The European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) has published the findings of its 2023 study on ‘European Citizens and Intellectual Property: Perception, Awareness and Behavior.’

 

The study aims to gain a better understanding of European consumers’ attitudes toward intellectual property and covers physical counterfeit goods and online digital content; our focus here will be on the latter.

Most Europeans Oppose Use of Illegal Content Sources

Given the entertainment industries’ regular and urgent calls to tackle online piracy, the EUIPO study paints a more positive picture in respect of attitudes towards illegal content.

 

“In general, most Europeans do not support obtaining digital content from illegal sources. The majority disagree with a variety of reasons that are sometimes used to justify this behavior, such as that it is OK if only for personal use (65 % disagree or tend to disagree with this), if the price of the content is too high (72 %), or if the content is not available via a legal source (74 %),” the report notes.

 

 

In line with most, if not all, studies in recent years, acceptance of piracy decreases with age. While 19% of citizens aged 55-64, and 18% of those aged 65 and over, believe that its acceptable to access content via illegal sources if the price is too high, acceptance rates jump to 41% and 46% in the 25-34 and 15-24 groups, respectively.

 

Piracy acceptance rates are also higher in the younger age groups when content isn’t available from legal sources, reaching 44% among 15 to 24-year-olds. However, the majority of Europeans (80%) say that they prefer to obtain content from legal sources, if an affordable legal option is available.

 

In that respect, a surprising 69% of respondents consider the quality and range of content to be better than that currently available from illegal platforms.

14% of EU Citizens Pirate, But Not Exclusively

The study found that 43% of Europeans paid to access online content from a legal service in the past 12 months. Just 14% admitted to having used illegal sources during the same period but these aren’t all hardcore pirates. Of this group, six in every 10 citizens (60%) also purchased content from legal sources, leaving a small minority overall who only consume content from illegal sources.

 

 

Among those who used exclusively legal sources, the main reason cited for not using illegal sources is that the content they want is available on legal platforms (44%), with 40% stating that they prefer not to use illegal platforms because of the harm this could cause to content creators.

 

Avoidance due to perceived dangers of pirate sites affecting either themselves or someone else was relatively low, 13% and 19%, respectively. Fear of being caught and/or fined was higher at 24%.

 

 

Overall, 82% of those surveyed agreed that obtaining content illegally carries a risk of exposure to some kind of harmful content, such as scams or content inappropriate for minors. This belief is held more among those who don’t access content online (85%) than those who do (75%).

Sports Content Popular With Pirates

While 14% of Europeans report that they accessed content from illegal sources in the previous 12 months, one type of content proved to be the biggest draw.

 

Sports content was obtained from illegal sources by 12% of Europeans, with 11% saying that they used a set-top box or downloaded apps. Once again, the younger the pirate, the more likely they are to access content illegally.

 

“Accessing content from illegal sources is considerably more common than average among younger Europeans. In the 15-24 age group, 33 % report using illegal online sources intentionally, 27 % say they have streamed content from illegal sources to watch sports, and 25 % say that they have used illicit streaming devices to access content illegally – all more than double the EU average,” the study notes.

Where Europeans Access Illegal Content

Just over four in ten Europeans (43%) who access content illegally online say they do so via dedicated websites. Roughly a third (32%) say they acquire content using social media with just under a quarter mentioning apps (23%). Peer-to-peer networks like BitTorrent and dedicated IPTV services are used less often.

 

 

“There are no marked differences between age groups or Member States when it comes to preferred channels,” the study notes.

Uploading, Sharing, Providing Content to Others

In light of the 14% of Europeans who accessed content from unlicensed sources in the preceding 12 months, that 11% overall uploaded/shared content with others seems relatively high.

 

In common with those who download or stream from illegal platforms, uploading is much more common among younger people. The researchers note that in the 15-24 and 25-34 groups, 25% and 21% uploaded/shared content in the preceding 12 months, a figure that drops to less than 10% among those aged 44 and above.

 

“There is a very strong correlation between accessing content illegally and making protected content illegally accessible by uploading it: 42 % of those who have also accessed online content from illegal sources have also uploaded protected content, while only 6 % of those who have not accessed content illegally have uploaded protected content,” the researchers add.

Justifications & Reasons to Stop Pirating Content

According to the study, those who access content online using illegal sources are more likely to believe that there are reasons to justify this behavior than those who do not. Leading justifications for accessing content illegally include ‘personal use’ (71%), legal content being too expensive (68%), and the content being unavailable on a legal service already purchased (65%).

 

“The impact of price and availability of offers is mirrored in the fact that a better affordability of content from legal sources and a larger offer of such are the most important reasons that users of illegal sources would stop using them (for 43 % and 37 % of Europeans, respectively),” the researchers note.

 

“A better understanding of the harm caused by using pirated content to the content producers or to jobs and the European economy (22 % and 21 %, respectively) are much less likely to keep people from using illegal sources.”

 

The full report is available here here (pdf)

 

For several decades, The Scene has been the main source of all pirated content made available on the Internet.

 

Technically, release groups operate in a closed ecosystem, but the reality is different. The vast majority of the files published on private Scene servers eventually find their way to public pirate sites.

 

The secretive nature of The Scene has been a major challenge for law enforcement but in the summer of 2020, the US Department of Justice made a major breakthrough. Following a thorough investigation, three members of the illustrious SPARKS group were indicted.

The Rose That Grew from Concrete

The raids and the criminal investigation sent shockwaves around The Scene. Some groups stopped releasing entirely and others significantly slowed down their output, which was felt in many parts of the public piracy ecosystem too.

 

Amid this turmoil, a new TV release group going by the name of CAKES emerged. The group published its first release “The 100 S07E16” on October 1, 2020, and many more would follow.

 

During the next few years, CAKES built its reputation as a steady release group, one that eventually covered 7,000 titles. That’s an impressive average of more than 50 new releases per week.

 

Aside from the massive output, CAKES was also known for including four lines from Drake’s track “Pound Cake” in its release notes. These same lines are also at the start of its farewell message.

 

Overly focused, it’s far from the time to rest now
Debates growin’ ’bout who they think is the best now
Took a while, got the jokers out of the deck now
I’m holdin’ all the cards and dudes wanna play chess now

 

Goodbye.Its.Been.Fun.S01E01.READNFO.1080p.WEB.H264-CAKES

Do For Love

The message explains that when CAKES started out, the team made an internal promise to pull the plug when “the love” is gone. Without going into further details, that time has apparently arrived.

 

While some people may be disappointed with this decision, CAKES has clearly made up its mind. The group prefers to highlight the achievements and experiences instead, referring to the past few years as a “crazy journey.”

 

“If you had told us how the last few years would go, we wouldn’t have believed you. The skills learnt, the massive lows, the euphoric highs, it couldn’t have happened with a better group of people.”

 

“I couldn’t be prouder of our team, not just for what was achieved but knowing the right moment to call time. As sad as this is, goodbye from team CAKES,” the group adds.

GLHF!

While the notice doesn’t spell it out, CAKES is likely not the only group to shut down. There seems to be a connection with another group, GLHF, which is also mentioned in the farewell message.

 

GLHF stopped releasing new titles over a week ago, which is highly atypical. The group originally started in December 2020, shortly after CAKES became active, and has released more than 6,500 titles since.

 

With CAKES and potentially GLHF affected, two steady suppliers of TV releases have disappeared. This doesn’t mean that all piracy will end; other groups typically appear, just like CAKES did earlier.

 

Or could there be more going on behind the scenes, perhaps?

 

CAKES ends its farewell with a final musical reference that is quite fitting, considering all the drama and uncertainty. The quote from Jay Z’s track “What More Can I Say” leaves plenty of room for interpretation.

 

We’re supposed to be number one on everybody list
We’ll see what happens when I no longer exist

 

 

According to the original complaint filed July 2, 2020, this was a case about “copyright piracy” and how YouTube, the largest video-sharing website in the world, plays host to huge numbers of videos infringing on the rights of copyright holders.

 

It was a case about how YouTube facilitates and induces a “hotbed of copyright infringement” through its development and implementation of a copyright enforcement system called Content ID, a system that protects powerful copyright owners yet denies ordinary creators any “meaningful opportunity” to enforce their rights.

 

It was a case about how this system maximizes YouTube’s profits but bars the platform from claiming safe harbor protection under the Copyright Act. Rather than terminating repeat infringers, the system provides them with cover, the lawsuit claimed.

11th Hour Issues Prompt Weekend Filings

Starting today, these claims would’ve been heard before a jury at trial in California.

 

On Saturday, plaintiffs Maria Schneider, Uniglobe Entertainment, and AST Publishing moved the Court for leave to dismiss without prejudice all of AST Publishing’s claims against YouTube, Uniglobe Entertainment’s claims based on foreign works, and Maria Schneider’s claims relating to Copyright Management Information (CMI).

 

The plaintiffs had hoped to pursue the litigation as a class action, but on May 22, the Court denied class certification. In their motion filed Saturday, the plaintiffs say this changed their views about how best to prosecute the case; YouTube’s repositioning was on display May 25 when it withdrew its safe harbor defense.

 

The plaintiffs say they reached an agreement with YouTube for a stipulated dismissal of claims without prejudice, but last Friday, YouTube reversed course.

 

“Through the good-faith efforts of Plaintiffs, and guided by the advice of the Court, the parties came to an agreement to significantly narrow the issues remaining to be tried before the jury. Defendants should not now be allowed to renege on the agreement that they made with Plaintiffs and that was the basis of the trial plan submitted to and adopted by the Court,” their motion reads.

Jury Trial Scheduled To Begin Today

Following earlier events plus those on Friday, Saturday and finally Sunday, the claims in this lawsuit won’t be heard today, tomorrow, or any other day in the future. After almost three years of litigation, it is all over.

 

“Pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 41(a)(1)(A)(ii), Plaintiffs Maria Schneider, Uniglobe Entertainment, LLC, and AST Publishing, LTD, and Defendants YouTube, LLC and Google LLC, hereby stipulate to the dismissal of the action,” the parties’ stipulation of dismissal dated Sunday reads.

 

“All claims that Plaintiffs raised or could have raised in this action are dismissed WITH PREJUDICE. Each Party will bear its own costs, expenses, and attorneys’ fees.”

 

 

Related documents can be found here (1,2,3, pdf)

 

In the wake of the 30+ year prison sentences handed down to the people behind Flawless IPTV, we’ve been exploring various aspects of the service’s operations and the extraordinary effort expended by the Premier League to bring Flawless down.

 

While no single facet of Flawless’ operations can explain why such punitive sentences were considered appropriate, the emphasis on the service’s efforts to undermine the Premier League’s ISP blocking program played no small part.

 

One of the key aims of the blocking program is to prevent football fans in the UK from watching games played in the UK at 3:00pm on Saturday. This ‘blackout’ only affects viewers in the UK; the plan at Flawless was to enable UK football fans to enjoy these games by offering 3:00pm games played in the UK yet only available legally in other countries.

ISP Blocking Program

By offering access to 3:00pm kick-off games, Flawless had a product that wasn’t available to buy in the UK. Fans loved the service but in the background, the Premier League was pulling out all the stops to prevent fans from accessing it.

