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 three newcomers on the list. “The Menu” is the most downloaded title.

The most torrented movies for the week ending on January 9 are:

Movie Rank	Rank last week	Movie name	IMDb Rating / Trailer
Most downloaded movies via torrent sites
1	(…)	The Menu	7.3 / trailer
2	(…)	Puss in Boots: The Last Wish	7.8 / trailer
3	(2)	Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery	7.4 / trailer
4	(1)	Avatar: The Way of Water	8.1 / trailer
5	(4)	Black Adam	7.1 / trailer
6	(3)	Violent Night	6.9 / trailer
7	(…)	The Pale Blue Eye	6.7 / trailer
8	(6)	Black Panther: Wakanda Forever	7.3 / trailer
9	(7)	Bullet Train	7.4 / trailer
10	(back)	Top Gun: Maverick	8.3 / trailer

 

 

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

 

In March 2021, DISH Network filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against pirate IPTV provider ChitramTV, demanding $31 million in damages.

 

The DISH lawsuit targeted the entire service, but attention quickly focused on Dinesh Vigneswaran of ChitramTV Canada, who allegedly sold subscriptions via Chitram.ca.

 

DISH said that during a telephone call with one of its investigators, Vigneswaran confirmed his involvement with ChitramTV when he said he had 60 resellers and a warehouse in the United States filled with pirate boxes.

 

DISH couldn’t identify anyone else in its investigation, so when Judge Lynn N. Hughes handed down a $31m judgment at a Texas district court in November 2021, Vigneswaran became the most obvious target for DISH’s collection team. For a few moments, at least.

 

After finding that Vigneswaran had answered the complaint at the 11th hour, the default judgment against him was withdrawn. The default against the still-unidentified parties remained in place, but Vigneswaran had a golden opportunity to turn things around.

Let The Chaos Begin

From the moment Vigneswaran began corresponding with the court, the outcome seemed all but inevitable. He told the court that he’d received a summons in May 2021 but believed the letter was a “fraudulent scam” and since he was the potential victim, he ignored it.

 

The Canada-resident then admitted to having a business relationship with ChitramTV, albeit one he was forced into. As the former head of sales at Lyca TV, he’d sold legal TV packages to friends and family, but when they underperformed, Vigneswaran felt that to “safeguard” his name and reputation, he should compensate them with ChitramTV’s pirate packages.

 

In a submission to the court dated February 2022, Vigneswaran denied being the operator of ChitramTV and presented a list of people he’d never spoken to. Referring to himself in the third person, he addressed Judge Lynn N. Hughes as “My Lord” to explain that the court had no jurisdiction and DISH was victimizing him as part of a vendetta.

 

In conclusion, Vigneswaran told the court that DISH was “not entitled for any relief” so the lawsuit should be dismissed. While he said he would be “available to answer and cooperate (legit) with the plaintiff,” the court should grant him a “permanent exemption.”

 

Other letters sent to the court (and the law firm representing DISH) spoke of a “malicious prosecution,” warning that if it didn’t stop, “recovery of 2 Million Canadian Dollars on account of damages” could be a potential outcome.

Nine Months Later….

After several months and numerous confusing submissions that elaborately and repetitively took the case nowhere, on November 15, 2022, Judge Hughes’ patience finally ran out. DISH previously called for Vigneswaran to be held in contempt and sanctioned, and that’s exactly what happened.

 

“Throughout this litigation, to label Dinesh Vigneswaran as troublesome would be an understatement. He has repeatedly failed to comply with the Court’s instructions and has made a mockery of basic, integral judicial processes,” Judge Hughes wrote.

 

“In light of Vigneswaran’s conduct, Plaintiff DISH Network, LLC has moved for the defendant to be held in contempt and sanctioned. This motion succeeds.”

 

Describing Vigneswaran’s disrespect as “rampant from its very onset,” Judge Hughes listed events that led to the defendant being held in contempt.

 

– Failing to respond to the initial complaint
– Eventually answering a month after entry of default
– Reminding the court of his “full exemption” via a request to “completely exempt him”
– Making a “mockery” of discovery with “boilerplate made-up objections”
– Filing objections “that have little to no basis in law or even common sense”
– Failing to produce most documents after a final warning on discovery compliance
– Unilaterally redacting documents so as to make them “virtually useless”
– Describing the motion for contempt as “unlawful, extralegal, and illegal”

 

“The course of this litigation reveals Vigneswaran’s callous disregard for the American court system. His failure to comply with explicit instructions has been alarming, and the Court has reached its tolerance,” the Judge continued.

 

“DISH has not quit, and this Court is unaware of a legal system wherein refusing or feigning cooperation makes a lawsuit magically disappear.”

No Reason For Defendant to Rack Up Monetary Sanctions

Noting that the case may as well be in its infancy due to the defendant being “stubbornly dedicated to keep producing rubbish,” Judge Hughes saw no reason for Vigneswaran to rack up monetary sanctions or for DISH to incur more costs.

 

A default judgment would send the right message but not at the maximum level of damages requested by DISH. Vigneswaran’s infringement had been willful, and he’d been far from cooperative, but the Court acknowledged he was just one part of a much bigger operation.

 

“[T]he maximum of $150,000 per registered work would be excessive, particularly considering the lack of proffered actual damages and that Vigneswaran is only one individual who served as but a cog in the machine,” the judgment reads.

 

“DISH will take from Vigneswaran $ 50,000 for each of the 19 registered works, to the tune of $950,000, plus 4.73% post-judgment interest.”

After Digging a $1m Hole, It’s Time to Keep Digging

The judgment was hardly a good outcome for Vigneswaran but after reading all of the filings in the case, there’s little doubt it could’ve been worse. Surprisingly, the possibility of an even worse outcome was kept alive thanks to a subsequent letter addressed to the court.

 

Vigneswaran’s appeal is currently listed for hearing at the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, but what that might hold in store is difficult to predict.

 

The immediate problem is more clearly defined, however.

 

The order for default judgment can be found here (pdf)

 

A 2020 class action lawsuit filed by musician Maria Schneider accused YouTube of mass copyright infringement, failing to suspend ‘repeat infringers, and restricting access to anti-piracy tools, among other allegations.

 

Despite YouTube’s findings that at least one member of the putative class acted fraudulently (Pirate Monitor) to fabricate ‘evidence’ of YouTube’s alleged shortcomings in support of the lawsuit, litigation continued. More than two years later, with both sides committing significant resources to a highly complex case, both Schneider and YouTube filed motions for summary judgment.

YouTube’s Motion For Summary Judgment

Schneider’s first amended complaint alleged that YouTube and its users infringed her copyrighted musical compositions and sound recordings, and that YouTube facilitated infringement by removing copyright management information (CMI) from her copyright works, in violation of the DMCA.

 

YouTube’s motion for summary judgment states that Schneider licensed her content to YouTube, presented no evidence of DMCA violations, and in some cases had filed untimely claims. An order handed down by Judge James Donato on Thursday addresses each aspect in detail.

Copyright Law: Infringement Standards

For a platform like YouTube to be held liable for direct infringement, it needs to be actively involved in that infringement, not just a “passive handler” of content supplied by others.

 

A claim of contributory (secondary) infringement requires the plaintiff to show that direct infringement has been carried out by third parties.

 

A claim of vicarious infringement requires the plaintiff to prove that the defendant had the practical ability to prevent infringement, had a direct financial interest in that infringement, yet failed to mitigate it.

YouTube Wins Partial Summary Judgment

Schneider’s amended complaint alleged direct and indirect infringement for 76 copyrighted musical compositions and two sound recordings. Judge Donato says that discovery failed to produce any evidence of infringement for 27 of Schneider’s copyrighted works, and that the musician acknowledges that to be true.

 

“Consequently, summary judgment is granted in favor of YouTube for those 27 works,” the order reads.

YouTube’s Licensing Defense

YouTube’s main defense to Schneider’s copyright claims in other works is that it holds a “blanket catalog license” granted by Modern Works Music Publishing (MWP).

 

According to YouTube, that license covers all of Schneider’s musical compositions, so Schneider’s infringement claims cannot succeed. The big questions now center on the nature of that license and whether YouTube can rely on it to fend off liability.

 

In 2008, Schneider appointed her management company ArtistShare Music Publishing (AMP) as the “sole and exclusive Administrator” of her musical compositions under a Music Publishing Administration Agreement (AA). AWP subsequently assigned “all its duties” in the agreement to MWP, which was already a 50% co-owner of AMP.

 

In April 2014, MWP and YouTube signed a Publishing Licensing Agreement (PLA) that granted YouTube a license to compositions “owned or controlled” by MWP. As acknowledged by the Judge, the license appears broad enough to “sound the death knell” for all infringement claims filed by Schneider.

 

“Consequently, the salient question is whether YouTube has demonstrated as a matter of law and undisputed fact that the PLA grants it a license to all of Schneider’s works-in-suit. It has not,” Judge Donato writes.

 

“The PLA grants YouTube a license only to compositions ‘owned or controlled’ by MWP. Viewing the record in the light most favorable to Schneider, the question of whether MWP owned or controlled Schneider’s compositions is replete with factual disputes that preclude summary judgment.”

 

Describing YouTube’s arguments to the contrary as “unavailing,” Judge Donato says that the existence of “quintessential factual disputes” precludes summary judgment for YouTube on the basis of the PLA.

YouTube’s ‘Terms of Service’ Defense

YouTube’s motion for summary judgment claims that when Schneider and her agents uploaded copyrighted content to YouTube, that content became licensed under YouTube’s Terms of Service (TOS). In this respect, YouTube says it is entitled to summary judgment on 114 of Schneider’s 381 infringment claims.

 

The YouTube TOS grants YouTube “a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sublicensable and transferable license to use, reproduce, distribute, prepare derivative works of, display, and perform” any content uploaded by users. The TOS also grants a non-exclusive license to YouTube users which enables them to “use, reproduce, distribute, and perform” that content “as permitted through the functionality of the Service and under these Terms of Service.”

 

The record shows that Schneider created a YouTube account in 2012, through which she and authorized third parties uploaded content to YouTube, including some of the works listed in the lawsuit.

 

Since the ‘TOS’ license is so broad, Judge Donato says that YouTube cannot be held liable for direct infringement of works covered by it. However, the license does not insulate YouTube from indirect infringement liability, including when users violate YouTube’s TOS by uploading infringing content.

 

As a result, YouTube wins summary judgment for direct infringement claims on 15 named works but related indirect infringement claims stand.

Time-Barred Claims

YouTube’s TOS contains a contractual one-year limitation period and a three-year limitations period under the Copyright Act. The record shows that Schneider had actual knowledge of 121 allegedly infringing videos more than a year before she filed this lawsuit against YouTube, and had actual knowledge of 73 allegedly infringing videos more than three years before.

 

Schneider claims that she had to accept YouTube’s TOS because without a YouTube account, she couldn’t submit any takedown notices. The record shows that YouTube accepts takedown notices via email and fax, among other methods.

 

Based on this and other refuted claims, Judge Donato concludes that YouTube has established that 121 infringements for which Schneider admits to having actual knowledge are barred by the one-year limitations clause in the YouTube TOS.

DMCA / CMI Removal

Section 1202(b) of the DMCA states that without approval from the copyright owner, no person is allowed to remove or alter Copyright Management Information (CMI), distribute or import for distribution CMI knowing that it has been removed or altered, or distribute, import for distribution, or publicly perform works, copies of works, or phonorecords, knowing that CMI has been removed or altered.

 

The statute also has a ‘scienter’ requirement, i.e intent or knowledge of wrongdoing. In this case, knowledge that removing/altering CMI will “induce, enable, facilitate, or conceal an infringement.”

