings, roughly the equivalent of the Préposé Fédéral in Switzerland) stated that because Martin had failed to declare her activities, her work in this area was illegal.

Furthermore, Martin also became the subject of a disciplinary investigation conducted by her own peers. Condemning her, a lawyer’s disciplinary board declared, “By choosing to reproduce aggressive foreign methods, intended to force payments, the interested party also violated [the code] which specifies that the lawyer cannot unfairly represent a situation or seriousness of threat.”

Martin was ordered by the disciplinary board to suspend her activities as a lawyer for 6 months and she was banned from belonging to lawyers’ professional associations for a period of 10 years. France had not gone well for Logistep and back in Switzerland, things were heating up.

In January 2008 the Swiss data protection authority (Préposé fédéral à la protection des
données et à la transparence) published a recommendation that Logistep stop collecting IP addresses in Switzerland. Among other things it argued that it was unacceptable that Logistep collects data without the knowledge of people involved and that the systematic collection and recording of data in order to track violations of copyright does not conform to the purpose of the P2P applications.

Logistep was dismissive of the request (the Préposé can only make recommendations) and vowed to carry on regardless. It did just that. In response the Préposé – with the assistance of the former Razorback administrator mentioned earlier and his lawyer Sébastien Fanti – filed a lawsuit.

In June 2009 the Federal Administrative Court (TAF) came to a decision, one which saw it overrule the Federal Data Protection commissioner’s decision of 2008.

While the Court acknowledged that the monitoring and data harvesting activities conducted by Logistep raised privacy concerns, it decided that those concerns were trumped by the needs of the anti-piracy company. In a nutshell, since there are few other ways to deal with this type of online piracy, the end justified the means. Logistep could continue.

Refusing to accept this decision, the Préposé decided to appeal the ruling. Yesterday that road came to an end and it was bad news for Logistep.

In a ruling by the Federal Court – which is final and cannot be appealed – the activities of Logistep were declared illegal in Switzerland.

From a panel of 5 judges, the vote was 3 to 2 in favor of the Préposé and against Logistep, with a statement that the breaches of privacy carried out by the company were illegal. Even the judges who believed that Logistep acted legally agreed that IP addresses are private data.

Furthermore, the Court decided to open a criminal case against Logistep.

According to Numerama, who have followed this case closely, the ruling was public which is unusual in these types of case. This type of arrangement is usually there to make clear a court’s intent to set a precedent.

The ruling means that it is now illegal to collect IP addresses in Switzerland with the aim of later filing a lawsuit, and the ruling reinforces the notion that IP addresses are public data. Furthermore, it seems unlikely that Swiss courts will accept IP addresses gathered from outside the country as evidence against suspected file-sharers either.

For Logistep, however, with a flick of a switch or two it will be business almost as usual. They have already announced a relocation of their data harvesting operation to Germany.

For former Razorback admin bile666, the battle goes on. Despite complying with notice and takedown requests, several years ago the Razorback eDonkey server was seized and that lawsuit continues today.

However, in light of this Swiss decision, TorrentFreak is informed that lawyer Sébastien Fanti and bile666 are seriously considering filing lawsuits against the IFPI and other companies that collected Swiss IP addresses so that criminal proceedings can also be initiated against them.

Article from: TorrentFreak.

Earlier this week we reported that police in 14 countries around Europe raided dozens of servers that allegedly belong to Warez Scene topsites.

In a follow up article posted yesterday, we offered more information about the raids and their aftermath from Scene insiders, but still a lot of questions remained unanswered. Things got particularly confusing when leading torrent sites including The Pirate Bay and BTJunkie were linked to the police action in one or two news reports, a rumor which then spread virally around other media outlets.

Since the raids were targeted at Scene servers, computers where members have direct access to a variety of files in a closed system, torrent sites would be an unusual target to include. Still, when there’s news about a huge piracy raid – especially in Sweden – torrent sites are the things that naturally come to mind for a lot of people.

So, when the news broke about the raids while The Pirate Bay was temporarily and coincidentally offline a couple of days ago, several reporters added one and one. This is why dozens of sites reported yesterday that The Pirate Bay was taken down in the raids. Even when it reappeared, it was assumed that the site had relocated elsewhere. Other torrent sites including BTJunkie were mentioned as targets as well. Luckily for the site’s users, none of these sites were affected by the raid, nor were they targeted.

Although we never linked any torrent sites to the raids ourselves we felt the need to clear up the confusion. TorrentFreak contacted both The Pirate Bay and BTJunkie and we were assured that nothing was going on. BTJunkie’s founder told us that they didn’t even suffer the slightest downtime. The Pirate Bay team said that they were indeed down for a few hours, but this was because they had to upgrade the servers.

Hopefully this will put an end to some of the rumors that have been making the rounds in the last few days. There is little doubt that the police raids have had a serious impact on the Scene, but apart from seeing a minor decrease in Scene releases appearing online, BitTorrent sites are operating as usual.

Article from: TorrentFreak.

With millions of visitors day, the leading BitTorrent sites are valuable properties. Although none of the big sites have been sold publicly, most of them are easily worth a million dollars.

In recent history quite a few medium-sized torrent sites have changed owners, but these were all deals done within the torrent community, none were conducted in the open.

The first time that an outsider went public with plans to buy a torrent site was last year when Global Gaming Factory (GGF) made a $7.8 million offer for The Pirate Bay, and a $25 million offer to buy Mininova. GGF planned to legalize the sites and turn them into media portals where movies and music would be sold with approval from copyright holders.

Most readers probably recall that the deals with the two largest torrent sites at the time didn’t go through due to funding issues. However, last month GGF CEO Hans Pandeya popped up again, this time with an offer for the largest semi-private BitTorrent community Demonoid. Apparently, he had not yet abandoned his plans.

Demonoid’s owner told TorrentFreak that he was not interested in anything GGF had to offer, so Pandeya had to target other sites to carry out his plans. Interestingly enough, a few days after Demonoid rejected Pandeya’s offer, the Canadian law firm Thompson Dorfman Sweatman LLP contacted several other larger torrent sites with similar offers.

In their correspondence the solicitors claim to be working for a U.S. based corporation that is interested in acquiring the assets of the sites in question. The identity of the potential buyer is not disclosed, but considering the timing it wouldn’t be strange if it turned out to be GGF CEO Hans Pandeya.

Torrent sites don’t often get offers from external parties, except the ones from GGF we discussed above. If Pandeya is indeed behind the offer, it would make sense for him to make his approach using the cover of a law firm due to the bad reputation he has built up among torrent site owners.

The torrent sites that have been approached prefer not to be named, but they are among the most visited on the Internet, which is in line with Pandeya’s plans. The only thing that’s different this time is the money being offered. Unlike the millions of dollars that were thrown around previously, the current offers are at the lower end of the scale.

None of the torrent sites that were contacted are interested in selling, so it is likely that we might never know the truth about the mysterious buyer or if he has connections to GGF.

Hans Pandeya was contacted for a comment, but didn’t want to respond on the record.

Article from: TorrentFreak.