 

Birmingham-based anti-piracy company Friend MTS was tasked with monitoring the internet for pirated Premier League streams. However, just like anyone else, the company needed to access the services offering those streams so that server locations could be identified and sent to ISPs Sky, Virgin, BT, TalkTalk, EE, and Plusnet for subsequent blocking.

 

Using covertly purchased Flawless subscriptions supported by watermarking technology, in 2017 Friend MTS was able to identify specific Sky viewing cards used by Flawless and trace those cards directly to Flawless kingpin Mark Gould. Sky responded by canceling the cards, but the cat-and-mouse game would continue.

A Mole Inside Friend MTS

Our 2019 article provided significant detail on the blocking program, including that information was being leaked from inside an anti-piracy company. We knew that company was Friend MTS, but only more recently did it become clear why the company rejected our requests for comment.

 

In April 2018, a person who identified themselves as ‘Bill’ opened a support ticket at Flawless. Claiming to work at Friend MTS, ‘Bill’ said that in return for payment via bitcoin, he would provide information from inside the company that would allow Flawless to identify the usernames and passwords of accounts used to obtain information on their service.

 

It later emerged that ‘Bill’ was Zak Smith, a Friend MTS employee who went on to supply Flawless with crucial information on the blocking system and other sensitive material from inside the company. Information handed over included a list of covert subscriptions and the payment methods used by the anti-piracy company to acquire them – PayPal accounts and scans/photographs of credit/debit cards, among others.

Blocking the Blockers

Using information already in Flawless’ possession, enhanced by the information detailed above, the IPTV provider was able to turn the tables by blocking Friend MTS IP addresses from the Flawless service. Not that the anti-piracy company was initially aware of that.

 

Through the development and use of a custom script, when the anti-piracy company attempted to access the Flawless service, to obtain IP addresses to be forwarded to ISPs for subsequent blocking, Flawless diverted those requests to servers operated by rival pirate IPTV services.

 

That meant that any IP address and related server/hosting information obtained during the sweep was actually related to services other than Flawless. When IP addresses were forwarded to the ISPs for blocking, rival IPTV providers were blocked, not Flawless itself.

The Beginning of the End

When arrests of those behind Flawless began in May 2018, information obtained from seized devices revealed the existence of ‘Bill’ and the information he’d supplied to Flawless. Knowing the information had come from inside Friend MTS, the company launched an investigation.

 

Comparisons were made between the times that data was leaked to Flawless and the company’s security systems which logged people in and out of the building, recording times and dates. With suspicion mounting that Bill was Zak Smith, attention turned to photographs ‘Bill’ had sent to Flawless.

 

In addition to confidential information, these photographs accidentally captured details of equipment and the office itself. ‘Bill’ was arrested under his real name on August 7, 2018, and pleaded guilty in February 2020. He was not sentenced with the others late last month, with reports indicating that a warrant had been issued for his arrest.

 

The success of OpenAI’s ChatGPT inspired Microsoft to add more AI features to its Bing search engine.

 

The idea is that this will allow users to receive more elaborate answers compared to an ordinary list of links.

 

Whether this strategy will pay off has yet to be seen, but in our tests, something else stood out. People are not the only ones asking questions. Bing itself is quite interested to hear what its users think too.

Bing’s Pirate Bay Poll

As expected, a regular keyword search for “Pirate Bay” returns a lot of information about the site. In addition to the correct URL, which was previously absent, Bing also lists an intriguing poll. Specifically, it wants to know how people effectively protect themselves while using The Pirate Bay.

 

Poll is in the bottom right corner

 

Bing provides its users with four options to choose from, including the use of a VPN, a proxy, the Tor browser, or a dedicated IP address. Depending on one’s definition of ‘safe’ a VPN is the most obvious answer, which is also reflected in the results.

 

This poll has little to do with ChatGPT of course but it is possible that Bing somehow uses the results to improve its general search functionality. Or perhaps these questions are generated by AI?

 

As a small experiment, we decided to ask Bing the same question it asked us (What is the most effective way to protect yourself while using The Pirate Bay?). And indeed, a VPN does up as the answer in a massive font.

 

Torrent Clients, Fmovies, RARBG, and The Dark Web

User polls aren’t exclusive to The Pirate Bay. There are several other file-sharing and piracy-related topics where other polls appear. When we type BitTorrent, for example, we’re asked about our favorite torrent client.

 

The options are rather limited but with 57%, uTorrent is the clear winner, followed by qBitTorrent with nearly a quarter of the votes.

 

 

When we search for Fmovies, one of the most popular pirate streaming sites, Bing suddenly wants to know what movie genres we watch most often on the site. Here, ‘action’ is the public’s favorite with nearly half of the votes.

 

 

Meanwhile, RARBG’s demise has yet to be reflected in Bing’s data. The search engine mentions a copycat site as the top result and still asks whether people think that a VPN is necessary to access RARBG.

 

Finally, there’s also a poll about the dark web, but perhaps it’s best if we don’t mention that explicitly.

 

Under US copyright law, Internet providers must terminate the accounts of repeat infringers “in appropriate circumstances.”

 

Historically, Internet providers rarely applied such a drastic measure, but under pressure from lawsuits, many ISPs are now acutely aware of their obligations.

Music Companies sued RCN

Internet provider RCN is one of the providers targeted by this legal campaign. Four years ago, the company was sued by several major music industry companies including Arista Records, Sony Music Entertainment, Universal Music, and Warner Records.

 

The music companies alleged that RCN wasn’t doing enough to stop subscribers from pirating on its network. Instead of terminating the accounts of persistent pirates, the Internet provider looked away, they argued.

 

The stakes in these liability lawsuits are high. Internet providers face hundreds of millions of dollars in damages claims, while tens of thousands of Internet subscribers are at risk of having their accounts terminated.

Exploring a Potential Settlement

RCN initially responded to the allegations with a counterattack. The company accused the RIAA and its anti-piracy partner of sending ‘false and fraudulent’ DMCA notices, arguing they shouldn’t serve as evidence for disconnections.

 

This countersuit ultimately failed. In two instances, a New Jersey federal court concluded that RCN failed to show that it was financially hurt by any incorrect or incomplete DMCA notices. As such, the case moved forward.

 

These cases can lead to a high-profile trial, but it appears that both parties are exploring options to end the matter before it gets that far. Specifically, they are considering a potential settlement.

 

“More recently, the Parties have communicated directly about the possibility of settlement but are not currently engaged in settlement discussions. The Parties are open to discussing potential settlement avenues with the Court,” they wrote in a status report to the court last week.

 

The settlement option is serious, both parties reiterated in a court hearing this week. And to help the process, U.S. District Court Judge Robert Hirsch appointed a mediator yesterday.

 

“Counsel and the parties (including individuals with settlement authority) shall attend mediation sessions as requested by the Mediator,” Judge Hirsch writes.

 

 

While we don’t know the positions of both parties, rightsholders have won similar lawsuits in the past which puts the music companies at an advantage. However, with a settlement, RCN is likely to avoid a Cox-style billion-dollar verdict.

Filmmaker Suit ‘Expands’

An eventual settlement won’t end all piracy-related trouble at RCN. The provider is also involved in a similar lawsuit with several movie companies; they recently tried to involve Reddit users in their evidence-gathering efforts.

 

This lawsuit continues, and a few days ago the plaintiffs filed an amended complaint in which they demand millions of dollars in damages. The complaint also calls for a site-blocking injunction targeting popular pirate site domains such as YTS, The Pirate Bay, and 1337x.

 

The amended complaint now lists high-profile law firm Foley and Lardner among the plaintiffs’ attorneys and adds new piracy evidence from Facterra. The evidence-gathering company, owned by American Films, was also added to a similar lawsuit against Internet provider WOW.

 

—

 

A copy of the status update in the lawsuit between the music companies and RCN is available here (pdf). The proposed amended complaint of the filmmakers against RCN can be found here (pdf)

 

With an estimated 2.5 billion users overall and around 120 million users active daily, YouTube is an entertainment powerhouse and a globally-recognized brand.

 

Premium products aside, YouTube is free to use. But with around a billion hours of content consumed every day, YouTube has to find ways to make that pay.

 

The most visible cost to the user is advertising, lots and lots of advertising. Less visible costs include significant user tracking, with an average of seven trackers per YouTube page, according to WhoTracksMe data.

 

With a growing subset of YouTube’s users becoming more aware of how the platform is monetized, YouTube appears to be paying greater attention to those with a preference to opt out, whether that’s through browser extensions like uBlock Origin or other methods that require even less effort.

Invidious: A Privacy Front-End For YouTube

Invidious describes itself as an open source alternative front-end to YouTube. In basic terms, this means accessing YouTube via a different interface on a different domain which strips away the advertising, user tracking, and reliance on Google subscriptions.

 

A Public Invidious Instance

 

The software is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and, for those with nominal technical skills, Invidious can be self-hosted on relatively modest hardware using Docker. For those who prefer just to use Invidious, there is no shortage of people happy to share their instances with the public.

 

How long that will continue is now up for debate.

YouTube Legal Orders Invidious to Shut Down

A few hours ago, the Invidious team revealed that YouTube’s legal department had made contact, claiming to have become “recently aware” of breaches of YouTube terms of service agreements and developer policies.

 

The crux of YouTube/Google’s claims is that clients (Invidious in this case) that use YouTube’s API (application programming interface) must display and link to Google’s privacy policy and “clearly and comprehensively” explain how their client uses and processes user information.

 

 

API clients must not “place any limitations” on YouTube functionality, or “mimic or replicate core user experiences” unless they add “significant independent value or functionality.” Clients may not infringe copyrights or exploit copyright-infringing materials, Google adds. (1,2)

 

“We hope that you will cooperate with us by correcting and ceasing to Offer Your Client that violates our terms and policies within 7 days from the date of this letter,” the shutdown notice concludes.

Invidious Team Feel Uncooperative

The main problems apparent in Google’s cease and desist are straightforward; Invidious does not use YouTube’s API, and as a result, the project’s developers never agreed to any associated terms of service. As anyone who foolishly left their own instance open to the public will confirm, Invidious is effectively a proxy service, one with a penchant for bandwidth.

 

“[YouTube/Google] don’t understand that we never agreed to any of their TOS/policies, they don’t understand that we don’t use their API,” team member TheFrenchGhosty commented on GitHub.

 

“Things will continue normally until they can’t anymore. Assume it’s just the start. Assume they’ll ask GitHub to takedown the repos (if so go to our Gitea https://gitea.invidious.io/iv-org). Assume the team wont be able to work on Invidious. You know what you have to do.”

 

The team says they “won’t do anything” unless they have to, but also acknowledge that this may not end well.

 

The cease and desist may not specifically apply due to its focus on YouTube’s API but, since users of YouTube are also subjected to endless terms and conditions, finding a different angle won’t be hard. If YouTube/Google really wants the Invidious team out of the picture, they are prepared for that, but disappearing their software will present a whole new set of challenges.

 

“May Invidious live and prosper, with, or without us,” the team conclude.

 

 

Following an in-depth investigation and a five-year Premier League private prosecution, five men behind the UK’s largest-ever piracy service were sentenced last month to more than 30 years behind bars.

 

While other branded services were featured in the investigation, the focus was on Flawless IPTV and its operations between August 2016 and May 2018.