 

YouTube says that Schneider has produced no evidence to support her claim that YouTube removed or altered CMI in her works, or acted with intent/knowledge, as required under the DMCA. The Court’s view is much more broad.

 

“This argument sinks on a reef of disputed facts. To start, it is not necessary for Schneider to establish that YouTube itself removed or altered her CMI to state a claim under section 1202(b).

 

“Schneider could still prevail under section 1202(b)(3) upon a showing that YouTube distributed her works with the knowledge that CMI had been removed, even if [YouTube] did not remove it,” Judge Donato’s order reads.

 

Overall, due to the existence of numerous disputed facts, summary judgment for YouTube is denied on the issue of CMI. The parties are now required to file a numbered list of Schneider’s remaining works-in-suit and corresponding infringement claims by January 12.

 

Judge Donato’s order can be found here (pdf)

 

Free access to information is a broadly held ideal, but when students have to pay for their textbooks, it’s far from reality.

 

Getting a proper education certainly isn’t cheap. As a result, many students have found shortcuts in pirate sites such as Libgen and Z-Library.

 

In addition, pirated books are also regularly shared between students or resold through online marketplaces. The latter can lead to a lucrative revenue stream, but certainly not without risk.

Textbook Pirate Convicted

Yesterday a 26-year-old Danish man was convicted in a criminal case, following an investigation by anti-piracy group Rights Alliance. The man was found guilty of offering 29 textbook pdfs for sale through local online marketplace DBA.

 

While a criminal conviction doesn’t look good on one’s resume, the textbook seller won’t have to serve a custodial sentence. Instead, the court issued a 10-day suspended prison sentence.

 

On top of the probation period, the man was also ordered to pay 5,000 Danish kroner (~$700) in compensation to Rights Alliance, while 2,245 kroner (~$310) were confiscated.

 

Rights Alliance is pleased with the deterrent message sent by this criminal conviction. While the punishment may not scare hardened criminals, it confirms that selling pirated textbooks is a crime.

Piracy Culture in Education

Rights Alliance director Maria Fredenslund welcomes the outcome while stressing that more must be done to change the ‘unhealthy’ pro-piracy culture among students.

 

Last year, a student survey found that nearly half of all students who use digital textbooks get their copies through illegal means.

 

“Unfortunately, we see an unhealthy culture in higher education, where every other student has acquired study books illegally. This means that a large part of Denmark’s youth is willing to break the law,” Fredenslund says.

Piracy Beats Legal Options

Most students are well aware that selling and pirating books is against the law. However, 68% still find it acceptable to share digital textbooks with friends or other students.

 

This type of sharing isn’t a fad; it appears to be ingrained in the educational culture. The chart below shows that piracy is by far the most common method to obtain digital textbooks, beating legal options.

 

Rights Alliance is calling for a thorough culture change and is actively engaging with educational institutions to see what can be done. The anti-piracy group has already launched some informational campaigns, but they failed to produce the desired outcome.

Culture Change?

This week’s conviction of the textbook seller is not the first. Similar suspended prison sentences have been handed down in previous Danish textbook piracy cases.

 

Rights Alliance says it is important to confirm that these activities are illegal. However, as the survey showed, most students are already well aware of the legal angle, but continue to share textbooks nonetheless.

 

It seems that the high cost of textbooks is a major driver of this activity, but there are indications that prices will fall. On the contrary, widespread piracy could make textbooks even more expensive, effectively creating a vicious piracy cycle.

 

Pia Vigh, Head of the Secretariat for Danish Education Publishers, hopes that the broader educational system will put the piracy issue on the agenda. If not, it may become increasingly expensive to publish Danish textbooks.

 

“The management, lecturers, and tutors must take responsibility and make the students understand that it ultimately affects themselves, their professionalism and their study environment if they share study books illegally,” Vigh says.

 

The question is whether students can be convinced that copyright and their study environment are more important than their own wallets.

 

Streaming piracy has taken over from BitTorrent in most parts of the world, but this traditional file-sharing technology remains popular in the Netherlands.

 

Anti-piracy group BREIN is well aware of BitTorrent’s popularity. In addition to targeting public torrent sites with site-blocking measures, BREIN has kept an eye on private torrent trackers too.

BREIN Targets Scripter

This week, BREIN reports that action against the latter led to a breakthrough last year, eventually leading to the decimation of the entire local ‘private’ torrent tracker scene. The anti-piracy group says that the identification of a key person with connections to 25 private torrent trackers led to the current situation of most being offline.

 

The unnamed man, who personally owned some of the trackers, coded and maintained the scripts these sites were running on. In addition to the coding work, the developer also offered hosting services, seedboxes, and VPN accounts to the torrent sites and their users.

 

BREIN doesn’t mention any of the private trackers by name. However, around the same time that this enforcement action went down, several of the largest Dutch-language torrent communities went offline. Those include Filmpaleis en Ebookparadijs, with the former publicly mentioning BREIN as the reason.

 

Shortly after receiving a house visit from BREIN, the torrent tracker dev signed an agreement to halt his activities, with a maximum €50,000 penalty for breach of promise. This week, the man further agreed to pay €12,000 in ‘damages’, payable in installments.

Zooming in on Private Trackers

Private torrent trackers are typically much smaller than their public counterparts but can harbor some of the most active sharers. These people are drawn to the trackers because of the superior download speeds and the absence of spam and viruses, BREIN notes.

 

BREIN director Tim Kuik is pleased with these latest achievements. In recent years the group carried out many enforcement actions to cripple the Dutch Usenet community, and it plans to do the same with Dutch torrent trackers.

 

“Our approach to Dutch private trackers is an extension of our approach to Usenet indexing sites, which has already delivered a major blow to illegal communities and uploaders. We want to achieve the same in the illegal BitTorrent scene,” Kuik says.

 

BREIN stresses that its investigation has already resulted in actions against other players in the ecosystem, without providing any further detail at this stage. These actions are likely targeted at the management of the trackers. The anti-piracy group confirms that it typically goes after the bigger fish, stressing that this also includes prolific uploaders.

 

Any platform that allows users to upload and share content runs the risk of some users uploading content for which they hold no rights.

 

Under copyright law, platforms can limit liability for the actions of their users provided they respond to DMCA takedown notices in a timely fashion and suspend or terminate users who repeatedly infringe copyright.

 

If a platform fails in either respect, rightsholders may attempt to hold it liable for infringements that it had the ability to stop, but failed to do so.

Celebrity Photo Agency Sues Twitter

On December 30, 2022, celebrity photo agency Backgrid filed a lawsuit against Twitter at the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.

 

The complaint alleges that Backgrid sent more than 6,700 DMCA notices to Twitter requesting the removal of its copyrighted images, but Twitter failed to take down a single one. Backgrid further alleges that its images were posted continuously by some Twitter users, but Twitter failed to suspend any accounts under its ‘repeat infringer’ policy.

 

The complaint notes that Backgrid attempted to resolve its dispute with Twitter directly, but when the company failed to respond, the photo agency launched this action.

Backgrid: No Action in Response to DMCA Notices

The complaint describes Backgrid as “the world’s premier celebrity-related photograph agency.” The company says that its celebrity images are regularly licensed by publications including Vogue, Ella, TMZ, and Harper’s Bazaar. Backgrid says that websites using its copyrighted and registered celebrity images increase their traffic and viewer engagement.

 

According to the complaint, Twitter receives similar benefits when users upload Backgrid images to the platform, but when those images are unlicensed, Twitter must take action to prevent further infringement. Backgrid alleges that in thousands of cases, Twitter did nothing.

 

“Despite having received DMCA notices from Backgrid, Twitter has not expeditiously taken down Backgrid’s Celebrity content,” the complaint notes. “For example, Backgrid sent over 6,700 DMCA notices, but Twitter has not expeditiously taken down content in response to the same and cannot seek protection under the DMCA.”

Complaint Details Specific Accounts’ Alleged Infringements

Twitter accounts that allegedly posted Backgrid content on multiple occasions are mentioned directly in the complaint. The first named account in the lawsuit (@BSO) is of immediate interest since it belongs to Robert Littal, former co-host of the TMZ Sports show and founder/editor of news site BlackSportsOnline.com.

 

The complaint alleges that the account was targeted by 73 DMCA notices in connection with 49 copyrighted Backgrid images, posted between September 2021 and November 2022. (small sample below)

 

Checks on two dozen links reveal that all remain intact, as does the account.

 

The second named account (@foochia) is operated by the news site Foochia.com. It describes itself as a platform “concerned with the affairs and concerns of Arab women, from which we look at the world of fashion, beauty, grace and elegance, and we follow celebrity news, art and culture.”

 

“Backgrid sent Twitter at least 101 DMCA take-down notifications encompassing at least 42 timely registered photographs on the ‘foochia’ account,” the complaint reads.

 

DMCA notices cover the same September 2021 to November 2022 period, and the related URLs on Twitter seem intact. The tweets contain images of celebrities including Kanye West, Justin Beiber, Rihanna, Kendall Jenner, and Jennifer Lopez, among others.

 

“Notwithstanding the receipt of the take-down notices described herein, the ‘foochia’ account remains live and active,” the complaint notes.

Repeat Infringer Allegations

Twitter’s copyright policy states that the company responds to copyright complaints submitted under the DMCA and under certain conditions may take action against user accounts.

 

“If multiple copyright complaints are received about an account, or other evidence suggests a pattern of repeat infringement, Twitter may suspend that account in accordance with our Repeat Infringer Policy. Our Repeat Infringer Policy takes valid retractions and counter-notices into account,” Twitter’s policy reads.

 

To benefit from limitations on liability under the DMCA (17 U.S. Code § 512), services providers like Twitter must have “adopted and reasonably implemented” a policy that provides for the termination in “appropriate circumstances” of subscribers who are “repeat infringers.”

 

The terms reasonable, appropriate, and repeat are not clearly defined in law, so Backgrid offers its own guidelines for the court’s consideration.

 

“Industry standard practices have resulted in the widespread adoption and implementation by legitimate ISPs of a ‘three-strikes’ policy with respect to repeat infringers,” Backgrid says.

 

“The industry standard requires that to qualify for the DMCA safe harbor protection, ISPs must terminate the accounts of users that have been the subject of three infringement complaints. Defendant, however, regularly fails and refuses to comport with the industry standard.

 

“Stunningly, all of the accounts remain live and online today while Twitter continues to profit from the blatant, repeated, and ongoing infringements of the copyrighted works of others, including without limitation the timely registered Celebrity Photographs [in suit],” the complaint adds.

“Direct, Contributory, and Vicarious Infringement”

According to the lawsuit, Twitter infringed “at least 1,526” of Backgrid’s celebrity images, with infringement “continuous and on-going.”

 

Backgrid alleges direct infringement due to Twitter failing to remove images “long after being apprised of their infringing status” and contributory infringement for encouraging users to upload and edit photographs found on the internet, failing to advise users of the consequences, and for removing metadata from the images.

 

“Defendant is aware of the massive scale of copyright infringement it facilitates and encourages, and of the revenue and profits such infringement generates for it,” the image company adds.

 

Backgrid seeks a declaration that Twitter infringes its copyrights and an injunction under 17 U.S.C. § 502 to prevent any further acts of infringement.

 

Based on its allegations that Twitter neither adopted nor reasonably implemented a repeat infringer policy, Backgrid requests a declaration that Twitter is liable for each of the works infringed on its platform.

 

Describing Twitter’s infringement as willful and egregious, Backgrid believes it’s entitled to maximum statutory damages of $150,000 per image – $228.9 million in total.

 

Backgrid’s complaint can be found here (1,2, pdf)

 

In 2020, YouTube-ripper Yout.com sued the RIAA, asking a Connecticut district court to declare that the site does not violate the DMCA’s anti-circumvention provision.

