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Demonoid returns?
11.12.2012
06:53 pm
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Given up for dead earlier this year, just a few hours ago, the heart of Demonoid, the legendary bit torrent tracker, has improbably started beating again.

Via TorrentFreak

After three and a half months of downtime Demonoid’s tracker is now back online. The unexpected revival of the tracker is the first sign of life in weeks and suggests that the Demonoid team is working to bring the full site back online. While the index and forum remain offline, the many thousands of torrents tracked by Demonoid have been brought back to life.

When Demonoid went down at the end of July, the site’s admin blamed a DDoS attack. This initial attack resulted in a series of problems that were not easy to fix.

However, at the time the tech admin of the site was determined to get the site back online.

“You know how it goes with Demonoid. It might take a while but it will come back,” the admin told us.

Due to pressure from Interpol’s criminal investigation, Demonoid’s ISP, ColoCALL, which is located in the Ukraine, stopped hosting the site over the summer.

This news comes hot on the heels of another story reported by TorrentFreak:

The RIAA has welcomed a mind-boggling jail sentence handed to a man who sold pirated movies and music. The 37-year-old man pleaded guilty to six felony counts of selling counterfeit media after he sold five movies and one music CD to an undercover investigator without the permission of copyright holders. As a result he will go to jail in Mississippi for 15 years to be followed by three years of supervised release.

RIAA Celebrates 15 Year Jail Sentence For Movie and Music Pirate (TorrentFreak)

Thank you, Bee Tea!

Posted by Richard Metzger
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11.12.2012
06:53 pm
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UKNova gone: Another torrent tracker bites the dust
09.04.2012
08:00 pm
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Private membership torrent tracker UKNova, a community entirely devoted to UK television programming, has been voluntarily closed by the proprietors. One of the older torrent trackers on the Internet, UKNova launched in 2004 as a place where British expats could get their fix of soap operas like Coronation Street and EastEnders, football matches and BBC comedy.

UKNova has long had the reputation as an “ethical” torrent tracker, bending over backwards not to encourage digital piracy. Torrents expired there after 30 days and anything out on DVD was prohibited, or immediately removed once a DVD release was even announced.

Since last week, the following message has greeted members when they’ve logged on:

To the members of UKNova.

UKNova is being forced to change. We have been issued with a “cease and desist” order by FACT (The Federation Against Copyright Theft).

Despite our efforts to cooperate with the UK media companies, FACT have stated: “ALL links or access to content provided by UKNova are infringing, unless it can be proven that explicit permission from the copyright holder for that content has been obtained”.

Whilst we believe that they are wrong both legally and morally on account of the strong ‘no commercial content’ stance that we have always taken, we are not in a position to be able to risk lengthy and costly court battles to prove this. Therefore we have no other option but to close down the trackers. It has not been an easy decision to take, but it is apparently our only option.

The forums will remain open for business as usual. Torrents and their associated pages will disappear over the next few hours.

Our heartfelt thanks go to all, past and present, who have worked tirelessly, often thanklessly, for the good of our community.

Memo to BBC: If your iPlayer was on offer in the US of A, I would happily pay $5 a month for the pleasure. Just sayin’.

Posted by Richard Metzger
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09.04.2012
08:00 pm
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BT Junkie, R.I.P.: Another domino falls in the anti-piracy battle

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BTJunkie, the popular torrent tracker that boasted tens of millions of monthly users has voluntarily shut down for good to avoid legal hassles. After a nearly seven year run as one of the world’s top five Bit Torrent destinations, the following message was posted on the homepage:

“This is the end of the line my friends. The decision does not come easy, but we’ve decided to voluntarily shut down. We’ve been fighting for years for your right to communicate, but it’s time to move on. It’s been an experience of a lifetime, we wish you all the best!”

Via TorrentFreak:

Talking to TorrentFreak, BTjunkie’s founder said that the legal actions against other file-sharing sites such as MegaUpload and The Pirate Bay played an important role in making the difficult decision. Witnessing all the trouble colleagues got into was cause for a lot of worry and stress, and those will now belong to the past.

That said, BTjunkie’s owner still thinks there might be a future for other BitTorrent sites.

“I really do hope so, the war is far from over for sure,” he told TorrentFreak.

While BTjunkie was never targeted directly by copyright holders, the site was reported to the US Trade Representative (USTR) November last year. Both the RIAA and MPAA listed the torrent index as a ‘rogue’ site that facilitated mass copyright infringement.

BTjunkie is also one of the search terms censored by Google because it’s piracy related, alongside The Pirate Bay, RapidShare, uTorrent and others.

Posted by Richard Metzger
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02.06.2012
08:48 pm
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Anti-torrenting efforts about to begin in earnest in US
09.08.2011
05:41 pm
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TorrentFreak reports that millions of online file-sharers will soon be getting their activities monitored by a third-party “detective” agency/entity who will be provided with raw information by the major ISPs. Alleged copyright violators will be notified that “they” (Hollywood, the music industry) are on to them and given a series of six warnings before more serious measures are taken. Why has the mainstream media been so mum on this story?

In June the MPAA and RIAA announced a ‘ground-breaking’ deal with all the major Internet providers in the United States. In an attempt to deter online piracy, a third-party company will monitor BitTorrent and other public file-sharing networks and collect the IP-addresses of alleged infringers.

The ISPs will then notify these offenders and tell them that their behavior is unacceptable. After six warnings the ISP may then take a variety of repressive measures, which include slowing down the offender’s connection.

This new system is a formalized version of the existing takedown system that’s already in use by copyright holders. It was announced under the name ‘Copyright Alerts‘ and will be managed by the Center for Copyright Information, but little is known about how the data on alleged infringers is collected and stored.

Previously we tried to get more background info, but to no avail. However, via a detour we got in touch with a spokesman for the Center for Copyright Information (CCI) who kindly provided us with some additional information.

We wanted to know what will happen with the IP-addresses that are collected, for how long will they be stored, and will there be a central organization that’s responsible for this process like there is in France. The CCI spokesperson informed us that the data will be exclusively kept by the ISPs.

“ISPs will hold this information, as they do today. Please also note that no personal information about subscribers will be shared with rights holders without the required legal process being completed,” he told us.

There’s no agreement on how long the data will be stored, but a minimum of 12 months is required.

“ISPs will determine this individually based on their own policy. However, please note that the Memorandum of Understanding allows for a 12 month reset period. That means that, if an ISP does not receive any ISP notices from rights holders concerning a subscriber’s account for a 12 month period, all prior ISP notices and copyright alerts from the subscriber’s account may be expunged.”

Previously TorrentFreak reported that DtecNet had been chosen to administer file-sharer activities, although CCI has denied this.

Read more at TorrentFreak

Posted by Richard Metzger
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09.08.2011
05:41 pm
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