 

During this period, Flawless served around 42,000 customers direct, charging each around £10 per month. The service had around 100 resellers who were free to set their own prices. They sold to around 20,000 subscribers, with Flawless taking a £6 per month cut for each subscription purchased.

 

The prosecution said that Flawless generated around £4.6 million in gross revenue, but that was an educated estimate. In 2018, Flawless began accepting payments from subscribers in bitcoin and evidence showing how much was received proved impossible to obtain.

 

That certainly wasn’t the case in respect of the service’s outgoings. Bank and PayPal accounts dealing in regular currency revealed payments to numerous entities all around the world. Documents made available to TorrentFreak provide unique insight into how much it cost to run Flawless and how much various people and entities were paid.

Flawless Had Almost Two Dozen ‘Employees’

In addition to the six people at the top who handled day-to-day operations, over the 22-month period between 01/08/16 to 22/05/18, Flawless employed at least 23 people.

 

A spreadsheet recovered as part of the investigation, covering the period February 2017 to April 2018, reveals Flawless turnover (gross revenue) per month at the top and the names of 10 ‘Senior Staff’ employees and how much they were paid directly underneath. (All in pounds sterling)

 

 

Since TorrentFreak was able to link employee names with identities in some cases, all personal information is redacted here. The prosecution clearly holds the full details, but we cannot confirm there are no investigations or prosecutions pending against the above.

 

The same holds true for 13 former moderators of Flawless.

 

 

According to bank and PayPal accounts identified in the investigation, total payments to employees during the period August 2016 to May 2018 exceeded £439,300 and were by far the largest expense for the Flawless operation.

Infrastructure and Stream Suppliers

No IPTV operation can exist without two key components; a supply of pirate streams and then servers to distribute those streams to subscribers.

 

Recent media coverage made much of how Flawless used its own methods to obtain streams from legal suppliers, but the IPTV provider also made purchases from ‘wholesale’ pirate stream suppliers.

 

 

For the reasons mentioned above, the names of the stream suppliers are also redacted here. However, they include what is likely to be the world’s largest wholesale supplier of pirate IPTV streams.

 

We can confirm that the same supplier is a priority target, not only for UK rightsholders, but also for those in Hollywood and beyond. Since the supplier continues to operate and is well aware of the Flawless investigation, possible enforcement action doesn’t appear to act as a deterrent.

Hosting Providers

Payments to employees aside, Flawless’ second largest expense was hosting providers. Again, we have taken the decision to redact the names of these companies.

 

They include major international corporations that most readers will recognize but as far as we know, none are accused of any wrongdoing, despite receiving in excess of £281,600 for their services. That amount includes the payments listed below for the period February 2017 to April 2018.

 

 

Other costs of operating Flawless included £28,000 for app development, around £12,200 paid to Xtream Codes (shut down in 2019), £9,500 paid to card-sharing suppliers, £3,600 to Sky viewing card suppliers, and £1,200 paid to the WHMCS billing platform.

 

During its 22 months online, Flawless’ overall expenditure on staff and suppliers was at least £818,200, an average of roughly £37,200 per month, just to stay online. The true costs, which go way beyond money, are clearly much, much higher.

 

Every day, millions of people from all over the world submit posts, comments, and other content to Reddit.

 

The social news and discussion platform turns 18 later this month and according to a Danish anti-piracy group, it’s time for the platform to ‘take responsibility’.

 

These comments from the Rights Alliance come in response to a revelation from the local radio program “Kulturen”. In a recent episode, it revealed that sexually explicit scenes were systematically shared on Reddit, totally absent of the broader context.

Widespread Abuse

Kulturen reported hearing from 20 Danish actresses affected by this issue, which some describe as abuse and being molested. While they are fine with the original sex or nude scenes, being featured this way is not what they intended.

 

Actress Andrea Vagn Jensen, who has had one of her explicit scenes shared online, explains to DR that there’s a huge difference between appearing naked in a film and being posted on Reddit.

 

“It’s just abuse. You deliver something for the production and the story, and then you end up being molested that way,” Jensen notes.

 

“It’s crazy that some people feel entitled to do that, and what’s just as crazy is that there are so many people who subscribe to it,” fellow actress Signe Egholm Olsen said, responding to the story.

 

This issue isn’t limited to Denmark. While the explicit nature of sex scenes is generally milder in Hollywood, there are entire subreddits dedicated to sharing nude clips from American productions too.

 

Copyright Violations

Aside from the personal integrity issues, posting the scenes has copyright implications too; removal on those grounds provides the most straightforward option when asking Reddit to take action, which many rightsholders have already done.

 

In this case, the Rights Alliance also reported the issue to the police, on behalf of the Danish Actors’ Association and the respective rightsholders. In addition to the financial aspects, copyrights also have moral rights which include the right to integrity, which could come into play here.

 

In response to the controversy, several clips were removed by Reddit, but that doesn’t end the problem as the scenes can simply be re-uploaded. The Rights Alliance, therefore, urges Reddit to take its responsibilities seriously under Article 17 of the EU Copyright Directive.

 

Article 17 requires large platforms to ensure that copyright-infringing content does not reappear after it’s removed. This can be achieved through upload and other filtering technologies, which are already in place on YouTube, Facebook, and elsewhere.

‘Reddit Should Filter Uploads’

Rights Alliance director Maria Fredenslund explains that these other platforms paved the way by showing that it is possible to develop effective filters. Reddit should follow suit.

 

“Reddit should step up and find solutions that prevent users from uploading illegal content to their platform,” Fredenslund says.

 

Fredenslund further informs us that the group hasn’t reached out to Reddit directly. That wasn’t needed since the problematic clips had already been removed. However, the group believes that upload filters are needed to prevent future trouble. That includes banning external URLs.

 

“From what we have explored with regard to their platform, they should be able to filter illegal uploads of short movies. Also very important, they could make sure that links to illegal websites are banned from being posted/webcasted on Reddit.”

 

For Reddit, filtering uploads would go a step further than the current DMCA takedown policy so whether the site plans to do so is unknown. TorrentFreak asked the company for a comment but, at the time of publication, we have yet to hear back.

 

According to the most recent order in Maria Schneider’s copyright lawsuit against YouTube, the long-running case is still scheduled for jury trial beginning Monday, June 12, 2023. Or at least what remains of it.

 

Based upon allegations that YouTube is a platform where rampant piracy goes unchecked, Schneider – with support from Uniglobe Entertainment and AST Publishing – had ambitions of class action certification, considerable sums in damages, and the jewel in the crown; universal access to YouTube’s Content ID system, to the benefit of creators everywhere.

Class Certification Denied

A key step towards achieving this goal was to have the plaintiffs’ case certified as a class action. In an order handed down last month, Judge James Donato explained why that wouldn’t happen.

 

“It has been said that ‘copyright claims are poor candidates for class-action treatment,’ and for good reason. Every copyright claim turns ‘upon facts which are particular to that single claim of infringement, and separate from all the other claims’,” his order denying certification reads.

 

“This is not to say that certification of a copyright infringement class is per se impossible. The Court certainly does not hold that here. But these factors underscore the challenges that plaintiffs face in seeking to obtain class certification.”

Unique Events, Unique Challenges

With its twists and turns, this lawsuit has presented constant challenges.

 

Lawsuits that seek to explore new ground are often complex, but the idea that YouTube’s restriction of access to Content ID effectively amounts to a breach of copyright law seems as much a stretch today as it did three years ago.

 

That this lawsuit originally featured a plaintiff called Pirate Monitor, which according to Google, deliberately uploaded thousands of videos and then proceeded to take them down under the DMCA, to boost infringement claims in this very lawsuit, is outrageous.

 

Pirate Monitor Ltd, Pirate Monitor LLC, and reported owner Gabor Csupo were subsequently targeted in a YouTube counterclaim for fraud/breach of contract. That Pirate Monitor LLC does not actually exist seemed to be part of the problem, a problem now solved after the Court dismissed the ‘company’ from the action.

 

As for the fraud/contract counterclaims against Csupo and Pirate Monitor Ltd, YouTube has decided not to pursue them, so only the DMCA notice claims remain.

Joint Trial Plan

Following a second pretrial conference on June 5, the Court issued orders in advance of the jury trial set for June 12.

 

In respect of Schneider’s infringement claims, the order states that the parties have agreed to try “six bellwether infringement works and six bellwether CMI [Content Management Information] violations” based on statutory damages on a per work (not per infringement) basis. The damages that may be awarded will be applied to the remaining claims on a pro-rata basis.

 

By agreement, the plaintiffs are required to dismiss AST Publishing as a party, dismiss the foreign unregistered works infringement claims by AST and Uniglobe, and dismiss Schneider’s claims in respect of CLFN (ClipFileName) metadata.

 

If all goes to plan, an in-person conference tomorrow afternoon will discuss the jury questionnaire responses, and by 7:00am June 12, the parties will have submitted a final joint list of witnesses to the Court.

 

“During witness testimony, all individuals at the tables for counsel will remain seated and silent except for the attorneys handling the examination. An opposing party’s presentations and witness examinations are not an opportunity for the other side to engage in discussions, take deliveries, rummage through boxes, and the like,” Judge Donata’s instructions read.

 

“Violators will be excused from the courtroom for the day and possibly the remainder of the trial, depending on circumstances.”

 

That seems unlikely to happen, perhaps as unlikely as this lawsuit fulfilling its key ambition of forcing change at YouTube, including universal access to Content ID. Unless Schneider’s emergency appeal to the Ninth Circuit regarding class certification suddenly turns the tide.

 

Referenced court documents can be found here (1,2,3,4)

 

Despite the growing availability of legal options, online piracy remains rampant. In Japan, manga comics are a particularly popular category.

 

Publishers are attempting to deal with this issue by ramping up enforcement. This recently led to major success when a Cloudflare probe helped to shut down 13DL, Japan’s largest pirate site.

 

These enforcement efforts are intensifying but they are not new. Back in 2019, Japanese authorities arrested the operator of Mangamura, one of the leading manga pirate sites at the time.

 

Mangamura had only been around for roughly two years but according to Japan-based anti-piracy group CODA, it caused well over $2 billion in damages to the local manga industry. The operator of the site, Romi Hoshino, was held responsible and eventually pleaded guilty in a criminal prosecution.

 

In 2021 the Fukuoka District Court sentenced Hoshino to three years in prison and more $650,000 in fines. This is a serious sentence, no doubt, but the publishers weren’t done yet.

Publishers Demand Millions in Piracy Damages

Last summer, manga publishers Kodakawa, Shogakukan, and Shueisha filed a civil lawsuit against the former Mangamura operator. Together, the companies requested 1.9 billion yen in damages. That’s close to US$14 million based on today’s exchange rate, without taking into account the 5% interest rate on top.

 

According to the complaint, Mangamura had around 100 million monthly visits at its peak. This arguably made it one of the largest pirate sites in history with the now 31-year-old Hoshino as the main defendant.

 

“The monthly visits went up to 100,000,000, and based on [CODA’s] calculation, the amount of the damages was estimated to be approximately 320,000,000,000 yen. Due to the large scale of the infringement, it was recognized as a social problem and named the ‘worst piracy site in history’,” the complaint reads.