 

This was a bold move, but not one without consequences. After a legal battle of nearly two years, the verdict meant disappointment for Yout.

 

Last October, Judge Stefan Underhill ultimately concluded that the service had failed to show that it doesn’t circumvent YouTube’s technological protection measures. Soon after, the RIAA submitted a request to have Yout pay $250,000 in attorneys fees incurred by the RIAA thus far.

Motion to Stay

Yout is not giving up on the case. Site operator Johnathan Nader will appeal the case as he believes that YouTube rippers don’t violate the DMCA. A few weeks ago, his legal team requested the court to put the attorney fees decision on hold while his appeal is pending.

 

The appeal could be crippled if any fees have to be paid right away, Yout argued. This would cause irreparable harm, one of the factors that weigh in favor of granting a stay.

 

The RIAA has a different outlook on the matter. The music group asked the court to deny Yout’s request because, among other things, it doesn’t believe that Yout lacks the means to fund its legal campaign.

 

“The record in this case suggests that Yout does not lack resources: Yout admits that its service is still operational and it has hired three new lawyers for the appeal,” the RIAA writes in its opposition brief.

 

Even if Yout does lack resources, it wouldn’t necessarily be irreparably harmed. It has the option of posting a bond and appealing that decision while the appeal is pending, which will conserve financial resources, the RIAA says.

 

The RIAA further argues that Yout is unlikely to win on appeal, which weighs against a stay. In addition, the RIAA says that it would be harmed by any further delays because it’s already $250,000 out of pocket after defending itself against the “meritless suit”.

Public Interest?

Yout told the court that staying the matter would be in the public interest, as many other site operators and the public at large are affected by the verdict, which essentially declared commonly used YouTube ripping tools illegal.

 

The RIAA’s response turns this argument on its head. The music group says that protecting artists’ copyrights is in the public interest too.

 

“Yout correctly states that copyright protection serves the public interest — but has the analysis exactly backward. Those interests are served by protecting creators of music from the massive circumvention of technological measures for which Yout is liable.”

 

The Copyright Act allows rightsholders to request attorneys’ fees to deter parties from bringing unreasonable claims without repercussions. That is exactly what’s at stake here, the RIAA believes.

 

—

 

A copy of RIAA’s opposition to Yout’s request to stay the motion for attorneys fees is available here (pdf)

 

Private torrent sites, or private trackers as they’re commonly known, are designed to be difficult to access.

 

In many cases, prospective members will need an invitation from someone who is already a member, although some sites will open their front doors when people open their wallets. This presents a challenge for people who want to give them valuable, urgent information but must pay to do so.

Background and Dilemma

Just a few hours ago, TorrentFreak received a rather detailed tip from a security researcher who prefers to remain anonymous. The information relates to three major/well-known private trackers and their users directly, but from the evidence presented, the security debacle exposes other sites too.

 

The researcher came to us with the story because, after trying to get the attention of the sites’ operators, even through other sites that might forward the message, nothing has been done. Surprising, given the scale of the problem.

 

The researcher’s goal is to protect the sites’ users but if we publicly name the sites here, that will not buy enough time for the admins to hear about the news and plug the gaps. Instead, we’ll provide enough information for the sites’ operators to recognize their own site from the inside and then one minute later, the problem should be fixed.

The Security Issue

To get their hands on the latest releases as quickly as possible, trackers often rely on outside sources that have access to so-called 0-Day content, i.e, content released today. The three affected sites seem to have little difficulty obtaining some of their content within minutes. At least in part, that’s achieved via automation.

 

When outside suppliers of content are other torrent sites, a piece of software called Torrent Auto Uploader steps in. It can automatically download torrents, descriptions, and associated NFO files from one site and upload them to another, complete with a new .torrent file containing the tracker’s announce URL.

 

The management page above has been heavily redacted because the content has the potential to identify at least one of the sites. It’s a web interface, one that has no password protection and is readily accessible by anyone with a web browser. The same problem affects at least three different servers operated by the three sites in question.

Web Interface For Torrent Clients

Torrent Auto Uploader relies on torrent clients to transfer content. The three sites in question all use rTorrent clients with a ruTorrent Web UI. We know this because the researcher sent over a whole bunch of screenshots and supporting information which confirms access to the torrent clients as well as the Torrent Auto Uploader software.

 

The image above shows redactions on the tracker tab for good reason. In a regular setup, torrent users can see the names of the trackers coordinating their downloads. This setup is no different except that these URLs reference three different trackers supplying the content to one of the three compromised sites.

Can it Get Any Worse?

Rather than publish a sequence of completely redacted screenshots, we’ll try to explain what they contain. One begins with a GET request to another tracker, which responds with a torrent file. It’s then uploaded to the requesting site which updates its SQL database accordingly.

 

From there the script starts checking for any new entries on a specific RSS feed which is hidden away on another site that has nothing to do with torrents. The feed is protected with a passkey but that’s only useful when nobody knows what it is.

 

The same security hole also grants direct access to one of the sites tracker ‘bots’ through the panel that controls it.

 

Then there’s access to ‘Staff Tools’ on the same page which connect to other pages allowing username changes, uploader application reviews, and a list of misbehaving users that need to be monitored. That’s on top of user profiles, the number of torrents they have active, and everything else one could imagine.

 

Another screenshot featuring a torrent related to a 2022 movie reveals the URL of yet another third-party supplier tracker. Some basic queries on that URL lead to even more torrent sites. And from there, more, and more, and more – revealing torrent passkeys for every single one on the way.

 

Security holes need to be fixed sooner rather than later but getting hold of operators in this niche is difficult by design. Users of all sites might want to make a bit of noise in the hope that the three that matter actually do something.

 

Update: Two shut down, one to go

 

Last month, we reported on a series of FIFA World Cup-themed domain name seizures by US law enforcement.

 

In the initial wave, Homeland Security Investigations took down 55 domain names operated by pirate sports streaming sites, and several more followed later.

 

Many of the sites had millions of regular visitors who were suddenly confronted with a seizure banner featuring seals of prominent law enforcement outfits. This was also the case for SoccerStreams, one of the main targets.

SoccerStreams Targeted

The seizure banner shocked many regular visitors, but like some of the other platforms, SoccerStreams didn’t immediately concede defeat. Instead, it appeared to relocate to reddit-soccerstreams.net where it continued as usual.

 

The SoccerStreams operators are no strangers to legal pressure. The site has its roots in a Reddit community that amassed more than 400,000 members. After repeated complaints from rightsholders including the Premier League, the subreddit was eventually banned in 2019.

 

Following the Reddit ban, a “SoccersStreams” site was launched, presumably by the founders of the subreddit. This turned out to be a successful move as it soon became the UK’s most popular pirate site.

 

The Premier League was also determined to deal with SoccerStreams, however. In a recent submission to the U.S. Government, it branded the site a “notorious market” among a list of other piracy targets.

 

The Premier League’s complaint may not have been the direct cause, but the U.S. Government did eventually seize SoccerStreams.net and SoccerStreams.to. And while the site’s operators staged a near-immediate comeback, this didn’t last.

Game Over for SoccerStreams

A few hours ago SoccerStreams shut down, replacing its sports stream inventory with a short farewell message for its loyal supporters.

 

“We are sad to announce that soccerstreams will be shutting down immediately. There will be duplicate websites that pop up to replace us, no doubt, but none of them will be by us.

 

“Goodbye old friends, see you in another life,” the message concludes, without providing any further detail.

 

The timing of the shutdown suggests that it may have been motivated by recent domain name seizures carried out by U.S. law enforcement. Fears of criminal prosecution may have played a role too.

 

However, as the farewell message makes clear, there is no shortage of ‘unofficial’ SoccerStreams clones. And it wouldn’t be a surprise to see ‘loyal’ SoccerStreams users moving on to these or other alternatives.

 

Whether the SoccerStreams team has given up for good is unknown. There’s always a possibility for sites to continue their activities under a new brand, to shake off the pressure, but in this case that would be pure speculation.

 

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. “Avatar: The Way of Water” is the most downloaded title.

The most torrented movies for the week ending on January 2 are:

Movie Rank	Rank last week	Movie name	IMDb Rating / Trailer
Most downloaded movies via torrent sites
1	(2)	Avatar: The Way of Water	8.1 / trailer
2	(1)	Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery	7.4 / trailer
3	(3)	Violent Night	6.9 / trailer
4	(4)	Black Adam	7.1 / trailer
5	(…)	Avatar (2009)	7.9 / trailer
6	(9)	Black Panther: Wakanda Forever	7.3 / trailer
7	(8)	Bullet Train	7.4 / trailer
8	(…)	White Noise	5.9 / trailer
9	(6)	The Banshees of Inisherin	8.0 / trailer
10	(7)	Emancipation	5.6 / trailer

 

 

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

 

A few years ago, Malibu Media was one of the most active ‘copyright trolls’ in the United States.

 

The California-based company behind the adult brand ‘X-Art’ filed thousands of lawsuits targeting Internet subscribers whose accounts were allegedly used to share Malibu’s films via BitTorrent.

 

In recent years this activity ground to a halt, and in the cases that remained active, things didn’t go to plan. After plenty of drama, Malibu was ordered to pay more than $100,000 to a wrongfully accused internet user in 2021.

Last Cases Standing

At the start of 2023, only two Malibu Media cases remain open. In one, the court denied a default judgment last summer, instructing the rightsholder to provide more evidence of infringement beyond a simple IP-address. After that, things went quiet.

 

In the other case, the accused file-sharer went on the offensive. The “John Doe” defendant filed a long list of counterclaims against Malibu Media, accusing the company of abuse of process and misuse of copyright, among other things.

 

“Plaintiff monetizes its alleged copyrights through coercive and needless litigation and by extracting settlements from that litigation disproportionate to the minimal value of Plaintiff’s works,” the defense wrote.

Corporate Status Suspended

The Doe defendant also asked the court to dismiss Malibu Media’s claims, arguing that the company can’t be involved in a lawsuit due to its corporate status. California’s Franchise Tax Board suspended Malibu Media in 2021 over tax deficiencies.

 

“Plaintiff lacks the capacity to sue. Specifically, Plaintiff is suspended in its state of incorporation, California. Under California law, a suspended corporation cannot maintain a lawsuit,” the defense wrote.

 

The suspension came to the forefront in 2021. The court initially allowed Malibu some time to get its paperwork in order to get the suspension lifted, but that doesn’t appear to have happened. At the time of writing, California’s Franchise Tax Board continues to list Malibu Media’s status as suspended.

 

In a recent advisory to the court, Malibu Media confirms that its corporate powers are still suspended. However, it argues that courts have previously held that suspensions are a “mere technicality” that, once fixed, return a company’s status “back to good standing”.

 

Malibu sees no reason why the present case should not be able to proceed to trial due to a technicality.

Dismissal Looming

U.S. District Court Judge Ezra agrees that previously suspended companies successfully continued lawsuits, but only after their suspensions had been resolved. That’s not the case here.

 

“Corporate status may be a ‘mere technicality,’ but courts in California and the Fifth Circuit only deem it so after the corporation has cured the defect in its corporate status,” the order reads.

 

“Therefore, if Malibu Media’s corporate status is not reinstated by Friday, January 20, 2023, the case will be dismissed without prejudice,” Judge Ezra adds.

 

A dismissal “without prejudice” means that Malibu will be allowed to refile its claims after the suspension is lifted. Based on the lack of recent progress, it’s doubtful that will happen anytime soon.

 

The underlying issues aren’t entirely clear but Malibu CEO Colette Pelissier is no stranger to corporate troubles. Other companies under her control – Colette Productions, Colette Holdings and Colette Properties – are all listed as suspended.

 

The order issued by U.S. District Court Judge David Alan Ezra is available here (pdf)

 

Top-tier Spanish football league LaLiga has been waging war against pirate sites and services for the past several years.

