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How British Scientists Got Inside North Korea to Study a Volcano

How British Scientists Got Inside North Korea to Study a Volcano

For weeks at a time in 2011, British and American researchers have gone to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, as North Korea is formally known, to collect rock samples and deploy seismometers—some even in the homes of North Korean villagers. The post How British Scientists Got Inside North Korea to Study a Volcano appeared first on WIRED.
Source: Wired.com Top Stories

MPAA Wants ISPs to Disconnect Persistent Pirates

pirate-runningIn recent weeks, many groups and individuals have voiced their opinions about the future of the DMCA, responding to a U.S. Copyright Office consultation.

This includes the MPAA, which acts on behalf of the major Hollywood studios. In a 71-page submission the group outlines many problems with the current law, asking for drastic reforms.

Ideally, the group would like search engines to enforce a “stay down” policy ensuring that content can’t reappear under different URLs. In addition, it would like registrars to suspend domain names of pirate sites, such as The Pirate Bay.

Another point of concern for the movie industry group is that of “repeat infringers,” people who frequently share pirated content. This applies to users of web services such as Facebook and YouTube, but also ISPs.

“The requirement that service providers terminate repeat infringers is critical,” MPAA writes in its submission.

The MPAA points out that the percentage of persistent pirates is relatively low compared to all Internet users who ever have committed copyright infringement online, but that they do pose a significant threat.

“The serial infringers, however, account for a disproportionate share of the overall prevalence of infringing content: They upload and download infringing copies much more heavily than those who do so once or twice; and they keep infringing content online and available for others to stream or download illegally for much longer than do other users.”

In the U.S. it is currently rare for ISPs to disconnect persistent pirates, with many arguing that only a court can decide if someone can be stripped from such an essential service as Internet access.

However, citing several recent legal cases, including the Cox lawsuit, the movie studios argue that ISPs should terminate the accounts of persistent pirates even if there’s no court order requiring them to do so.

According to the MPAA Internet providers “must terminate users who repeatedly and blatantly infringe copyright, regardless of whether there has been a judicial determination that the user is liable for copyright infringement.”

To accomplish this goal service providers should keep track of DMCA notices so they can identify repeat infringers and take appropriate action in response.

“The challenge now will be to have courts consistently enforce these rules against noncompliant services. Courts should also make it clear that an effective and compliant policy must not allow terminated users simply to create new accounts on the same service,” they write.

The Hollywood group’s calls are quite different from the voluntary agreement it currently has with ISPs. Under the Copyright Alert System ISPs are required to forward up to six notices per user account, but permanent Internet connections are not part of the deal.

Needless to say, ISPs are not going to be happy with the demands. In their submission to the Copyright Office they stressed that their subscribers shouldn’t lose Internet access based solely on copyright holder complaints.

With the many conflicting positions we reported on in recent weeks, it’s going to be very hard for the Copyright Office to come up with a plan that will suit everyone. In any case, we can look forward to some heated debates.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.


Source: TorrentFreak

Sky Subscribers Hit With New Wave of Piracy Notices

skyGoldenEye International are one of the small handful of companies engaged in so-called “copyright troll” activities in the UK.

Unlike thousands of other companies who try to have infringing content removed from the Internet, Golden Eye simply leaves it there while monitoring those who dare to download and share it.

For several years the company has been targeting subscribers in the UK and has recently sent out a new wave of threat letters. TorrentFreak has been in touch with many letter recipients, all of them customers of UK Internet service provider Sky.

The demands all relate to the alleged downloading and sharing of various pornographic movie titles owned by Ben Dover Productions, Immoral Productions, Third World Media, Echo Alpha and Harmony Films.

The High Court order through which GoldenEye (GEIL) obtained the users’ personal details is dated August 2015 but in some cases the alleged offenses date back to 2014 which in many cases makes it difficult to identify who might have been responsible.

Indeed, this is a problem faced by several letter recipients interviewed by TorrentFreak. While a minority accept that GEIL’s allegations are true, others are vigorously denying them.

Several insist that due to the number of people who have free access to their home connections it’s all but impossible to know who the infringer was back in 2014/2015, if there even was one.

But perhaps more worrying is what happens when people choose to engage Golden Eye themselves.

“In order to elicit a speedy response we recommend email as the most efficient communication,” GoldenEye says in its threat letter.

While email is indeed efficient, convenient and cheap for GoldenEye (a company obviously keen to keep its costs down), exchanges seen by TorrentFreak indicate a complete unwillingness for them to accept what they are being told.

In some instances letter recipients tell GoldenEye that not only did they not download or share anything illegally, but they haven’t allowed anyone else to do so either. The company effectively ignores these protestations and insists that its evidence was assessed by independent experts.

Interestingly, however, the reportedly independent experts are Tobias Fieser and Patrick Paige, men that are up to their necks in similar trolling activities in other parts of the world, with the latter previously being described in less than favorable terms.

Of course, no evidence has been actually tested by the court but most people corresponding with GEIL don’t know that. It’s worth noting that even if the evidence had been tested and it was guaranteed accurate, GEIL only have the bill payer’s name and if he or she didn’t do it, GEIL have a problem.

“It’s important to understand that the copyright owner can only take action against the person who actually committed the infringement. This may not be you,” the UK government told letter recipients in advice last week.

Worryingly, TorrentFreak has seen other correspondence that indicates that once letter recipients engage in discussion with GoldenEye via email, the porn outfit uses the opportunity to obtain more information, information that it did not have in the first instance. This is often known as a ‘fishing expedition’ and copyright trolls love them.

For example, some people have informed GEIL that they have left their router insecured so that friends and family can easily access the Internet when they visit. GEIL then want to know the names and addresses of these people so they can be pursued. Recipients are under no obligation to help with these inquiries but because of the legal threats, some feel obliged to comply.

Furthermore, others who have mentioned having an unsecured WiFi have been met with questions about the make and model of their router. Quite why GoldenEye need this information is uncertain but it’s almost certain that any information provided will somehow be used against the recipient.

The common theme throughout, however, is that whatever people tell GoldenEye in an email, the company either ignores or has a canned response for. The company sends PDF files back to people who email them with a defense and these are all template responses going over the same things time and again. It is clear that people aren’t being treated as individuals and that the process is being automated wherever possible.

With all this in mind people should consider whether email really is the best way to handle a claim from GoldenEye International. Granted, responses from the company are often quite quick, but this encourages people to respond quickly too, often without adequate consideration before doing so.

Resources: Speculative Invoicing Handbook, How to Deal with a File-Sharing Threat, hire a lawyer.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.


Source: TorrentFreak