 

Japanese complaint (translated)

 

This lawsuit is very much a Japanese endeavor but this week the manga publishers made an appearance at a California federal court where they requested subpoena to obtain vital information from Google and Cloudflare.

Google and Cloudflare Data is Crucial

Mangamura allegedly used the services of the American tech companies as part of its daily operations. The publishers believe that data from the companies could help to substantiate its claims.

 

This includes Google Analytics data to back up the visitor numbers, for example. Similarly, Cloudflare may have traffic stats as well and both companies should be able to connect the Mangamura operation to the main defendant.

 

“In support of the Applicants’ claims in the Lawsuit, additional information would be needed to verify (a) the accuracy of the calculation of their damages claimed in the Lawsuit, and (b) the identifying information relating to Mangamura to show the connection between Mangamura and Hoshino,” the subpoena request reads.

 

“[T]he number of visits or accesses to each of the Infringing Websites and the identifying information relating to the Mangamura would be critical in the Lawsuit,” the publishers add, adding that Google and Cloudflare are the only parties that can provide access to it.

 

From the subpoena request

 

The request was filed in court yesterday and has yet to be signed off on. In addition to the main mangamura.org domain, the less-frequently used manga-mura.net is also listed. The domains reportedly had different Google Analytics IDs.

Sending a Message

Whether Google and Cloudflare can deliver the requested information has yet to be seen. In any case, the publishers are determined to hold the operator of the defunct site financially responsible for the damages they suffered.

 

The Japanese complaint mentions that Hoshino likely had help from co-conspirators but no other names are listed. The Tokyo District Court did previously fine two advertising companies for placing ads on Mangamura. Neither of these companies show up in the publishers’ civil lawsuit.

 

Despite the fact that there’s only a single target in the Japanese lawsuit, the publishers hope that their legal action will eventually make other pirate site operators rethink their actions.

 

“We hope that the lawsuit will be conveyed to operators around the world and will deter them [from pirating],” Shueisha’s head of PR, Atsushi Ito, said previously.

 

—

 

Copies of the subpoenas requested by the three manga publishers are available here (Google/Cloudflare) and the associated application can be found here.

 

Last week the popular torrent site RARBG closed its doors. The operators cited personal and financial reasons for the surprise decision, which came as a shock to many.

 

In recent days there have been plenty of attempts to restore the old database. Some are considering the launch of new sites to keep the RARBG spirit alive but collecting metadata and copying a site’s design isn’t the main challenge.

 

The shutdown is significant in the sense that a major supplier of pirated content was taken offline. Taking on that role isn’t easy; it requires the right connections, technical expertise, and a willingness to risk being taken to court, or worse, thrown in jail.

RARBG Clones and Copycats

Despite the risks, there are plenty of RARBG-themed sites that have seen a flurry of new visitors in recent days. Some launched specifically for the occasion but others were around long before the site said farewell.

 

What motivates people to run these sites can be difficult to identify. Some operators may believe that they’re doing a good deed by harboring refugees, but there are also those that willingly try to deceive people into believing that RARBG is still operational.

 

Over the past few days, we received multiple tips from the public claiming that RARGB.to was back online. And indeed, those who visit that URL will end up at a site that looks like RARBG.

 

When people end up at that site using the referral site below, it may seem like the site is indeed back online. Until reality kicks in.

 

 

Those who look more closely will soon realize that it’s all a façade. RarGB.to isn’t the same as RarBG.to and altering the text of the hyperlink, as was done here, doesn’t change that fact. However, it hasn’t stopped the site from welcoming millions of new users.

Known Trickster

Interestingly, this knockoff site isn’t new. The operation has been around for years already and hijacked visitors from the original RARBG during this time. It often ended up higher in Google’s search rankings, which helped it to grow to millions of monthly visitors.

 

With RARBG gone, this number will likely skyrocket effortlessly, to potentially over a million visitors per day.

 

While the knockoff site does offer torrents, it is merely a collection of material sourced from external sites. The copycat operation doesn’t share any ‘original’ content and sneakily monetizes the RARBG brand, which is obviously starting to pay off now.

 

There are many sites like this. The motivations of the people running it may be different but most claim that they simply want to ‘fill the void’ RARBG left behind. However, scraping torrents and links from third-party sources and wrapping them in RARBG foil does little to achieve that goal.

RARBG is Gone

The reality is that RARBG is not coming back. We asked the RARBG team for a comment and they confirm that there are no official proxies, mirrors, or rebuilds. The real RARBG is gone, period.

 

But does it matter? Before we even finished the sentence above, some people will have discovered a ‘new RARBG’. Apparently, this is simply how these things go. That doesn’t come as a surprise, of course, as we have seen this trick play out a few times before.

 

After all, there are plenty of KickassTorrents, Extratorrent, and Torrentz clones around today, even though the original sites have long gone.

 

Also, the YTS website, which is arguably the largest torrent site in the web, once started as a knockoff. That site releases its ‘own’ branded content today, but it has privacy issues that put it into a bad light in recent years.

 

Whether one of the RARBG copycats or clones will eventually stick is hard to predict at this point, especially since the unavoidable legal pressure has yet to kick in. One thing is for sure, however; any and all RARBG ‘replacements’ have absolutely nothing to do with the original site.

 

At a time when a limited number of rightsholders were demanding thousands of dollars from alleged BitTorrent pirates, Rightscorp focused on the budget end of the market.

 

By attaching settlement demands to DMCA notices sent to ISPs, Rightscorp hoped these would be forwarded intact to subscribers. Rather than demand large sums, Rightscorp requested a relatively small amount, typically around $20, an amount payable through a dedicated portal. Not all ISPs passed the notices on but, thanks to those that did, Rightscorp believed it had a strong base to build on.

 

Over the next few years, the plan to turn piracy into profit failed to meet its key objective. At the time, Rightscorp was a publicly listed company but was hemorrhaging money. In 2014, the company revealed a $2.2m loss for the previous year, $6.5m in losses since the company launched in 2011.

 

After reporting even more losses a year later, Rightscorp stared into the abyss, but then a key event threw it a lifeline. A federal court in Virginia found that, by failing to take appropriate action in response to Rightscorp notices, ISP Cox Communications became liable for subscribers’ copyright violations when they downloaded and shared music owned by music publisher BMG.

Unprofitable But On the Money

For at least five years Rightscorp had warned that ISPs risked huge liability if they failed to disconnect repeat infringers. The company hadn’t been able to turn that into profit but momentum was building for companies with access to Rightscorp’s historical piracy monitoring data.

 

After being prompted by Rightscorp, the RIAA successfully sued Grande Communications and then won $1 billion in damages from Cox Communications, all underpinned by Rightscorp data.

Can The Indie Market Give Rightscorp a Boost?

Appeals in the above cases are still ongoing but Rightscorp’s earlier warnings were proven correct. The big question now is whether Rightscorp can somehow turn that prophecy into profit. In an announcement this week, Rightscorp said that it had joined A2IM (American Association of Independent Music), a non-profit trade organization representing the independent music industry in the United States.

 

“This collaboration aims to combat illegal peer-to-peer (P2P) torrent digital copyright theft and safeguard the rights of creators and content owners in the ever-evolving digital landscape. A2IM represents over 600 independent music labels and businesses, advocating for their rights and fostering a sustainable and vibrant independent music sector,” Rightscorp’s announcement reads.

 

Rightscorp says it joined A2IM with the intention to “educate and service the interests of independent musicians, songwriters, and music publishers” based on its “proven track record of successful initiatives” but whether independent labels have any interest in complex ISP liability lawsuits is unknown.

Collaboration or Just Networking?

It’s also unclear whether Rightscorp’s definition of “collaboration” with A2IM goes any further than the benefits usually enjoyed by ‘Associate Members’ of the organization, i.e. having access to the labels and being in a better position to offer relevant services.

 

After Rightscorp became an A2IM associate member, A2IM did publish an outline of Rightscorp’s business proposals, which cover three main components: having pirates kicked off the internet, persuading pirates to pay a settlement, or using Rightscorp data to take legal action, presumably against intermediaries.

 

“Once piracy has been detected, Rightscorp can provide termination notices to internet providers for their users who are infringing on copyrighted works. These notices serve as legal notification to internet providers of infringing activity from their customers,” the Rightscorp ‘spotlight‘ reads, alongside images from Ars Technica and TF.

 

 

“Additionally, Rightscorp has established a Notice Settlement Model, which includes a 50/50 split for any amounts received, and ISPs will have the responsibility to forward our notices in adherence to DMCA requirements for termination of repeat infringement activity.”

ISPs Are Now Acutely Aware of the Rules

While there’s little doubt that ISPs are in a much more precarious position than they were six years ago, they have the benefit of knowing exactly what is required of them. The question is whether that will make them more – or less – cooperative.

 

Rightscorp seems to suggest the former but the idea that it can send actionable “termination notices” to ISPs appears somewhat speculative on the cooperation front. Repeat infringer policies are for ISPs to determine and then actioned in a manner of their choosing. While that didn’t go as planned previously, they’re unlikely to make the same mistakes moving forward.

 

As for the notice settlement model, that assumes that ISPs will forward cash demands to their customers along with DMCA notices. There is zero requirement for that under the DMCA but only time will tell how far ISPs will be prepared to go; the underlying threat for uncooperative ISPs is that Rightscorp data could be used to sue them.

 

“Rightscorp also offers a Litigation Model, which is customizable based on the range of copyrights held in the data base. Successful litigation precedents have already been set by Rightscorp, and parameters of infringement within the data base can be tailored to your specific needs. Rightscorp’s fee for this service is proportional to the scope of the complaint,” the advert reads.

 

There is no mention of the above on the Rightscorp website but we did find something unusual. Rightscorp.com has been the company’s domain for years but located at Rightscorp.co, a domain registered just recently, a shiny new website has appeared featuring the logos of major labels, publishers and industry groups.

 

 

 

On January 2, 2015, a new system designed to assist copyright holders and better protect consumers went live in Canada.

 

Under the ‘Notice and Notice’ regime, ISPs are required to forward rightsholders’ copyright infringement notices to subscribers, in most cases those linked to the downloading and sharing of movies using BitTorrent. While generally considered a step forward, some warned that aggressive rightsholders would leverage the system to benefit themselves.

 

Late 2018, after some companies did exactly that, the Canadian government amended the Copyright Act to prohibit the inclusion of settlement demands in warning notices. Since then, rightsholders have filed dozens of applications at Federal Court to obtain the identities of tens of thousands of subscribers – many of whom were alleged notice recipients – so they could be sent cash settlement demands.

Same Core Companies, Same Core Business Model

Companies including Millennium Funding, Outpost Productions, Bodyguard Productions, Hunter Killer, and Rambo V Productions, make regular appearances in copyright lawsuits in the U.S. It was inevitable that their settlement model would eventually target Canadian subscribers but anyone paying attention would’ve known that was only the warm-up act.

 

Under common ownership, the same companies have also been suing and obtaining settlements from intermediaries in the U.S. including hosting companies, VPN providers, and the latest targets, internet service providers.

 

Regardless of jurisdiction, these actions operate along broadly the same lines; identify areas where intermediaries have allegedly failed to meet their piracy-fighting obligations, and then ruthlessly pursue high-value claims until a settlement begins to sound more appealing than the alternatives.