 

In common with the UK’s Premier League and Serie A in Italy, LaLiga focuses on unlicensed live-streaming platforms that offer cheap or even free access to subscription-based content.

 

LaLiga’s prime targets include free web-based streaming sites and subscription IPTV providers. All services face potential ISP blocking under dynamic injunctions, which have flexibility built-in to tackle pirate countermeasures more effectively.

 

When LaLiga labeled dozens of software video players as piracy tools last year, the threshold for illegality suddenly became much less clear.

LaLiga Targets Video Players

In a submission to the European Commission in early 2022, LaLiga called out around 20 IPTV services and 30 streaming sites. A cursory glance would’ve revealed the unlicensed nature of these platforms, but LaLiga also nominated more than 80 software video players, many of them available for download on Google Play and Apple’s App Store.

 

“It is important to note that all of these player applications allow the consumption of an innumerable amount of audiovisual contents such as sports, movies, series TV channels, etc. In other words, this problem affects the entire audiovisual and entertainment industry in general,” LaLiga said (pdf).

 

The goal of the submission was to have some or all of these applications named in the EU’s Counterfeiting and Piracy Watch List 2022. When the report was published early December 2022, just one of the most popular apps was listed in the ‘Piracy Apps’ section.

Called Out By European Commission

“Stakeholders from the audiovisual sector reported IPTV Smarters for inclusion in the Watch List as an IPTV turnkey solution from India,” the Commission wrote (pdf).

 

“It is reported to be an IPTV software solution, which trades under the brand name WHMCS Smarters and offers website design and development, customized apps on several platforms and a billing platform. The operators also offer an IPTV media player through the IPTV Smarters Pro APP.”

 

By also mentioning the WHMCS side of the Smarters business, the European Commission not only went beyond the functionality of the IPTV Smarters Pro app, but did so under a ‘Piracy App’ heading, using text that carried zero allegations of piracy.

 

The EC’s approach was nothing new, however. Last October the Motion Picture Association nominated WHMCS Smarters for ‘Notorious Market’ status in its submission to the United States Trade Representative.

 

The MPA labeled the whole WHMCS Smarters platform as ‘Piracy-as-a-Service (PaaS)’ but in common with the EC, stopped short of making specific allegations.

 

Based on their public reports to the authorities, rightsholders obviously view Smarters as problematic. The EC and USTR reports are directed at governments and authorities worldwide, but absent any specific allegations, where and how this will culminate is unknown.

 

In the meantime, LaLiga has just announced successful legal action in Spain.

Court Orders Google to Remove IPTV Smarters Pro

In a late December press release celebrating its anti-piracy successes over the past 12 months, LaLiga announced the outcome of legal action taken against the IPTV Smarters Pro software.

 

On December 22, 2022, Investigating Court No. 53 of Madrid issued an order – after a positive report from the Public Prosecutor – whereby, considering the precautionary measures requested by LaLiga, it agreed to withdraw from the Google store (Google Play) the well-known player application ‘IPTV SMARTERS PRO’, which once installed allowed – according to the conclusions of a UDEV report – to view premium television channels in which LaLiga matches were broadcast among other content. (LaLiga statement – translated)

 

At the time of writing the decision text isn’t available via the usual government portals, so the exact legal basis for the order remains unclear. Until the order becomes available, it’s impossible to know what was taken into consideration but, based on LaLiga’s statement, LaLiga matches were observed playing in the app.

 

That could also be true for Google Chrome and Firefox, provided a number of positive steps were taken by the user to add in illegal streams first, of course. The circumstances here are currently unknown but if the Smarters Pro software as delivered by Google carried illegal streams (which seems unlikely), Google would’ve removed it on request.

Specialist Police Unit Report

What’s interesting here is that LaLiga’s statement quite clearly points to UDEV (Unidad de Delincuencia Especializada y Violenta), a specialist unit of Spain’s National Police (Policía Nacional), as the entity responsible for verifying that infringement was actually taking place.

 

So, in summary, LaLiga demanded precautionary measures against the software, UDEV determined infringement and issued a report to that effect, and the public prosecutor’s satisfaction with the application and evidence meant that the court – Juzgado de Instrucción Nº 53 de Madrid – found that ‘precautionary measures’ were appropriate.

IPTV Smarters Pro Still on Google Play

At the time of writing, IPTV Smarters Pro is still available on Google Play in Spain. The removal order was issued on December 22, but disruption at this time of the year is common and the deadline for compliance is unknown.

 

Also of interest is the timing of LaLiga’s submission to the European Commission calling out IPTV Smarters Pro for infringing its rights (February 2022), and when the football league decided to file infringement notices with Google targeting the Smarters website.

 

A DMCA notice published on the Lumen Database dated January 4, 2022, targeted 16 IPTVSmarters.com URLs, including its main page, about page, terms and conditions, privacy policy, refund policy and download page.

 

A second DMCA notice reveals that LaLiga demanded the search engine delisting of the official IPTV Smarters Pro Google Play page on December 12, 2022. The same notice went on to demand the delisting of more than 140 URLs on IPTVSmarters.com.

 

“The denounced website sells channel services or subscriptions to servers that provide unauthorized payment channel decryption keys. They are copyrighted broadcasts that are available through the IPTV/CCCAM service,” LaLiga’s DMCA notice reads.

 

The ‘How it Works‘ page on IPTVSmarters states “We don’t provide or Sell any Subscriptions, Stream and Content. We are a Software Development Company.”

 

Unlike the allegations in the MPA and EC reports, these allegations are extremely specific, right down to the URL. Among those 140+ URLs are some that offer the Smarters app for direct download (without needing Google Play), forum discussions on how to pay for the app without involving Google, and dozens of pages relating to user accounts.

 

Somewhat ironically, the DMCA notice also demanded the removal of Smarters’ dedicated copyright page which explains how to complain about copyright infringement and have infringing content removed. On the same page, Smarters says it will “suspend or terminate the accounts of user(s) found to infringe copyrights of others.”

 

After more than two decades of use and abuse, the DMCA takedown notice has managed to make enemies on all sides.

 

Rightsholders decry the need to send millions of them, nobody likes receiving them, and people on both sides feel outraged when DMCA notices are used as a weapon.

 

And they are, on a daily basis, and in their thousands, with almost no repercussions for the overwhelming majority of perpetrators.

Bungie Fights Back

In March 2022, videogame giant Bungie decided to make an example of an unknown individual who was believed to have sent 96 fraudulent DMCA takedown notices to YouTube. Subsequent content removals were wrongfully attributed to Bungie and high-profile Destiny content creators felt let down. With the community in uproar, Bungie’s response was delivered by its legal team.

 

Among other things, Bungie’s $7.7m lawsuit demanded $150,000 in statutory damages for each fraudulent takedown notice, claiming that every time its content was taken down, the company’s right to authorize the public display and performance of its copyrighted works was violated.

 

When Bungie filed an amended complaint in June 2022, the company revealed that a sophisticated investigation had identified the alleged DMCA fraudster: Destiny gamer and Bungie customer Nicholas Minor, better known online as ‘Lord Nazos’.

Six Months Later…

In common with many similar lawsuits carrying multi-million dollar claims, public excitement surrounding the Bungie/Minor case was soon displaced by routine court filings and dramas elsewhere. A joint status report and discovery plan filed mid-November lacked fireworks and little hope of a settlement.

 

“Plaintiff spent considerable resources addressing the community outcry and investigating the fraudulent takedowns, eventually identifying Defendant as the person issuing the takedowns,” Bungie informed the court.

 

“[P]laintiff pled six causes of action: fraudulent notice under §512(f) of the DMCA, false designation of origin under 15 U.S.C. § 1125(a), copyright infringement under 17 U.S.C. § 501 et seq, business defamation, violation of the Washington Consumer Protection Act under RCW 19.86.020, and breach of contract.”

 

The statement from Minor was brief. He denied engaging in willful conduct or bad faith as alleged in the amended complaint, and then denied almost everything else too.

 

“Defendant disputes Bungie’s contentions that he submitted knowingly false DMCA notices or counternotices, that he infringed Bungie’s copyrighted works or that there is a factual or legal basis for an infringement suit for any infringement that was the subject of a DMCA notice,” Minor’s statement reads.

 

“Bungie’s claims for false designation of origin, business defamation and violation of the Washington Consumer Protection Acts are legally and factually inapplicable to this case.”

The Long Haul Ahead

The deadline for joining additional parties to the case expired a few days ago without any being added. January 6, 2023, marks the deadline for amended pleadings and on September 18, 2023, expert witness reports are due.

 

Motions related to discovery must be filed by October 18, 2023, and discovery itself must be completed by November 17, 2023. Any motions to dismiss some or even all of the claims are due a month later, on December 18, 2023. Or to put things another way, almost a whole year from now.

 

If the parties fail to reach a settlement, the case will go to a jury trial. The date set by the court is April 15, 2024, and the trial itself is expected to last between three and five days.

 

A win is always a win, but beyond that, it’s hard to see any benefit for either side. By April 2024, the reasons for the lawsuit will be long forgotten and if DMCA notices are still as relevant as they are today, they’ll still be abused to disappear content, for whatever reason prevails on that particular day.

 

The status report and order setting trial date can be found here and here (pdf)

 

Every year we write hundreds of articles here at TorrentFreak, with some are more popular than others.

 

On the brink of the new year, we look back at 2022 by reviewing the thirteen most-read news items of the last 12 months.

 

All in all, it was quite a controversial year once again. The Z-Library crackdown and aftermath was a massive story. And with a criminal investigation into two of the site’s alleged operators, that will likely continue in the coming year.

 

Various leaks, domain troubles, and court orders made top headlines as well. The most popular articles are listed below, grouped into the twelve biggest stories of the year.

1. Z-library Shutdown and Aftermath

Z-Library shows up in several of the most-read articles this year. The site first appeared in the news during October when we revealed that TikTok had banned the Zlibrary hashtag following complaints from authors. That was just the start, however.

 

In November, the U.S. Government seized Z-Library’s main domain names. Soon after, the authorities revealed that two alleged Russian operators had been arrested in Argentina as part of a criminal investigation.

 

While the indicted duo await potential extradition to the United States, Z-Library remains operational on the dark web. In addition, Telegram bots and archive sites try to satisfy the demand for pirated books.

 

—

2. Pirate Sites Disappear from DuckDuckGo

In April, we noticed that several high-profile “pirate” sites were unfindable in DuckDuckGo’s search results. It wasn’t clear why these domains disappeared but The Pirate Bay, Fmovies, YTMP3.cc, and many others were no longer showing up.

 

After some back and forth, Bing was identified as the culprit. DuckDuckGo said it would work hard to mitigate the problem. The missing sites eventually returned to DuckDuckGo and Bing search results.

 

—

3. US Court Orders Every ISP in the United States to Block Illegal Streaming Sites

In May, a coalition of Israel-based media companies obtained a broad injunction at a New York court that required every ISP in the United States to block three pirate streaming sites.

 

This requirement was met with massive opposition from prominent companies such as Google and Cloudflare, after which the parties eventually agreed to seek a less explosive compromise.

 

—

4. Adblocking Does Not Constitute Copyright Infringement

In January, Axel Springer lost its copyright infringement lawsuit against Eyeo GmbH, the company behind Adblock Plus. The German publishing house, which owns the Bild and Die Welt brands, among others, claimed that adblockers interfere with the presentation of websites in browsers, thus breaching copyright.

 

The Hamburg District Court disagreed and decided to dismiss the case. According to the court, ad blocking doesn’t involve any unauthorized duplication and/or reworking of copyrighted computer programs, as defined in Germany’s copyright law.

 

—

5. “House of the Dragon” Fills GOT’s Shoes

The long-awaited premiere of “House of the Dragon” finally arrived in August. The Game of Thrones prequel immediately proved a hit on pirate sites, where the first episode was widely available nearly a day before the official release. As a result, hundreds of thousands of pirates watched the show before paying customers.

 

House of the Dragon made piracy headlines once more when the season finale leaked early. The circle was completed this week when – in true Game of Thrones spirit – House of the Dragon became the most pirated TV show of 2022.

 

—

6. Genshin Impact Leaker Ubatcha

A few weeks ago, prolific Genshin Impact leaker ‘Ubatcha’ was targeted in a DMCA subpoena application filed by publisher Cognosphere. The legal uncertainty left its mark, much to the disappointment of Ubatcha’s close followers.

 

The question now is whether Cognosphere will leave things as they stand or push forward with a full-blown lawsuit to send a deterrent but potentially fan-alienating message.

 

—

7. Netflix Password Sharing is a Crime?

Earlier this month, the UK Government’s Intellectual Property Office published new piracy guidance. To the surprise of many, it warned that sharing passwords for streaming services such as Netflix is illegal, and may even incur criminal liability for fraud.

 

Soon after we uncovered this unusual advice, the Office quietly updated its tough warnings, removing all references to password sharing.

 

—

8. Spider-Man: No Way Home Leaked Early

In March, a high-quality Blu-ray copy of ‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’ leaked online, weeks before the official physical release.

 

The pirate copy was released by EVO, the same group that previously leaked many other prominent titles before disappearing later in the year. While the Blu-ray source is unknown, an unauthorized eBay seller coincidentally offered the disc for sale around the same time.

 

—

9. 1337x Became Unreachable

1337x.to, one of the world’s most-visited torrent sites, became unreachable in April. The site’s DNS records had been wiped, which made it impossible for browsers to resolve the domain.

 

As it turned out, someone forgot to renew the 1337x.to domain name before it expired. This oversight was eventually spotted and the team managed to extend the registration before it was gone for good.

 

—

10. Why the “You Wouldn’t Steal” Campaign Didn’t Work

You wouldn’t steal a car, right? So why are you pirating? With this 2004 message, the movie industry hoped to turn illegal downloaders into paying customers.

 

While the campaign is arguably the most widely known ani-piracy PSA, a new research paper identified several behavioral insights that explain why these and other initiatives often fail to reach the desired outcome.

 

—

11. MindGeek’s Anti-Piracy Efforts

In April, adult entertainment conglomerate MindGeek won a major court battle against Daftsex.com. In addition to $32 million in damages, the court issued an injunction allowing the rightsholder to take over this and other domains.

 

Interestingly, ‘someone’ tried to hijack the domain takeover process by posing as MindGeek in an email to domain registry Verisign.

 

—

12. Iconic Cracking Group Codex Quits

In February, Scene cracking group CODEX officially threw in the towel. The iconic tag had taken the cracking world by storm during the prior eight years. The group was able to crack even the toughest copy protections, instilling fear among game publishers and garnering respect among its peers.

 

CODEX represented competition for RELOADED, the dominant PC games cracking group at the time. When the competitive element disappeared, the group felt it had reached its goal.

 

“So now, years after reaching our initial goal, we feel that it is time to move on. We thank everyone who accompanied and supported us on our journey,” the group wrote.

 

—

13. How Bungie Used Digital Trails to Track Down an Imposter

In response to persons unknown sending large numbers of fake DMCA notices to YouTube while impersonating its anti-piracy partner, Bungie filed a lawsuit in the U.S. seeking millions in damages.

 

At the time the name of the ‘Doe’ defendant was unknown. We unveiled how a Bungie investigation followed digital breadcrumbs to track down and identify that person by name and physical address.

 

—

 

Over the past five years the Australian Government has committed significant resources to several copyright-related initiatives, not least the Copyright Amendment (Online Infringement) Act 2018.

 

In preparation for 2023 and beyond, the government wants to determine whether enforcement measures available under existing copyright law remain appropriate, effective and proportionate. The first stage of that process begins with an issues paper published by the Attorney General’s Department.

Copyright Enforcement Review & Consultation

Copyright in Australia is governed by the Copyright Act 1968 which is administered by the Attorney-General’s Department.

 

Copyright infringement, such as downloading/sharing music, movies and TV shows, is punishable under civil and criminal law, depending on individual circumstances. The Copyright Act also allows rightsholders to request ISP blocking injunctions against overseas pirate services, and pursue legal action against those who circumvent technical protection measures.

 

Through its Copyright Enforcement Review the Government seeks to understand current and emerging enforcement priorities and the challenges they face within the existing framework, as shown below.

 

A public consultation seeking views from “all parts of the copyright system,” including rightsholders, users, institutions and service providers, will help the government determine if changes are required to ensure the protection of creative content moving forward.

 

The government says that proposals should not impose “unreasonable administrative or economic burdens” on those expected to implement them.

Overall Piracy Shows No Strong Trend in Either Direction

The issues paper states that most Australians who consume content online “do the right thing,” but a minority still consume content in a way that infringes copyright.

 

The government acknowledges that any infringement is troubling for rightsholders but notes that “data does not indicate a strong upward or downward trend in demand for unlicensed and infringing digital content over recent years.”

 

What the data does show, however, are shifts in specific forms of infringing content consumption. While music, movie and TV show piracy show a general downward trend, piracy of content in the publishing sector is on the increase.

 

“The growth in visits to publishing piracy sites in recent years is driven to a large extent by increases in visits to sites categorised as Manga sites, which accounted for over 60% of Australian visits to publishing piracy sites in 2021,” the paper adds.

 

The detail in the review suggests a willingness to look at all aspects of copyright enforcement in Australia, from those defined under law to measures obtained via private, commercial agreements.

Industry and Statute-Based Mechanisms

Any development of industry-driven mechanisms must take place within existing law, but their nature allows participants to go beyond their legal obligations. While these types of agreements can limit friction and reduce the need for legal action, more often than not the first casualty is transparency.

 

Examples include collaboration between industry partners to identify and take down allegedly infringing content more quickly, or the utilization of automatic content recognition tools to prevent content from reappearing following a takedown.

Site-Blocking Measures

Statute-based mechanisms available under the Copyright Act will also face scrutiny during the government’s review. One example is Australia’s 7-year-old site-blocking mechanism, which to date has blocked 1,600 sites following an initial injunction, and an unspecified number under 300 extension orders tackling replacement domains, mirror and proxy portals.

 

Previous reports from the government, rightsholders, and anti-piracy groups have praised the efficacy of blocking in Australia. A 2018 report from Incopro (pdf) noted that it “resulted in a usage reduction of 53.4% to blocked sites when comparing usage recorded in November 2017 to before blocking took effect.”

 

In 2020, the MPA reported (pdf) that blocked pirate site users “increased consumption of content on legal viewing sites in the post-period following the blocking by 5%.” A 2021 OCI survey found that 59% of citizens who encountered a block simply gave up, with 18% seeking legal access instead.

 

Given the gentle prompting in the issues paper, those who previously praised Australia’s blocking program may be encouraged to demand more. Technological “tools and techniques” including VPNs can be used to bypass site-blocking, the paper notes, adding that the use of custom DNS services “may be increasing.”

 

Major rightsholder submissions may cite blocking circumvention as an issue but are more likely to focus on improvements to the existing system. Australia’s approach to blocking is extremely thorough and the legal process is meticulous, but by most standards, it is very, very slow.

 

Rightsholders may be hesitant to request too much, but the speed of blocking following an application is likely to be a key issue. It might be too soon for Australia, but no one should be surprised if there are calls for a fast-track administrative blocking system, operated by a new or designated authority, and assisted by industry-nominated ‘trusted notifiers’.

 

The Copyright Enforcement Review issues paper can be found here (pdf) and the announcement here. Submissions can be made here (link)

 

The consultation ends March 7, 2023

 

At the end of every year, we take a look at the most-downloaded TV episodes among torrenting pirates.

 

For several years in a row the list was headed by Game of Thrones but that reign came to an end in 2019 after the series ended.

 

This changing of the guard made room for two Disney+ exclusives to step in. In 2020, ‘The Mandalorian’ was the most pirated show, followed by ‘Wandavision’ in 2021.

 

With neither of these shows releasing new episodes, we can crown another winner this year.

 

As suggested in our previous coverage, ‘Game of Thrones’ prequel ‘House of the Dragon’ is the most pirated TV show of 2022. The HBO show beat fellow newcomer ‘The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power’ which sits in second place.

 

What stands out most about the Top 10 is that it’s entirely made up of newcomers. This also means that ‘Rick and Morty’, a regular on the list for several years, has dropped off.

 

With the current streaming landscape being so fragmented, it is no surprise that streaming exclusives dominate the list today. Apparently, many people see piracy as an alternative to taking out yet another subscription.

 

It’s worth noting that BitTorrent traffic only makes up a small portion of the piracy landscape. Most people use streaming sites and services nowadays, which generally do not report viewing stats.

 

—

 

Below we have compiled a list of the most torrented TV shows worldwide and released in 2022 (per episode). The ranking is estimated based on sample data from several sources, including I Know and statistics reported by public BitTorrent trackers.

 

Most downloaded TV-shows on BitTorrent, 2022

rank	last year	show	network
torrentfreak.com
1	(…)	House of the Dragon	HBO
2	(…)	The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power	Amazon Prime
3	(…)	The Boys	Amazon Prime
4	(…)	Moon Knight	Disney+
5	(…)	Halo	Paramount+
6	(…)	Obi-Wan Kenobi	Disney+
7	(…)	The Book of Boba Fett	Disney+
8	(…)	Stranger Things	Netflix
9	(…)	She-Hulk: Attorney at Law	Disney+
10	(…)	Andor	Disney+

 

When movies are recorded directly from cinema screens, the resulting pirate copy is known as a ‘cam’, regardless of the device used – camcorder or otherwise.

 

The terms camming, camcording, cammer, and other variations are not exclusive to movie piracy circles though; those paid to monitor and crack down on pirates use them a lot too.

 

In a report to the USTR in early 2022, the International Intellectual Property Alliance used similar terms more than 130 times when calling out China, Ecuador, India, Mexico, Russia, Brazil, and other countries for not doing enough to prevent in-cinema recording (pdf).

 

While camming is clearly an ongoing problem for some countries, enhanced security and tough legislation in the United Kingdom should deter even the most determined pirates. In theory, at least.

Arrest in the UK

Early October, the UK’s Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit announced the arrest of a man in Liverpool “in connection with an investigation into film piracy.” The involvement of the Film Content Protection Agency (FCPA), the Film Distributors’ Association anti-piracy group, left little doubt this was related to camming.

 

Over the weeks that followed, TorrentFreak was able to link the arrest with an industry report claiming that at least four movies, recorded in two UK cinemas during the summer, had appeared online.

 

Our report published late November provides more detail and last week an FDA/FCPA newsletter dated December 20 (pdf) confirmed events as reported.

 

Aside from being recorded in the UK, where an intent to distribute copies online can carry a 10-year prison sentence, the copies were notable for another reason – their extraordinary quality.

 

This isn’t mentioned by FCPA and we’re still unable to confirm which movies are linked to the case, but the period cited – June to August 2022 – coincides with surprisingly high-quality cam copies suddenly appearing online around mid-June before stopping around mid-August.

 

Double-whammy events like these aren’t exactly common in the UK, especially given the alleged quality and the obvious threat to the market. However, records show that camming ‘incidents’ in UK cinemas are extraordinarily common, yet receive almost no press.

Other Camming Incidents in 2022

Camming incidents appear to be covered more comprehensively in annual reports, meaning that overall data for 2022 won’t be available for another few months. In the meantime, the four movies cammed in Liverpool can be added to other incidents recorded elsewhere in 2022.