 

In their lawsuit against Bell, Millennium Funding and the other companies assert copyrights in half a dozen movies which may have been worth less than $1 million in damages in a U.S. lawsuit, give or take. In Canada, intermediaries who fail to meet their obligations under the Notice and Notice scheme face statutory damages of between CAD$5,000 and $10,000.

 

The movie companies claim that they sent over 81,000 notices to Bell between February 2019 and June 2021 but Bell failed to forward almost 40,000 of them. As a result, the plaintiffs believe they can multiply each of those notices by CAD$10,000 and file a claim against Bell for CAD$400 million.

First Bell Subscribers, Now Bell Itself

During a court hearing earlier this year dealing with the case against Bell, a lawyer for Bell Canada described the studios’ settlement model targeting internet users as “extortion.”

 

An attorney representing the studio’s legal team said that if Bell had an issue with handing over its customers’ details as part of the Notice and Notice scheme, it could have mentioned that earlier – when handing over its customers’ details as part of earlier applications, for example.

 

While the “extortion” comment was later withdrawn, allegations in a Bell counterclaim filed in response to the original CAD$400 million lawsuit had already gone much further. In a somewhat unusual move, Bell sued Aird & Berlis LLP, the law firm hired by the studios to send the infringement notices and the architect of their enforcement program in Canada.

 

Bell’s defense is relatively straightforward. The ISP admits that not all of the notices sent by the Millennium plaintiffs were forwarded to subscribers but any shortfall was for legitimate reasons. In some cases, the plaintiffs’ notices were not sent or not received by Bell. Other notices were not forwarded to subscribers because they contained inaccurate information, were duplicates of notices already sent, or Bell was unable to forward them because it had no email addresses on file for customers.

Bell Comes Out Fighting

In its counterclaim, Bell accused the plaintiffs and Aird & Berlis of engaging in conduct that constitutes misuse of copyright, abuse of process, and champerty and maintenance, whereby a third-party pays some or all of the litigation costs in return for a share of the proceeds. An “illegal and unlawful means conspiracy” that runs counter to public policy and the public interest, the company added.

 

In his order last June, Case Management Judge Kevin R. Aalto began with an analogy.

 

“It is often said in sports that the best defense is a good offense. Sometimes the same can be said for litigation. That is what Bell is trying to achieve here by suing by way of counterclaim the law firm acting for Millennium and raising what are policy issues relating to the Copyright Act,” Judge Aalto wrote.

 

“That is not the purpose of litigation. That is a matter for Parliament. Bell’s attempt to turn this case into an inquiry on the propriety of copyright enforcement arising from the Notice and Notice Regime is misplaced.”

 

Bell said that Aird & Berlis intimidated alleged infringers and forced settlements greater than actual damages suffered. Judge Aalto pointed out that the Notice and Notice regime facilitates no direct communication between rightsholders and alleged infringers. Contact only takes place after the plaintiffs obtain their identities as part of a separate process.

 

More fundamentally, Judge Aalto said no facts supported Bell’s allegation of misuse of copyright, even if misuse of copyright was a cause of action, which it is not. If misuse of copyright was applicable at all, that would be for alleged infringers to address, not Bell.

Allegations, But Little to Support Them

In another setback for Bell, the abuse of process and unlawful means conspiracy allegations performed no better than the allegations of champerty and maintenance.

 

“There are no material facts whatsoever to connect the dots as to how [Aird & Berlis] and Millennium are not in a solicitor-client relationship that somehow amounts to the tort of abuse or unlawful means conspiracy,” Judge Aalto added.

 

With that, Bell’s allegations of copyright misuse, champerty and maintenance, abuse of process and unlawful means conspiracy were struck out, without leave to amend. Bell went on to appeal and in an order dated May 31, 2023, Judge Angela Furlanetto mostly found in favor of the Case Management Judge and by extension, the movie companies.

 

Bell Canada wasn’t the first and certainly won’t be the last to describe settlement schemes as extortion. Equally, the companies in this particular action won’t be the last to remind people that in the face of large-scale piracy, plaintiffs are legally permitted to run right up against the limits of the law until lawmakers decide otherwise.

 

In that respect, not a single inch of progress was made in the last 15 years, globally, but it’s the tendency for defendants to settle that provides the most fuel. The question is whether Bell will decide to make a stand or top up the tank along with its customers.

 

Millennium Funding, Inc. v. Bell Canada: Proceedings and May 31, 2023 Order

 

The data for our weekly download chart is estimated by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only.

 

These torrent download statistics are only meant to provide further insight into the piracy trends. All data are gathered from public resources.

 

This week we have two newcomers on the list. “John Wick: Chapter 4”, which came out as a high-quality pirate release, is the most downloaded title.

The most torrented movies for the week ending on June 05 are:

Movie Rank	Rank last week	Movie name	IMDb Rating / Trailer
Most downloaded movies via torrent sites
1	(1)	John Wick: Chapter 4	8.0 / trailer
2	(…)	Hypnotic	5.4 / trailer
3	(2)	The Super Mario Bros. Movie	7.3 / trailer
4	(3)	Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves	7.4 / trailer
5	(5)	Avatar: The Way of Water	7.8 / trailer
6	(…)	The Black Demon	3.6 / trailer
7	(6)	Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania	6.4 / trailer
8	(7)	The Covenant	7.6 / trailer
9	(9)	Fast X	6.3 / trailer
10	(4)	Sisu	7.0 / trailer

 

Note: We also publish an updating archive of all the list of weekly most torrented movies lists.

 

Manga comics are popular around the globe in a content category that has seen piracy grow significantly in recent years.

 

This popularity is also apparent in manga’s home country Japan, where several dedicated pirate sites are active.

 

Publishers are working hard to counter this trend and last month they turned to a U.S. court for help. Working with the Japanese anti-piracy group CODA, manga publisher Shueisha obtained a DMCA subpoena that required Cloudflare to uncover the identities of several pirate site operators.

13DL.to Folds

This legal strategy doesn’t always pay off as some site operators use strawmen and fake data, but in this case, the publisher struck gold. Soon after the subpoena was issued, Japan’s largest manga piracy site 13DL.to stopped releasing new content.

 

13DL.to

 

New uploads stopped appearing three days after the DMCA subpoena to Cloudflare was issued and the site’s operator later confirmed that the site has shut down for good. At the time of writing, it’s no longer operational.

 

This is a major win for the publishers as 13DL.to had an estimated 25 million monthly visits, mostly from Japan. The site listed links to fresh manga releases which were distributed through external file-hosting platforms such as RapidGator, TakeFile, Novafile, WupFile, and HexUpload.

Cyberlocker Targets

Several of these hosting sites were also targeted in the DMCA subpoena obtained by the publisher, after they were first targeted in a regular DMCA notice, listed below.

 

Original DMCA Notice to Cloudflare

 

According to CODA, the operator of 13DL was responsible for uploading the pirated comics to these third-party sites. This provided a source of revenue through the affiliate payments these cyberlockers offer.

 

CODA notes that Cloudflare has yet to respond to the DMCA subpoena but is expected to do so this month. In addition to information on 13DL, platforms including takefile.link, novafile.org, wupfile.com, hexupload.net, and manga-zip.is are also part of the legal request.

‘Final Present’

In addition to the Cloudflare probe, CODA is also working with the publishers and ‘ethical hackers’ to explore other options to uncover the identity of 13DL’s operator. This includes going after one of the aforementioned cyberlockers, which is presumably operated from Scandinavia.

 

The latter action was prompted by a ‘final present’ the operator shared with users. The gift is a file containing download links to 180,000 pirated manga works that was shared after the site announced its shutdown.

 

“CODA, in cooperation with the rights holders, attorney Nakajima, and ethical hackers, is currently requesting procedures from a local law firm in Scandinavia, where the cyberocker is believed to operate, in order to promptly file a sender information disclosure request regarding the distribution of the ‘final present’.

 

“We will use every means at our disposal to identify the operator,” CODA notes in its press release.

 

Following 13DL’s demise several copycat sites appeared, using the 13DL brand in an attempt to fill the void. According to CODA, people should stay away from these sources, for their own safety.

 

“[These sites are] operated by criminals, and you may be infected with malicious malware by clicking on ads or downloading infringing material. Please be careful not to access these sites,” the group warns.

 

Studying can be a costly endeavor. Aside from the party budget, there are books and tuition fees to pay as well.

 

To reduce costs, some students choose to share books or buy cheaper second-hand versions. Others go a step further and venture onto the dark side, by downloading or even buying ‘pirated’ books.

 

These cost-saving tactics are nothing new. A few decades ago, copying machines at universities were already duplicating copyrighted works every day of the week. However, with digital books becoming more common, copying has become a breeze. This is a form of progress that publishers are not happy with.

Danish Deterrent?

Textbook piracy is happening around the globe. While enforcement is relatively rare, in Denmark several students have been convicted for selling pirated copies of textbooks. Publishers hoped that these cases would act as a deterrent but there are no signs that this is the case.

 

Danish anti-piracy group Rights Alliance recently published a new study, conducted by Epinion, which polled the attitudes and behaviors of students towards digital textbooks. In particular, those that are obtained illegally.

 

There have been several of these surveys over the years, which makes it possible to see how patterns change over time. In this case, things aren’t trending in the right direction. Despite lawsuits and public calls to avoid piracy, students continue to obtain unlicensed books from various sources.

50% Obtain Textbook Illegally

Of all the students that used digital textbooks (84%), half admit to having used at least some ‘pirated’ copies. This number has been relatively stable since 2020 and doesn’t seem to be impacted by recent prosecutions and fines handed out by the courts.

 

This relatively high percentage doesn’t mean that students are oblivious to the law; 70% admit to knowing that piracy is illegal.

 

How many books are obtained illegally can differ quite a bit. For some, it’s just a book or two, but one in four of the ‘pirating’ students acquire more than half of all textbooks through unofficial sources. And 7% of these students obtain between 91% and 100% of their books illegally.

Jail Threat Doesn’t Scare Students

Rights Alliance stresses that educational institutions have a role to play. They should put more effort into educating students on the subject, an issue that’s often overlooked.

 

“There is a concrete need for educational institutions to be sharper in their communication to students in this area,” says Rights Alliance director Maria Fredenslund.

 

“When management, teachers and tutors on the programs distance themselves from illegal sharing of study books, it has a concrete effect on the social norms within the programs,” she adds.

 

The question is whether this will make a massive difference. The majority of the survey respondents were already aware of the illegal nature of book ‘piracy’ but continue anyway. Apparently it goes a long way towards saving costs.

 

This is also reflected in the research, which found that only 18% would consider reducing their illegal textbook habits if they risked jail time. In addition, a lack of support from one’s social circle would only motivate 11% to reconsider.

It’s All About the Money

There is one key element that would sway students to go legal and that is price. The survey found that roughly half of the pirating students would purchase books if prices were significantly reduced.

 

To convince the majority of this group to change their behavior, prices should be at least 50% cheaper than they are now. This is probably not the solution publishers are looking for, however.

 

 

In addition to slashing prices, better access to digital books through official libraries is also mentioned as a solution by many students. Again, this is another way to reduce costs.