 

At Cineworld Dundee (Scotland) on an unspecified date, a staff member identified a customer camming a movie. The title hasn’t been published but in line with FCPA policy, the diligent staff member received an award for her anti-piracy work.

 

Along with staff in hundreds of other cinemas in the UK, she is likely to have received training and detailed instructions on how to respond to a camming event (pdf).

 

In another incident earlier this year, a ‘cammed’ copy of Spider-Man: No Way Home appeared online soon after its theatrical release. Forensic investigators linked the copy to a cinema in Leeds, West Yorkshire.

 

The image below was circulated to cinemas in the UK following the arrest of a suspect. It later appeared in a FCPA newsletter in redacted form. We’ve concealed the suspect’s identity in the original but the text clearly shows that preventing any repeat behavior remained a priority for FCPA.

 

The image on the right appears to be a still from surveillance footage, one of the key weapons in the fight against camcorder piracy. Data from camming incidents in 2021 shows evidence can also be obtained from less obvious sources.

Camming Incidents Break Records in 2021

The Film Distributors’ Association Yearbook 2022 notes that PIPCU, MPA, The Industry Trust, and the Alliance for Intellectual Property, all partner with FCPA in its fight against piracy. The level of camming incidents reported in 2021 shows that the FCPA needed all the help it could get.

 

“During 2021 the FCPA was directly involved in the professional investigation, intelligence gathering and research of 125 copyright theft incidents in cinemas,” the FDA publication reads (pdf).

 

Due to COVID-19 lockdowns, the 125 incidents actually occurred over just seven months, the highest number ever reported by the FDA.

 

“The majority of these incidents led to the offenders being confronted and excluded from screenings by the cinema management. However, the more serious occurrences required swift police assistance, and resulted in five people being arrested and a further seven receiving recorded police cautions for illegal in-cinema activity,” the report adds.

Detail on Specific Cases

Details on some individual cases can be found in a report published by the UK Cinema Association (UKCA). It notes that online global piracy release groups struggled to obtain content in early 2021 due to COVID-19-enforced closures of cinemas around the world. When cinemas began to open up, pirates picked up where they had left off – including in the UK.

 

“Two high-impact cases occurred in particular immediately as UK cinemas began re-opening in May [2021], with two publicly available copies of a new film traced via film forensics to two London cinemas only six miles apart,” the report reveals.

 

“Subsequent investigations revealed that the same offender was responsible in both instances, plus another case in December 2020. Having been identified and traced, he was arrested in July.”

Pirates Tracked and Traced, One Literally

When the UK came out of lockdown, visitors to cinemas and other venues such as pubs and clubs, were required to fill in so-called ‘track and trace’ documents. In the event of an infection, government ‘track and trace’ teams were then able to directly contact people who were in the vicinity and ask them to isolate to prevent the spread.

 

According to UKCA, the suspected cammer arrested in July completed one of these forms with his details and signed it.

 

From July 2021, another three cammed movies appeared online and were subsequently traced back to cinemas in London. All of the offenders were identified but efforts to locate them are reported as “ongoing”. Interestingly, the report claims that these cases were linked in some way, despite none of the individual offenders knowing each other.

 

“In one unusual case, film theft returned to an East London cinema which had experienced high-impact piracy in 2019, albeit this time through a different offender, something which serves as a reminder that this activity can happen at any cinema, no matter how unlikely a target site might seem,” the report concludes (pdf).

 

Screeners are advance copies of recent movies that are generally sent out to critics and awards voters for review.

 

These copies have regularly ended up in the hands of pirates after which they’re widely circulated online. That includes screeners of potential Academy Award nominees, which usually appear around December.

 

In recent history, hundreds of these screeners have leaked early. In 2015, for example, a a spree of high-profile screeners were released by the Hive-CM8 group. These allegedly came from the talent agency Innovative Artists which was later sued by Warner Bros.

 

During the past two years, the first movie screeners surfaced even earlier in the season. In 2020, the first ones came out in October and a year later the first leaks appeared in September. These ‘digital screener’ leaks were linked to film festivals, instead of awards show voting.

No Screener Leaks

This year, however, things have been rather quiet on the screener front. While many awards screener links have already been sent off for review, the first have yet to leak to the public.

 

Looking at recent history, it’s almost unthinkable that no pirated screener copies will appear online this year. For more than two decades they have leaked in significant numbers, often from Hollywood’s own connections. So why would that stop now?

 

While it’s still possible that a wave of new screeners will come out during the next few days, several developments make that less likely than usual.

EVO?

Many of the screeners leaked in recent years were published by the release group “EVO”, which mysteriously disappeared a few weeks ago. The group used to post a steady stream of TV and movie releases, not just screeners. This regular posting schedule came to an abrupt halt last month and hasn’t resumed.

 

EVO’s disappearance was followed by unsubstantiated rumors of an arrest. We haven’t found any hard evidence of an enforcement action but leaking screeners is a risky endeavor that draws the attention of the largest Hollywood players.

 

There are only a few groups that are willing to take these risks. Even if there are other release groups that have access to screeners, these may be spooked by EVO’s sudden absence.

Screeners Lost Relevance

This enforcement threat may play a role in the absence of leaks this year. The fact that all Oscar screeners are now sent digitally may also help to increase security, although that’s certainly not a silver bullet.

 

A third and perhaps even more important factor is the overall relevance of screeners in today’s movie piracy landscape.

 

Piracy groups typically release pirate screeners when there’s no high-quality copy of a movie available online. This was very common in the past, due to the long window between theatrical and Blu-Ray or digital releases. That’s no longer the case.

 

Today, release windows have shrunk significantly or disappeared altogether. When Netflix releases a new movie a high-quality copy is posted to pirate sites soon after. As a result, a screener of an already-released Netflix title is useless for piracy groups.

Rare Breed

The shorter release windows have made screener leaks a rare breed. In the early 2000s, it was pretty common to see screeners of all Oscar contenders leak online before the winners were announced. Last year, the volume dropped below 10% for the first time.

 

The fact that fewer screeners leak doesn’t mean that piracy is less prevalent, of course. On the contrary, screeners are less relevant because there are other high-quality leaks of the films already circulating online.

 

This doesn’t mean that screeners no longer exist in the streaming era. Depending on the release date, voters still need early access to a Netflix or Disney+ film if it’s not on the platform yet.

 

All in all, we can conclude that it is certainly notable that there haven’t been any screener leaks thus far this year. However, it’s not entirely unexpected; It’s simply a sign of the time.

 

After gathering data and in the absence of announcements by U.S. law enforcement agencies, on December 10 TorrentFreak reported on a wave of domain seizures.

 

Many of the affected sites displayed a banner indicating the involvement of three government agencies – IPR Center, Homeland Security Investigations, and the Department of Justice.

 

Data clearly showed that the domains were all connected to illicit live sports streaming, but it took another three days for that to be officially confirmed.

 

On December 13, the United States Attorney for the District of Maryland confirmed that more than 50 domains had been seized to protect FIFA World Cup 2022. None of the domains were mentioned by name, but TorrentFreak independently identified just over three dozen.

 

Less than a week later, with some sites using backup domains and some investing in replacements, U.S. law enforcement followed up with a new wave of seizures that attempted to whack-the-moles as they resurfaced.

The Domain Seizure Mystery

At least for the time being, the domain seizures appear to have stopped, but that in itself only adds to the growing list of questions.

 

Why seize these domains and not others? Why seize domains to protect FIFA when a) football isn’t exactly popular in the U.S. and b) there are plenty of bigger sites covering NFL/NBA/NHL/UFC etc, and continue to do so? Why not seize domains every month, every week, or even every day?

 

We don’t have definitive answers on any of these questions, but data collected by TorrentFreak on close to 70 seized domains (listed at the end of this article) offers pointers on why some domains could be more vulnerable than others. The bigger picture over millions of domains suggests that many pirate sites are already vulnerable to domain seizures.

Seizures Targeted Some High Traffic Domains

The live sports streaming piracy market is both huge and global. Public streaming websites are just a part of a larger picture where even the seizure of 70+ domains has limited impact, despite inconveniencing hundreds of millions of monthly visitors.

 

The chart below shows the seized domains that enjoyed the most traffic, measured by their visits in November 2022, before the seizures began. The list started as a ‘Top 10’ but due to some replication of traffic across WeakStreams and SoccerStreams, one of the domains was excluded.

 

Given that the United States is behind these domain seizures, we wanted to determine where these sites were (and in some cases still are) most popular. The domains listed below are followed by monthly visits data for November 2022 (SimilarWeb data, rounded), their five most popular visitor countries, and the percentage of each domain’s total traffic they accounted for.

 

Librefutbol.com – 70m – Argentina 45%, Peru 14%, Columbia 9%, Mexico 5%, Chile 4%
Score808.com – 32.1m – Malaysia 9%, Kenya 9%, Indonesia 6%, Nigeria 5%, UAE 5%
Hesgoal.com – 30.1m – UK 14%, U.S. 11%, Belgium 6%, Sweden 6%, Netherlands 4%
Freestreams-live1 – 21.1m – U.S. 23%, UK 13%, Canada 9%, Poland 3%, Germany 3%
Soccerstreams.net – 16.4m – U.S. 22%, Canada 12%, UK 12%, Portugal 6%, India 3%
istream2watch.com – 10.8m – U.S. 26%, Canada 9%, UK 6%, Portugal 5%, Germany 3%
Rojadirectatv.tv – 11.7m – Spain 32%, Columbia 17%, Mexico 14%, Argentina 8%, Chile 8%
Steamlivenow.me – 10.7m – U.S. 28%, Canada 9%, UK 6%, Portugal 5%, Germany 4%
Yalla-Shoots.com – 8.4m – Egypt 19%, Morocco 15%, Algeria 9%, UAE 6%, Germany 6%

 

While visitors from the U.S. account for around a quarter of visits to three of the most popular domains in the list, Argentina’s love for Librefutbol.com amounted to 31.5m visits per month in November alone – in a nation of fewer than 46 million people.

 

New domains for the site are reportedly in operation, but the seizure will have had a significant effect on traffic, at the worst possible time for Argentinian football fans.

Domain Registrars

The domains listed above show a reasonable spread of extensions – from .com to .tv, through .net and .me – but the full list offers even more variety and clearly no better protection against seizure.

 

Despite having a reputation for being at least a little more resilient than most, a pair of .to domains also found themselves directed toward U.S. Government servers. A pair of domains registered with Sarek Oy stood up no better, despite the registrar having a reputation for being an awful lot more resilient than others.

 

Nearly 15% of the seized domains were registered with GoDaddy, but with 4.4m domains and almost 15% of the domain market overall, that looks normal. NameCheap-registered domains accounted for almost 27% of seizures against its 14% market share but with 4.06m domains overall, anything could happen if another 50 or 100 domains were added to the seizure list.

 

After examining close to 70 domains in search of a pattern or anomaly, little about the domains suggest anything out of the ordinary. All are clearly susceptible to seizure whenever U.S. authorities decide that’s the appropriate course of action.

Location, Location, Location

One thing is glaringly obvious, however. When U.S. authorities need something done, it certainly doesn’t hurt when domain companies are on home soil. And they are, overwhelmingly so.

 

Of all domains seized in December based on allegations of illegal streaming, almost 69% were registered with US-based companies. The runner-up with just over 13% of the domains was India-based PDR Ltd, but ultimately even that has US-based owners.

 

That leads to the biggest question of all: if 70 or so domains can be seized in the blink of an eye, why can’t 700 or 7,000? Even if the domains were seized as part of an adversarial legal process, the chances of any domain owners appearing in the U.S. to fight for their return are vanishingly small. And that means only one thing – more domain seizures.

 

Given the tendency towards symbolism, a new wave of seizures may coincide with a major sporting event or a notable date in Hollywood’s diary. Precisely when is unknown but one thing is certain; any domain with a connection to the U.S. is vulnerable and finding alternatives may not be as easy as it sounds.

Suggestions That .org Domains Are ‘Safe’

The Pirate Bay has operated from thepiratebay.org for years, which may be seen as a plus for domains with a .org extension. Indeed, it appears that operators of a handful of the sports streaming sites listed below have switched to a .org variant, despite the controlling Public Interest Registry and parent Internet Society both having a base in Virginia, United States.

 

Indeed, when more than 240 Z-Library domains were seized last month, among them were z-lib.org, b-ok.org, book4you.org, hk1lib.org, art1lib.org, ca1lib.org, eg1lib.org, and at least two dozen more with a .org extension.

 

For reference, we compared the WHOIS records of thepiratebay.org (registrar easyDNS Technologies – Canada) with the WHOIS records of ten random Z-Library .org domains that currently have DNS records pointing to SeizedServers.com.

 

Book4you.org is the only domain with a registrar in the United States (GoDaddy.com, LLC). The next seven – b-ok.org, zlib.org, hk1lib.org, cl1lib.org, art1lib.org, ca1lib.org, eg1lib.org and au1lib.org – were all registered with Canada-based Tucows Domains.

 

2lib.org was also registered with Tucows, with Njalla-owner 1337 Services LLC as the registrant. Privacy was most likely maintained but the domain was still seized, unlike The Pirate Bay’s which appears impossibly bulletproof. For now, at least.

 

Domains Seized By U.S. Authorities (December 2022, list may be incomplete)

 

– 222live.com
– 247football.net
– 88kanqiu.tv
– 88zhibo.net
– 9goal.tv
– 9goaltv.cc
– 9goaltv.to
– acrackstreams.com
– ajsports.tv
– amzfootball.com
– beeduball.com
– bongtron1.live
– cado89.com
– crichd.pro
– eplsite.football
– extremotvplay.com
– freestreams-live1.com
– futbollatam.com
– futbollatin.com
– futboltv-envivo.com
– futboltv.biz
– futboltv.live
– ghiban1.live
– ghiban2.com
– goaltime.tv
– guduballs.com
– hesgoal.com
– hesgoal.me
– hesgoal.pro
– hesgoal.tv
– ijube.com
– istream2watch.com
– juventus-live-stream.com
– koragol.com
– librefutbol.com
– live-sports-stream.net
– livetv605.me
– mythethao.com
– mythethao.live
– ovopremium.com
– polysportstv.info
– releasesky.com
– rojadirecta-futbol.live
– rojadirecta.global
– rojadirecta.me
– rojadirecta.vip
– rojadirectaliga.com
– rojadirectatv.tv
– rojadirectatvlive.com
– rojadirectatvonline.net
– score808.com
– soccer24hd.com
– soccerstreams.net
– soccerstreams.to
– sportstream.tv
– streamlivenow.me
– tarjetarojaonlinetv.com
– tenorsky.com
– toplivematch.com
– toplivematch.net
– tructiep99.com
– tvrojadirectaonline.net
– vipleagues.net
– weakstream.net
– weakstreams.com
– wizwig1.com
– yalla-shoots.com

 

Some players in the pirate IPTV market view subscription sales as little more than a side hustle, one that brings in a few dollars here, and a few dollars there. No big deal.

 

That may well be the case but elsewhere in the chain, people are making serious money. Bill Omar Carrasquillo, aka Omi in a Hellcat, openly admits that he made multiple tens of millions from his service, Gears TV. The operators of Nitro TV didn’t make that much, but the amount still contained one or two digits followed by six zeros.

 

In common with Carrasquillo, legal problems also engulfed Nitro operator Alex Galindo and several members of his family. After being sued in 2021 by US broadcaster DISH Network, Sling and NagraStar, in June 2022 a court ordered Nitro’s operators to pay more than $100m in damages, a staggering amount that won’t ever be recovered in full.

 

Recovery in part can’t be ruled out, however.

Plaintiffs Go After the Money

In July 2022, the plaintiffs stepped on the gas by requesting several writs of garnishment at a Texas district court. Believing that the Galindos had squirreled away several million dollars in various bank accounts, the plaintiffs sought permission to find out exactly how much was involved and where it could be found.

 

Among those contacted were Wells Fargo Bank, Woodforest National Bank, JPMorgan Chase Bank, Bank of America, and Capital One (example response below)

 

All responses received amounted roughly to the same thing – if there was ever any money, it’s all gone now. In October 2022, the plaintiffs updated the court on their findings, noting that more than $10 million had been spent, relocated, or otherwise disappeared.

Disappearing Millions

Referring to Nitro TV defendants Alejandro (Alex), Anna, Martha, and Osvaldo Galindo as “Judgment Debtors”, the plaintiffs reminded the court of ignored pre-lawsuit cease-and-desist correspondence, failure to shut down Nitro TV after the lawsuit was filed, and destruction of evidence while it was underway.

 

Then came details of the bank accounts;

 

– $5.8m deposited into Martha and Osvaldo Galindo’s Chase accounts. Balance: $49.22.
– $3.0m deposited into Martha’s Capital One account. Response: No active accounts
– $1.0m deposited into Anna’s Woodforest account. Balance: unspecified negative sum
– $164k deposited into Alex’s Wells Fargo account. Response: No active accounts

 

“All told, the entirety of the $10 million that Judgment Debtors are known to have received from their sale of Device Codes has been removed from Judgment Debtors’ accounts,” DISH and Nagra informed the court.

 

“More than $1.5 million of those funds was transferred to a Galindo family member in Mexico and another $181,730.00 was transferred to Alejandro Galindo’s ex-wife, further demonstrating that Judgment Debtors have taken steps to conceal their illicit proceeds and prevent Plaintiffs from enforcing the Judgment.”

 

Some assets are less easily relocated, however.

A Very Nice House in Texas

While protection varies from state to state, a homestead exemption can limit creditors’ access to equity held in a home. A property identified by the plaintiffs in Friendswood, Texas, does not enjoy any protection, the plaintiffs informed the court.

 

“The Friendswood Property was purchased using funds that Judgment Debtors wrongfully acquired from their sale of Device Codes [pirate IPTV subscriptions],” the companies said, referencing the property in the video below.

 

 

The plaintiffs said that customer IPTV subscription payments totaling $5.5m were paid into a Paymentech account. Around $5.4m was transferred to a Chase account operated by Martha Galindo, with $925,913 ultimately financing the house in Friendswood, under Alex Galindo’s name.

No Protection, Court Orders Sale of Property

“The Friendswood Property does not qualify for homestead protection under this well-established Texas law because the property was purchased using wrongfully acquired funds that Judgment Debtors received from their infringing Nitro TV service,” the plaintiffs informed the court.

 

The Galindos could have objected, but did not. On November 30, 2022, the court ordered the United States Marshal Service to levy and sell the property, and apply the proceeds towards satisfaction of the judgment.

 

The Marshal Service visited the house on December 9, 2022. According to court records, someone inside responded to the official’s knock and ring, but he wasn’t invited into the property. A Notice of Sale was posted on the front door.

 

A formal notice was later published by The Daily News, the oldest newspaper in Texas. It has since been removed but the key details are as follows:

 

[The U.S. Marshals Service] will proceed to sell, without appraisement, for cash, to the best and highest bidder, on the first Tuesday in January 2023, that being the 3rd day of January 2023, at Public Auction at the Galveston County Courthouse located at 722 Moody Ave., Galveston, TX 77550 in the commissioner’s court, between the hours of 10a.m. and 4p.m., all the right, title and interest of the defendant(s) in the real property as described below in order to satisfy the judgment issued in the above mentioned action.

 

At the start of the sale, the Marshal shall set the minimum bid and bid increments, if any. At the conclusion of the sale the winning bidder shall provide the U.S. Marshal with a deposit of ten percent (10%) of the winning bid and the remaining ninety percent (90%) shall be paid within seven (7) days thereafter, excluding Saturdays, Sundays, and holidays.

 

While large damages awards are often the outcome of pirate IPTV lawsuits in the United States, their scale can at times render them ridiculous to most ordinary people.

 

The persistence of DISH, Sling and Nagra, shows that while the amounts can be unbelievable, the consequences live on, long after the headlines have been forgotten.

 

The potential for the consequences to drag on in this matter seems considerable. Even if the property sells for $1 million, the amount outstanding on the damages award will still exceed $99 million.

 

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

 

By now most BitTorrent users should be well aware that their IP-addresses and downloads can be easily monitored.

 

This has resulted in hundreds of thousands of lawsuits against alleged video pirates, both in the U.S. and abroad.

 

In the U.S., most of these cases are filed by Strike 3 Holdings. The company produces adult entertainment videos made available via the Blacked, Tushy, and Vixen websites. When the videos are shared on pirate sites, Strike 3 takes action.

More Pirates, More Lawsuits?

These lawsuits can be a lucrative business, especially when targeted defendants opt for quick settlements of a few thousand dollars. The money comes on top of the deterrent factor, which is often cited by copyright holders as one of the main reasons to take action.

 

These lawsuits deter many alleged pirates and maybe some of their neighbors too, but the copyright-infringement problem is rather persistent, as is exemplified by Strike 3’s own track record.

 

This week, we decided to take a look at the number of file-sharing lawsuits filed in the United States in 2022. The data shows that one company has been particularly active: Strike 3 Holdings.

New Record!

From January 1 to today, Strike 3 submitted 2,788 complaints in various courts around the U.S., targeting “John Doe” subscribers. This is a record-breaking statistic. Never before has a copyright holder filed this many lawsuits against alleged file-sharers in a single year.

 

For comparison, in 2017 all rightsholders combined filed 1,019 file-sharing cases. In the following years, this number increased mostly thanks to Strike 3, which set the previous record at 2,094 in 2018.

 

Strike 3 filed its first case in 2017 and since then has submitted over 9,000 complaints at federal courts.

 

Strike 3 is currently responsible for most legal action against file-sharers in the U.S. Other independent movie studios also file piracy-related lawsuits, but these are limited to a few dozen at most.

 

With this level of workload, it’s no surprise that most cases are resolved relatively swiftly. Of all lawsuits filed in the first half of the year, more than 90% have already been closed. This happens when the parties reach an out-of-court settlement or if Strike 3 drops a complaint for other reasons.

Edge Cases

There are also instances of defendants simply ignoring Strike 3 lawsuits. When that happens, Strike 3 often requests a default judgment from the court, which can go either way depending on the circumstances.

 

A massive award for damages is one potential outcome. Last year a federal court in New York ordered a local resident to pay $108,750 in damages for sharing 145 pirated videos via BitTorrent. Other courts have denied similar default judgment requests.

 

Due to the costs involved, it’s rare for accused pirates to fight back and then secure a win, but when Strike 3 filed a lawsuit against a “John Doe” who turned out to be a 70+-year-old retired police officer, the tables were turned.

 

Another “Doe” is putting up a spirited fight in a separate case, one that’s currently heading to trial. If that goes ahead, it will only be the second time that’s ever happened.

 

Overall, we assume that Strike 3 must be quite pleased with the results of its legal campaigns. If it was a money-losing operation, they probably wouldn’t file thousands of complaints every year.

 

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 three newcomers on the list. “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery” is the most downloaded title.