 

All in all the research shows that it will be hard to stop textbook piracy as long as the legal alternatives are considered unaffordable. Prosecuting more people and launching awareness campaigns may convince some to change their habits but, for the majority, it’s all about the money.

 

With torrent sites dominating the high seas of piracy in 2006, Bulgarian authorities decided to arrest Eliyan Geshev, administrator of the the country’s most popular tracker, ArenaBG.

 

Public uproar in Bulgaria was significant but just a day later, Geshev was a free man once again. After police provided zero evidence of any crimes being committed, a court found no grounds for Geshev’s initial arrest. Reporters who attempted to interview Geshev as he left court suddenly found themselves attacked by security guards.

 

In advance of Geshev being detained, the government had promised to “show no mercy” when targeting pirate site operators. In the wake of his release, Bulgarian authorities charged with tackling organized crime ordered ISPs to block ArenaBG.

 

Three ISPs said they would comply, others refused after declaring site-blocking “illegal.”

Site-Blocking Returns 15 Years Later

At the time, ArenaBG was hosted in the U.S. so in theory could’ve been handled there. In the end that wasn’t necessary as the blocking instructions against ArenaBG were withdrawn. In other EU countries, site-blocking plans were quietly gaining traction and would continue to do so.

 

Neighboring Greece approved blocking measures in 2012. Progress was dampened three years later due to constitutional concerns but today, Greece is a fully-fledged member of the EU site-blocking club, alongside its latest recruit: Bulgaria.

 

A decision handed down May 31, 2023 at the Sofia City Court requires three Bulgarian internet service providers to block two major torrent platforms. The names of the ISPs are unhelpfully redacted in court documents, but not so the names of the sites. Somewhat predictably, The Pirate Bay makes yet another appearance in a site-blocking action, along with Zamunda, the most popular torrent site in Bulgaria.

Recording Industry Behind The Action

The initial claim was filed in February 2020 by the Bulgarian Association of Music Producers (BAMP) with support from IFPI, the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry.

 

Court documents reveal that the claimants requested a dynamic injunction against the main domains of The Pirate Bay and Zamunda, plus any other domains, sub-domains, mirror and proxy sites that may facilitate access to the sites in future.

 

Based on claims that over 90% of the sound recordings indexed by the sites are protected by copyright and shared illegally by Bulgarian BitTorrent users, BAMP and IFPI referenced the CJEU ruling in the BREIN/ Ziggo case (C-610/15). The CJEU found that ISPs in Member States can be ordered to block access to The Pirate Bay, even though the site itself stores no infringing content.

 

In respect of the three unnamed ISPs, the claimants said that since they’re intermediaries whose services are used by third parties to infringe copyright, under Article 8, paragraph 3 of Directive 2001/29/EC the following applies:

 

Member States shall ensure that rightholders are in a position to apply for an injunction against intermediaries whose services are used by a third party to infringe a copyright or related right

 

In written responses filed by two of the three ISPs, BAMP and IFPI’s claims were bluntly described as “inadmissible.”

Bulgarian ISPs Fight Back

One of the ISPs, identified only as ‘N.1’ in court documents, described the claim as unfounded and inadmissible, adding that it “opposes the active legitimization of the plaintiff.” The ISP also pointed out that Bulgarian law does not recognize a claim “for blocking access to Internet sites.” As for EU law requiring Member States to ensure access to injunction applications, that would not apply here because Bulgaria hadn’t yet transposed that into national law.

 

Pushing back further still, the ISP disputed allegations that it enables subscribers to commit copyright infringement on the torrent sites, so therefore disputes that its subscribers use the sites to download pirated content using BitTorrent. In summary, the ISP asked for the claim to be rendered inadmissible or possibly rejected as unfounded.

 

The ISP identified as ‘F.1’ used the words ‘inadmissible’ and ‘baseless’ to describe the claim. The ISP said that the claim was filed for the “termination of a violation” but since the claim failed to provide any details in respect of the ISP, conducting an effective defense would be difficult. In common with ‘N.1’, the ISP ‘F.1′ asked for the claim to rendered inadmissible or rejected as groundless.

 

After the ISPs questioned the accuracy of translations, and the authenticity and validity of IFPI/BAMP legal documents, the Court appointed forensic experts to investigate. The details of the various findings occupy a large part of the decision, including details of a dispute related to the claimants’ standing to bring a claim and the eventual termination of claims relating to unnamed foreign music producers.

ISPs Required to Block Pirate Bay and Zamunda

The Sofia City Court ultimately decided that the ISPs must block both sites.

 

“[T]he defendant companies, in their capacity as providers of Internet access, should be sentenced to take action within a period of up to six months, the necessary actions to stop the illegal use by envisaging and implementing measures aimed at blocking the Internet access of its users, to the web pages on which the online file sharing platforms ‘ThePirateBay’ and ‘Zamunda’ are accessible.”

 

The ISPs will be able to determine their own methods of blocking to “best match their resources and capacity,” with a threshold of “at least making it difficult to carry out unauthorized visits” to The Pirate Bay and Zamunda.

Industry Groups Stay Positive

In a joint press release, the recording industry groups focused on the positives.

 

“We welcome the decision of the Sofia City Court, which marks a major step forward in the recorded music industry’s fight against online music piracy,” said BAMP executive director Petya Tocharova

 

“For the first time in Bulgaria, a court decision has been issued to block access to pirate websites, and we consider this precedent an important step in the right direction.”

 

Francis Moore, Chief Executive of the IFPI, said: “We welcome this decision and the impact it will have on curbing illegal access to music. Copyright infringement of any kind causes serious harm to local music ecosystems and diverts money away from those who create and invest in music.”

 

Whether blocking two torrent sites will have much of an impact on music piracy is unclear. Research cited in the blocking decision reported 27,000 files containing music available via The Pirate Bay and 44,000 on Zamunda. The overwhelming majority of music piracy today involves content ripped from YouTube, a site with dozens of millions tracks completely unhindered by blocking.

 

Measurable impact of site-blocking on piracy tends to appear when many sites are blocked at once, at least according to industry reports. That raises the prospect of numerous return visits to Bulgarian courts, in potentially adversarial circumstances, at a time when cooperation is seen as the only real solution to a very complex problem.

 

Internet provider Cox Communications has been on the sharp end of several piracy lawsuits in recent years.

 

The biggest hit came four years ago when the Internet provider lost its legal battle against a group of major record labels.

$1 Billion Appeal

A Virginia jury held Cox liable for pirating subscribers because it failed to terminate accounts after repeated accusations, ordering the company to pay $1 billion in damages to the labels. This landmark ruling is currently under appeal.

 

As part of the appeal, Cox informed the court of a supplemental authority that could support its position. The case in question is Twitter vs. Taamneh, in which the U.S. Supreme Court recently held that the social media platform isn’t liable for ISIS terrorists, who used Twitter to recruit and raise funds.

 

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 Cox, the same logic applies in its case, where the ISP was held liable for the piracy activities of subscribers.

 

“These same aiding-and-abetting principles animate copyright law’s contributory liability doctrine, and they likewise foreclose liability here,” an attorney for Cox informed the court.

 

Cox argues that the Supreme Court ruling confirms that aiding-and-abetting liability only applies when parties knowingly took part in the activity. That runs contrary to the finding in its own dispute with the record labels, where “culpable expression and conduct” or “intent” were not required.

 

“Though Twitter arises in a different context, its reasoning applies with full force and supports reversal of the contributory infringement verdict,” Cox added.

 

The two cases are indeed quite different, but ultimately they are about imposing liability on third-party services. According to Cox, the Twitter terrorist ruling clearly shows that it isn’t liable for pirating subscribers, but the music companies see things differently.

Terrorists vs. Pirates

Earlier this week, the music labels responded in court, countering Cox’s arguments. They argue that the Twitter ruling doesn’t apply to their piracy dispute with Cox, as the cases are grounded in different laws.

 

While the music industry certainly isn’t happy with pirates, the Cox case is a copyright matter while the Twitter lawsuit fell under the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act. And for now, pirates are not categorized as terrorists.

 

“Twitter arose under the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act. Plaintiffs there identified ‘no duty’ under that terrorism statute requiring defendants ‘to terminate customers after discovering that the customers were using the service for illicit ends’.”

 

“This case arises under the Copyright Act. This Court has already held that an internet-service provider has a duty to ‘do something’ about known infringers,” the music companies ‘counsel adds.

 

‘Not So Passive’

After establishing the difference between pirates and terrorists, the music companies point out that Twitter wasn’t directly connected to the misconduct. The platform’s role was more passive and its connection to ISIS was more distant than Cox’s connection to its subscribers.

 

Cox took a more active role and materially contributed to the pirating activities, which stands no comparison to the Twitter case, plaintiffs argue.

 

“Cox was not so passive,” the music company counsel writes, adding that the Internet provider “set up sham policies ensuring infringement would continue.”

 

“Cox knew of specific instances of infringement occurring on its network, tied them to specific users, and chose not to terminate those users to avoid ‘losing revenue from paying subscribers’,” the reply brief adds.

 

How the court of appeal will interpret the Twitter ruling remains to be seen. With $1 billion in damages on the line, both sides will likely do everything in their power to fight this case to the bitter end, and it may ultimately find its way to the Supreme Court.

 

—

 

A copy of Cox’s letter to the court, including the referenced Supreme Court ruling can be found here (pdf). The music companies ‘reply is available here (pdf)

 

Rising interest in pirate IPTV services over the past several years has led to a limited number of people meeting demand while making considerable sums of money.

 

Technical ability, insider knowledge, and a keen eye for business all help to maximize pirate IPTV suppliers’ profits, but there can be considerable drawbacks too. The problem isn’t making big money, it’s managing to hold onto it when law enforcement agencies take an interest.

Pirate IPTV / Money Laundering Investigation

Published this week, a report from La Presse notes that as part of an investigation into IPTV piracy and money laundering, Canadian investigators from the Sûreté du Québec (SQ – Quebec Provincial Police) targeted Éric Grenier, identified by the publication as a director of companies behind streaming service, Arubox.TV.

 

 

Citing police sources, La Presse reports that the investigation began after a group of telecoms companies headed by Bell Canada filed a complaint with police alleging millions of dollars worth of damage to their businesses, attributable to the Arubox IPTV service.

 

In response, the Office of Criminal Assets Recovery and Money Laundering carried out five searches this week, including one at Grenier’s condo in Laval, another against an alleged accomplice in Saint-Eustache, and a third against a relative of Grenier in Brownsburg-Chatham.

As the investigation continues, police sources report that blocking orders will be requested against Grenier’s bank accounts and condo, valued at nearly $500,000.

 

At the time of writing, the main Arubox TV website remains online but the status of the underlying IPTV service is less clear. A Stalker login portal associated with Arubox appears functional but since logins are verified by device MAC addresses and valid subscriptions, verifying the status of the service wasn’t immediately possible.

 

 

When they sign up, Arubox subscribers are given a URL to put into their set-top boxes in order to access the service. That URL can be found on a completely separate domain that we’re informed may have links to another IPTV service. A source familiar with the situation says that the operator of the second service has connections to the first. A review of messages related to the second service indicates that its operator also received a visit from the police this week, in connection with the Grenier investigation.

Éric Grenier: Controversial and Media Friendly

As part of its own investigation, La Presse recently trawled Grenier’s Facebook account and discovered that he’s been promoting Arubox.tv since at least 2020. The image below tends to suggest he’s a fan of Formuler set-top boxes, widely considered to be among the best IPTV devices available, even if the Z8 model is a little outdated.

 

Grenier Advertising IPTV Boxes

 

This image from social media represents just the tip of a very large media iceberg that has kept Grenier in the public eye for years.

 

Know locally as the ‘Quebec Hugh Hefner’ due to his links with the adult industry, Grenier’s ownership of a strip club and appearances on a Canadian reality TV series sit alongside claims in the media, citing police sources, of alleged connections to a Hells Angels motorcycle club.

 

All of these pale into insignificance in light of a story published in the Montreal Gazette in 2014. It features a computer containing 10kgs of a highly illegal substance, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, 10kgs of a less-expensive replacement substance, and an alleged loss to Grenier of $500K.

 

No set-top boxes were involved back then but nobody wants to go too hard, too soon.

 

 

 

Pirate sites come and go, often without being noticed by the public at large. That was certainly not the case when RARBG said its goodbyes yesterday.

 

The popular torrent site had millions of daily users spread across several domain names. This included the flagship .to domain which currently displays a farewell message.

 

After a brief intermezzo, many users simply began their search for alternatives, perhaps unaware that the effects of RARBG’s shutdown go beyond the site itself, leading to a much broader impact, including on popular ‘alternatives’.

RARBG Releases & Tracker

On the surface, RARBG looked like any other torrent site but it was one of the few platforms to release a steady stream of fresh content. All pirated movies and TV-shows come from somewhere and RARBG acted as a key bridge between scene sources and the public at large.

 

This content was picked up by RARBG’s bots from external sources before being posted on the site itself. ExtraTorrent’s in-house release groups worked in a similar way, including under the ‘ETTV’ label, before shutting down last year due to a lack of funds.

 

The absence of new releases is likely to make the overall piracy ecosystem more vulnerable. The same can also be said for RARBG’s dedicated tracker, which was also pulled offline yesterday, abruptly terminating millions of connections. And it doesn’t end there.

Torrent and Streaming Sites Feel the Pain

With another popular source of pirate movie and TV-show releases gone, the piracy supply side is shrinking. The vast majority of public torrent sites don’t have their own release channels. Instead, they relied on external parties such as RARBG.

 

This equally applies to direct download sites and streaming portals. While pirate streaming sites have become much bigger than their torrent peers in recent years, their movie and TV-show libraries can often be traced to torrent sources.

 

 

There are still alternative sources available, for now, but with RARBG gone the choices are more limited. This means there will be considerable pressure on the remaining suppliers, to say the least.

 

In addition to the typical pirate sites, RARBG links also appeared in dedicated pirate channels on platforms such as Telegram. These no longer work. The same also applies to users of software such as Sonarr, for whom RARBG was a popular source too.

From the Ashes?

The above may sound grim but it does illustrate the important position RARBG held in the piracy scene. That said, pirates have shown to be resilient in the past so there will likely be others willing to take the risk and fill the void.

 

Those will include copycats who will try to take over the RARBG brand. The same happened in the past with EZTV, YTS, KickassTorrents and Torrentz, with various levels of success.

 

Things aren’t getting any easier though. In its farewell message, RARBG summed up several reasons for shutting down. Aside from tragic personal issues, they included rising hosting costs and a decline in revenue. That’s becoming a trend too.

Inflation…

While we haven’t seen inflation mentioned as a reason to shut down a pirate site before, financial struggles are prevalent. As mentioned earlier, ETTV cited the same reason to close shop last year and others went before them.

 

So what about the sites that remain? Speaking with TorrentFreak, the operator of LimeTorrents mentions that the site has no plans to stop but they confirmed that rising hosting costs and low adverting revenues are indeed a real concern.

 

That said, inflation and other cost-related issues also work in favor of pirate sites, the site’s operator mentioned. After all, legitimate platforms such as Netflix and Disney+ cost money, while torrent sites are free and offer more content.

 

All in all, we can conclude that the broader piracy ecosystem has lost a key player that was much more than just another torrent site. While others could take its place, if they are willing to take the risk, the loss of RARBG is undoubtedly a considerable setback.

 

After well over a decade of pushing back against pirate site blocking applications, many European ISPs now see little value in putting up a fight.

 

Earlier confirmation from Europe’s highest court, that site-blocking injunctions are legal when they proportionately protect third-party rights, is one of the key reasons for not contesting blocking applications today. In the Netherlands, where ISPs have a strong tradition of resisting site blocking injunctions, a recent application for a dynamic, shape-shifting blockade prompted ISP KPN into action.

Movie Companies Want to Block Lookmovie and Flixtor

In common with similar groups everywhere, Dutch anti-piracy BREIN is a proponent of site-blocking as part of an overall anti-piracy toolkit. The problem BREIN faces is a growing tendency for pirate sites to shift to new domains or receive assistance from proxy and mirror sites, in response to static site-blocking measures targeting specific domains.

 

Hoping to reduce infringing access to pirate streaming sites Lookmovie and Flixtor, while reducing the potential for domain switching and proxy/mirror site countermeasures, BREIN took legal action at the Court of Rotterdam in April against ISP and fibre optic network provider, KPN.

 

When presenting its case for the blocking of Lookmovie, BREIN explained that the platform provides free access to movies and TV shows, including some with Dutch subtitles, without any permission from copyright holders.

 

As the traffic statistics for just one of its domains show, the site receives millions of visitors overall according to SimilarWeb data.

 

 

BREIN notes that users who prefer not to watch ads on Lookmovie can pay a fee to avoid them, either on the site’s main domain, 13 others it also operates, or via a network of proxy and mirror sites.

 

BREIN’s Request For a Dynamic Injunction

 

BREIN’s case against Flixtor is broadly the same, with the anti-piracy company noting that the site is readily accessible from any of 11 domains and an unknown number of proxy and mirror sites.

Countering Perpetual Domain and IP Changes

To counter the growing phenomena of sites switching to domains and IP addresses not specifically mentioned in injunctions, BREIN asked KPN to comply with the terms of a dynamic injunction. When sites deploy new IP addresses, new domains or use sub-domains, dynamic injunctions are usually able to cope.

 

BREIN believed that as long as any proxy or mirror sites were the same or virtually the same as the originals, KPN would be ordered to prevent its customers from accessing them in the same way it can be required to block the original sites. KPN begged to differ.

KPN’s Site-Blocking Objections

The District Court of Rotterdam’s judgment notes that KPN objected to BREIN’s site-blocking application on several grounds. The ISP took the position that blocking websites is not an effective response to infringement because the infringing websites themselves remain online. As a result, internet users are free to circumvent site-blocking measures using VPNs, for example.

 

The Court agreed that circumvention takes place but said that isn’t an obstacle when awarding a site-blocking injunction.

 

“Closing access to Lookmovie and Flixtor by blocking domain names, proxies and mirrors will prevent access to the protected works through those addresses. As BREIN also acknowledges, a blockade does not completely prevent unauthorized calls from protected works, as some internet users will find detours to access blocked websites,” the judgment reads.

 

“It cannot be ruled out that internet users bypass blockades via VPN connections, but it is plausible that a blockade of the websites will lead to these sites no longer being accessible, at least considerably more difficult to access, for the normal internet user, as a result of which carrying out infringement becomes seriously complicated.”

 

The Court further noted that since BREIN requested a dynamic injunction covering new IP addresses and domain names as they appear, these alternative routes of access will also be subjected to a permanent blockade. As a result, blocking can be considered sufficiently effective overall..

Are Dynamic Injunctions Overbroad?

KPN further argued that BREIN’s blocking request was too broad, with associated costs and the risk of over-blocking increasing over time as more proxies and mirror sites are added. The ISP also complained that injunctions should be time-limited but the Court wasn’t convinced.

 

“KPN has been blocking domain names, mirrors and proxies for several years now, and it has not been found that implementation has led to major problems. On the contrary, BREIN has made it clear that it always sends updated lists of new domains to be blocked by e-mail to KPN, after which KPN implements the blockades within a short period, sometimes within an hour,” the judgment notes.

 

The suggestion here is that blocking may have been automated by KPN and since detailed checks may not be carried out, any inconvenience is minimal. In any event, KPN’s historically speedy response to blocking also helped to satisfy the Court that BREIN’s request for a blocking response in five working days wasn’t unreasonable either.

Dynamic Injunction Granted

After considering the freedom to access information and KPN’s freedom to conduct a business, the Court found that BREIN’s application is compatible with these fundamental rights.

 

“BREIN’s claims to block and block KPN subscribers’ access to the (sub) domain names and IP addresses through which Lookmovie and Flixtor operate or will operate are therefore granted,” the judgment reads.

 

BREIN believes the Court made the right decision.

 

“The measures requested by BREIN are judged to be reasonable; KPN’s freedom of enterprise is not unreasonably restricted. The defense that the blocking of proxies and mirrors would be too broad is also rejected: KPN has been implementing blockades for several years now and this has not led to any implementation problems,” BREIN reports.

Injunction Implications Go Beyond KPN

In October 2021, BREIN and several ISPs – KPN included – entered into an agreement known as the ‘Covenant.’ Signatory ISPs promised that when a judgment is handed down against an ISP, requiring it to block websites following an adversarial process, the other ISPs would voluntarily comply with the same decision. As a result, blocking of Lookmovie and Flixtor will be deployed across the Netherlands.

 

Another useful side effect for BREIN is likely to involve Google. As previously reported, when Google is presented with a court order that requires an ISP to block pirate websites, Google recognizes the injunction by voluntarily deindexing the listed domains, resulting in their complete removal from search results, in the territory where the injunction is valid.

 

The District Court of Rotterdam’s judgment can be found here

 

In recent years, website blocking has become one of the most widely-used anti-piracy enforcement mechanisms in the world.

 

ISPs in several dozen countries prevent subscribers from accessing a variety of ‘pirate’ sites, often in response to a court order.

 

These orders often started as basic injunctions, requiring providers to block one or more domain names. Today, many courts issue dynamic injunctions too, allowing rightsholders to add new domain names or IP-addresses, without returning to court.

 

Dynamic blocking orders are also common in India with courts noting that the flexible approach helps to combat pirate site ‘hydras’. India is also known for another progressive site blocking strategy, one that targets piracy before it happens.

Preemptive Spider-Man Piracy Blockade

This week the High Court in New Delhi granted a site blocking order requested by Sony Pictures. This injunction aims to protect the upcoming release of “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse,” which is scheduled to premiere in theaters later this week.

 

As far as we know, no pirated versions of the film are currently available online. Sony doesn’t mention any in its application either but expects rogue copies to appear on known pirate sites in the near future. To limit this potential piracy, these sites should be blocked, the studio argued.

 

The application lists 101 pirate sites including variants of The Pirate Bay, YTS, RARBG, LimeTorrents, Fmovies, Myflixer, 123movies and others. Many of these already share copies of the 2018 film “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse” and are allegedly “in the process” of pirating the sequel too.

 

 

After reviewing the available evidence, Justice C Hari Shankar of the New Delhi High Court comments as follows:

 

“The facts of the case as recited hereinabove indicate that the plaintiff’s copyright in the films ‘Spider-Man: Across The Spider-Verse’ and ‘Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse’ have/are in the process of being infringed and violated by the Defendants 1 to 101.”

Mirrors and Copies are Covered

The owners of the pirate sites were alerted to the proceeding last week but it appears that none have objected formally. As a result, Justice Shankar issued an order that prohibits the operators from making pirated copies of the Spider-Man films available to the public.

 

In addition, Indian Internet providers are ordered to block access to the pirate sites’ listed domain names, as well as any proxies and mirrors that may come online in the future.

 

“[The Internet providers] are directed to block access to the websites at S. Nos. 1 to 101, as well as any mirror/redirect/alphanumeric websites which appear to be associated with any of the said websites,” the order reads.

 

 

This leads to the intriguing situation that ISPs must block domain names, including those that have yet to be registered, to protect a film that is expected to be pirated in the future.

 

These types of preemptive blocking orders are not new in India. Similar ones have been issued previously and there’s little doubt that rightsholders such as Sony will request more of them in the future.

 

—

 

A copy of Justice C Hari Shankar’s order is available here (pdf). The full list of domain names mentioned in the order reads as follows:

 

1) flixhd.cc
2) www6.f2movies.to
3) www2.movieorca.com
4) moviekids.tv
5) moviesnation.vip
6) allmovieshub.party
7) 1xbetmovies.bio
hdtoday.tv
9) hdtoday.ru
10) 0123movie.net
II) www5.himovies.to
I2) bflix.gg
13) thepiratebayIO.org
I4) thepiratebay.party
15) thepiratebay.org
16) m.thepiratebayO.org
17) thepiratebay3 .to
18) fmovies.llc
19) fmovies.hn
20) fmovies.ps
21) uhdmovies.bio
22) psa.re
23) medeberiyas.com
24) proxyrarbg.org
25) rarbgdata.org
26) rarbgmirrored.org
27) rarbgp2p.org
28) rarbgproxied.org
29) rarbgto.org
30) rarbgunblocked.org
31) rarbggo.to
32) myflixer.vc
33) myflixer.center
34) filmkio.run
35) hurawatch.cc
36) wwwl.attacker.tv
37) cataz.net
38) soap2day.id
39) soap2day.mn
40) soap2day-online.com
41) ww6.soap2day.day
42) ww7.soap2dayhd.co
43) Putlokemew.sb
44) putlokemew.vc
45) putlockers9.live
46) aiofi lm.top
47) watchseries.id
48) watchseries.world
49) watchserieshd.live
50) watchserieshd.ru
51) 123-movies.pics
52) 123moviesite.one
53) arc018.com
54) bolly4u.cafe
55) desiremovies.lat
56) dopebox.se
57) emovtes.si
58) filmywap.com.pe
59) flixtor.id
60) goku.sx
61) grantorrent.bz
62) hdencode.org
63) hexdownload.co’~
64) hindmoviez.wiki
65) katmovieshd.ms
66) limetorrents.lol
67) losmovies.ru
68) membedl.com
69) mobomoviez.fun
70) movierulzhd.wiki
71) movies7.io
72) moviesj oy.plus
73) moviesmod.co.in
74) moviestowatch.tv
75) nkiri.com
76) Old3.rlsbb.cc
77) onionplay.rs
78) primewire.id
79) projectfreetv.space
80) sflix.se
81) solarmovies.win
82) solidtorrents.to
83) swatchseries.biz
84) tamilvip.city
85) terbit2l.art
86) tfpdl.seEmail:
87) Tgx.rs
88) theflixer.tv
89) themovieflix.eu.com
90) thenetnaija.net
91) vegamovies.chat
92) vhmovies.to
93) vumoo.to
94) watchsomuch.to
95) ww1.123moviesto.cc
96) wwl.streamm4u.ws
97) ww4.solarmovie.to
98) www3.yggtorrent.do
99) xmovies8.fun
100) yesmovies.lat
101) yts.rs

 

Operating from 2016 until 2018, the Flawless IPTV service copied subscription TV broadcasts from official (and unofficial) sources and then restreamed that content to tens of thousands of customers, at a dramatically cut down price.

 

For many UK football fans, Flawless granted access to the sport they love, at a price they could afford. Others viewed the service quite differently.

 

From the Premier League’s perspective, Flawless was a fraudulent, criminal enterprise that stole potential revenue from the country’s leading football clubs. Through its illegal participation in the subscription TV market, Flawless had a direct impact on Sky and Virgin Media subscription package sales.

 

More broadly, Flawless undermined the Premier League’s right to offer exclusive broadcasting licenses in the UK and that had the potential to affect how much broadcasters were prepared to pay for those licenses.

Today’s Sentencing Hearing

Following an extraordinarily deep and costly investigation, and a five-year Premier League private prosecution, five men behind the UK’s largest-ever piracy service were sentenced today at Chesterfield Justice Centre.

 

Mark Gould, Steven Gordon, Peter Jolley, Christopher Felvus and William Brown were sentenced to more than 30 years in prison combined. A sixth defendant, Zak Smith, did not appear in court.

 

In total, Flawless operated for just 22 months but still managed to generate an estimated £4.6 million in revenue. £3.7 million of that was profit, split very unequally between those sent to prison today.

 

Mark Gould, 36, was the driving force behind Flawless. His share of the profit was around £1.7 million. Today he received an unprecedented 11-year sentence on two counts of conspiracy to defraud and contempt of court.

 

Steven Gordon’s cut was significant too, roughly £1 million according to the prosecution. Two counts of conspiracy to defraud and contempt of court led to a sentence of five years and two months.

 

Peter Jolley’s share of the profit was reported as £773,000. He received a sentence of five years and two months, on two counts of conspiracy to defraud and money laundering.

 

Christopher Felvus’ share was a relatively modest £164,500. Two counts of conspiracy to defraud earned him a sentence of three years and 11 months.

 

William Brown made just £15,000 but after pleading not guilty and then losing his case, today he was sentenced to four years and nine months, on two counts of conspiracy to defraud.

 

Zak Smith appears to have made less than £5,000 from Flawless. He did not appear in court today and a warrant was issued for his arrest.

 

What follows are just some of the events that led to the men being sentenced today, including why Flawless was so successful, and how it all fell apart.

Flawless Won Fans By Exploiting a Restricted Market, Fraudulently

Top-tier football matches in England take place in the Premier League, a league operated by a company of the same name, owned by the clubs that play in it.

 

Premier League broadcasting rights cost billions, so when broadcasters like Sky and Virgin hand over their share of the cash for exclusive local rights, recouping that cash from UK football fans is reflected in costly subscription package prices.

 

For cash-strapped football fans in the UK, pirate IPTV providers represent choice and affordability in a market where very little exists. Subscriptions available at a fraction of the official cost are a huge draw but the elephant in the room is unavoidable.

 

Pirate IPTV services cost less and offer more, but that’s only because they pay nothing to rightsholders like the Premier League, while paying nothing to broadcasters whose transmissions they copy.

 

The end result of an aggressive Premier League private prosecution spanning five years, the sentences handed down today show that undermining corporations worth billions has the potential to end in complete catastrophe for IPTV operators. It also ends badly for football fans and the public in general.

 

While this was a private prosecution, the Premier League – and by extension Premier League clubs – will now recoup the costs of the investigation and prosecution from the Crown, meaning that tax paying football fans and taxpayers in general will pick up an incredibly large bill.

Flawless IPTV

Launched around August 2016, Flawless IPTV began as a three-way partnership consisting of Mark Gould, Steven Gordon, and Peter Jolley, all of whom had parted ways with another IPTV provider, known online as Overlords. Christopher Felvus, who was also active in the pirate IPTV scene, made up the quartet and for Flawless, it was game on.

 

In common with licensed services, pirate IPTV providers have broadly two options for reaching the market. Selling subscriptions directly to consumers makes the most money on paper but also causes the most headaches. Selling to customers via resellers makes considerably less, but in many cases a 40% cut may be considered worth it.

 

Flawless decided to cover both angles by selling direct from its own website and social medias, and also indirectly via a network of resellers.

 

With a heavy focus on Premier League content, particularly matches broadcast during the UK’s ‘3pm blackout’, Flawless and success went hand in hand. A big hit with football fans, the IPTV service went from strength to strength with a comprehensive, mostly reliable product, for just £10 per month. For a while, everything went broadly to plan.

 

Numerous behind-the-scenes dramas, some worthy of a TV series in their own right, kept the business on its toes in the months to come. Yet after signing up thousands of customers with no notable issues, a subscription purchased in 2017 sparked a massive criminal investigation and marked the beginning of the end for the entire service.

Charity Received Complaints

Crimestoppers, a UK charity famous for its anonymous tip lines, is said to have received complaints about Flawless in the summer of 2017. Instead of contacting the police, Crimestoppers alerted the Federation Against Copyright Theft (FACT) which led to a covert purchase of a Flawless subscription in October of the same year.

 

After concluding that Flawless offered streams broadcast by Sky and Virgin, among others, FACT leveraged its connections in government, law enforcement agencies, and civil authorities, calling for action to defend the Premier League’s rights.

 

A report to GAIN, the Government Agency Intelligence Network, led to the allocation of significant public resources. With the support of a dedicated financial investigator, a senior Trading Standards officer took over the investigation and a little over six months later, Flawless was all but finished.

Mark Gould Arrested First, Others follow

In May 2018, search warrants were executed at two addresses in London. Gould was arrested at his home in Greenwich, an apartment on the river recently purchased for £600,000 – cash.

 

Around a month later the authorities arrested Steven Gordon and Peter Jolley, and three weeks after that Christopher Felvus was detained. William Brown and Zak Smith were arrested early August 2018 but it would be another five months before the case was submitted to the court, and another three years before today’s sentencing.

Profitable Business, But Not For All

In total, Flawless operated for just 22 months but still managed to generate an estimated £4.6 million in revenue, £3.7 million of that in profit. As highlighted earlier, Gould is said to have made most from the operation, around £1.7 million.

 

William Brown made almost nothing from Flawless yet today received a sentence roughly on par with that handed to Steven Gordon, who made more than £1 million from the operation and was also held in contempt of court. In common with all of the defendants sentenced today, Brown had no previous convictions.

Warrant Issued For Arrest of Zak Smith

This curious anomaly leads us to Zak Smith, his apparent absence from court today, and a warrant for his arrest. Smith made roughly three times less than Brown, around £5,000, but was expected to receive a similar sentence today. The reasons for that are extraordinary.

 

The details of Smith’s involvement aren’t just interesting, they are arguably worthy of a Netflix drama series in their own right. Smith worked at anti-piracy company Friend MTS, known for working with the Premier League to ensure that pirate services are blocked by ISPs during match times.

 

This type of blocking is authorized by High Court injunction, the finer details of which are closely guarded secrets. Or at least that’s the usual plan. In some cases blocking programs appear suddenly ineffective, with services like Flawless operating broadly as usual, with Flawless competitors not doing anywhere near as well.

 

We’ll return to that story very soon and reveal how the dismantling of Flawless was interpreted as a prompt to launch more IPTV services that made even more money.