The most torrented movies for the week ending on December 26 are:

Movie Rank	Rank last week	Movie name	IMDb Rating / Trailer
Most downloaded movies via torrent sites
1	(…)	Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery	7.4 / trailer
2	(…)	Violent Knight	6.9 / trailer
3	(2)	Black Adam	7.1 / trailer
4	(1)	The Fabelmans	7.9 / trailer
5	(9)	Avatar: The Way of Water	8.1 / trailer
6	(3)	The Banshees of Inisherin	8.0 / trailer
7	(4)	Emancipation	5.6 / trailer
8	(8)	Bullet Train	7.4 / trailer
9	(10)	Black Panther: Wakanda Forever	7.3 / trailer
10	(…)	Spirited	6.6 / trailer

 

 

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

 

Five years ago, several of the world’s largest entertainment industry companies teamed up to create a brand new anti-piracy coalition.

 

The Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment (ACE) brought together well-known Hollywood companies including Disney, Warner Bros, NBCUniversal, media giants such as Sky and BBC, as well as streaming-based newcomers Amazon, Netflix, and Hulu.

 

In the years that followed several other media companies were added to the roster. This year alone, 18 new members were announced, bringing the total count to 52. Perhaps more importantly, the coalition’s scope and reach expanded too.

 

A major event in 2022 saw Qatari media company beIN join the coalition and with it, a new focus area for ACE – live sports streaming protection. Elsewhere, the global nature of the alliance was strengthened with new members from Asia, Latin America, and Europe.

Explosive Growth

Looking back at the progress made over the past 12 months, ACE head Jan van Voorn highlights “explosive growth” as a key achievement. He believes that a broad coalition, with tentacles all over the globe, increases the overall effectiveness of its anti-piracy efforts.

 

“This growth dramatically increases ACE’s global network, including key partnerships with local law enforcement and other authorities, and its ability to shut down illegal piracy operations around the world,” Van Voorn tells us.

 

“Piracy is a global challenge that requires a global approach, so bringing members from all over the world into one coalition makes us more effective and impactful at hitting the right targets.”

 

Adding more members doesn’t magically increase the group’s effectiveness, of course. What it does, however, is open the door to collaboration with intermediaries, governments, and law enforcement agencies in other countries. This has been a key driver of many recent successes.

Collaborating with Governments and Law Enforcement

Confidential agreements with domain registrars and registries, for example, help to efficiently take down domain names. In addition, advertising companies and payment processors help to cut off revenue to pirate sites and services, when appropriate.

 

“We continue to expand our impact through voluntary agreements with domain registries and registrars, fast-track procedures with social media companies, ad companies, payment processors, online marketplaces, etc., all over the globe. So, we work with all parties in the internet ecosystem,” Van Voorn says.

 

The same strategy applies to governments and law enforcement. ACE has partnered with Interpol and Europol, for example, and also has full-time team members embedded within the City of London Police and the U.S. Government’s National Intellectual Property Rights Coordination Center.

 

Forging these relationships takes time but they eventually start to pay off. These collaborations are the key to unlocking the true potential of its alliance, ACE believes. This is a two-way street, as ACE also assists governments in local enforcement efforts.

 

“Collaboration enables ACE members and the local content industry to speak to government officials with one voice about the need to better prioritize copyright enforcement. And governments are beginning to listen,” Van Voorn notes.

Lean and Mean

A larger organization doesn’t automatically make an alliance more effective, especially if interests and priorities begin to conflict. From the outside, however, it appears that ACE, which is led by the Motion Picture Association, is running a tight ship.

 

Van Voorn believes that growing the alliance will make it more streamlined and effective. In the past, the anti-piracy efforts of media companies were siloed, even though the piracy threats they face are very similar.

 

ACE’s overall strategy is to collaborate, share knowledge and resources, and then target the piracy problem as a united front.

 

“There was a lot of duplication of effort, for many companies around the world, and we saw that we needed to do more together to avoid that duplication and build a global collation to deal with these issues in a much more cost-effective, but more importantly, in an impactful way.”

 

This global approach helps to expand the alliance’s reach. It can easily shift focus between continents and share information back and forth.

 

“ACE’s global network enables us to access pirate operators’ information quickly and escalate and streamline any new workstreams from a specific country or region to the rest of the world,” Van Voorn says.

 

ACE typically starts by identifying and locating targets, and then prioritizing the big fish – larger piracy players ideally. The next step is to determine when and where to carry out potential enforcement actions, often with help from authorities.

 

“The hierarchical nature of the piracy ecosystem means that when we take down the world’s largest piracy services, the ripple effect ensures that the lower-tier piracy services are also impacted.”

 

A good example of an enforcement effort with a broad impact was the shutdown of HDFoxCDN, a Brazil-based pirate video CDN that offered access to a broad library of pirated content. With minimal effort, pirate sites could use its API to embed tens of thousands of titles.

Piercing the Anonymity Veil

Looking ahead to 2023, Van Voorn says that ACE will continue where it left off by adding more members in the new year.

 

“ACE will continue its expansion, both by adding global members and expanding our focus on live sports content. Our enforcement actions will be designed to obtain the most significant impact by grouping actions by tactic, time, region, or language.”

 

New enforcement actions against “Piracy as a Service” (PaaS) targets are already in the works. Taking down illegal streaming services also remains a priority.

 

The key objective is to identify the ‘anonymous’ people behind these illicit operations. To do so, ACE will call on investigators and lawyers all over the globe to force breakthroughs.

 

“Piracy operators use various technologies in an attempt to create anonymity. These people do business online and try to hide their identities. And as they can enlist the support of intermediaries from anywhere in the world, they can reside anywhere in the world.

 

“So, breaking that anonymity and going after these operators is a challenge we fight daily. We will continue to expand our toolkit to break this anonymity and go after illegal services,” Van Voorn says.

Attack Vectors

ACE has filed several lawsuits over the years but that appears to be less of a priority now. ACE doesn’t confirm this as an intentional choice, but might be focusing more on immediate impact instead of drawn-out and expensive court battles.

 

The coalition chooses its strategy on a target-by-target basis using a holistic approach, Van Voorn says. In other words, it chooses the enforcement option that is likely to have the most impact and success.

 

“This can include engaging in open discussions by way of cease-and-desist notices on pirate operators, ensuring that illegal enterprises are voluntarily shut down, and criminal referrals to international and local law enforcement agencies.

 

“We will also pursue litigation, where it is known to be effective in reducing piracy and increasing legitimate consumption of content,” Van Voorn concludes.

Putting a Number on It?

Interestingly, ACE has collected some large damages payments through its legal actions and many confidential settlements too. Unfortunately, the alliance wasn’t willing to share the total settlement amount or how gets distributed.

 

This isn’t a surprise as the alliance carefully weighs the information it shares with the public. This also means that, in addition to the many reported successes, major setbacks may exist as well.

 

When we asked ACE how many sites and services were shut down, we were informed that this data isn’t public either. Our own investigations show that at least 270 domain names have been taken over by ACE

 

It is certainly possible that some of these sites returned under new domains or brands. At the same time, many of the largest pirate sites remain online, so ACE still has plenty of work left to do.

 

An awful lot has changed in the online piracy world over the last decade, but key fundamentals still underpin the entire ecosystem.

 

Many platforms depend on IP addresses, domain names, and a functioning DNS, but none can exist without some kind of hosting facility.

 

Numerous options are available, but service operators who value consistent uptime and a reduced chance of being linked to a piracy-facilitating server, tend to make their choices more carefully than others.

Offshore Hosting

One option is so-called ‘offshore hosting’ but what that actually means is open to interpretation. At a base level, it can mean that a server is based in a country that differs from that of the operator, but that in itself is nothing unusual.

 

When that second country has a lax attitude to infringement and when third, fourth or fifth countries enter the mix in various ways, ‘offshore hosting’ takes on a whole new character, one of particular interest to pirates hoping to stay both online and unidentified.

 

Of course, anything that helps pirates necessarily irritates those trying to stop them.

Internet Governance Forum – IGF 2022

The Internet Governance Forum (IGF) held this year’s meeting in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Under the overarching theme ‘Resilient Internet for a Shared Sustainable and Common Future‘ the event spanned five days from November 28, 2022, reportedly attracting more than one thousand speakers and visitors from 160+ countries.

 

The Audiovisual Anti-Piracy Alliance (AAPA) and beIN Sports, who together hold a key interest in tackling pirate IPTV providers, presented at IGAF 2022. AAPA described itself as a group that “lobbies for better antipiracy legislation and enforcement” while building “private and public partnerships to achieve more efficient and effective enforcement.”

 

The AAPA/beIN presentation centered on the challenges of offshore hosting, and as the above image shows, multiple billion-dollar businesses are seeking solutions.

Legitimate use of an ASN or a Subterfuge?

“The hosting provider landscape continues to evolve and has become proliferated with companies using the term ‘offshore’ hosting,” the presentation’s introduction reads.

 

“AAPA aims to highlight that many of these companies have become synonymous with cybercrime activities. Promoting safety for illicit activities in the knowledge they do not have to comply with national or international laws.”

 

According to AAPA and member beIN, an offshore host is an entity that is likely to own no physical hardware itself while operating from “fake or questionable” headquarters in countries with poor intellectual property legislation.

 

AAPA further notes that offshore hosts lease IP addresses from outside ASN-registered territory, while operating servers in the UK, EU and US. This topic warrants an article in its own right but AAPA’s example – an operation with a RIPE ASN, headquarters in Hong Kong, Seychelles IP addresses, and rented servers in the Netherlands – suggests significant challenges.

DMCA Notices Are Ignored

Another claimed feature of offshore hosts is their tendency to absorb DMCA notices rather than do much about them. An AAPA slide provides an example of how this feature is marketed to potential customers, and while they don’t mention the service by name, it wasn’t difficult to find.

 

An operation known as Koddos is featured in the recent Counterfeiting and Piracy Watch List published by the European Commission. According to the report, it has “office locations in Hong Kong (China) and Seychelles. It is reported by rightholders to consistently ignore their takedown notices.”

 

So how do offshore hosting providers manage to deflect DMCA notices when other platforms are expected to respond to them quickly, or else? The answer to that its relatively straightforward once a few terms are understood.

DMCA > RIR > LIR > ASN > AS > Hosts

The internet is not just a network, it’s a network of networks. Some very large internet networks (or groups of networks) are given the label Autonomous System (AS) since they serve the same assigned IP addresses and share a common list of other Autonomous Systems to which they connect.

 

IANA, the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority, assigns an ASN (Autonomous System Number) to an AS so that it can be identified online. Cloudflare’s ‘post office‘ analogy explains the system perfectly.

 

“Imagine an AS as being like a town’s post office. Mail goes from post office to post office until it reaches the right town, and that town’s post office will then deliver the mail within that town. Similarly, data packets cross the Internet by hopping from AS to AS until they reach the AS that contains their destination Internet Protocol (IP) address. Routers within that AS send the packet to the IP address,” the company explains.

 

In respect of offshore hosts, AAPA’s example sees ‘Host Company 1’ applying for an ASN number via a Local Internet Registry (LIR), which in turn is a member of a Regional Internet Registry (RIR).

 

Once the ASN is assigned to Host Company 1, it shares the same ASN with Host Company 2, and Host Company 3….and Host Company 4. From there they work as a team, behind a single ASN, as AAPA’s presentation shows.

 

The real stinger here is that any DMCA notices have to be sent to the email addresses registered with the RIR and they have a tendency to go unanswered. Physical addresses registered to the companies are “fake or PO boxes” AAPA says, meaning that identifying who owns them can be difficult or even impossible.

 

From an enforcement perspective, that’s less than ideal. AAPA reports that during the first six months of the football season, only 10% of the DMCA notices sent to one offshore hosting company were actioned.

 

“There is no repeat infringer policy. Outreach is ignored and legal action cannot be taken because no one knows where this company is or who the owners are. One company hosts almost 50% of a broadcaster’s infringing streams,” AAPA’s presentation reads.

 

Whether anything can be achieved in the short term is unknown but by delivering its presentation and “call to action” at the Internet Governance Forum, which operates under a United Nations mandate (pdf), the chances of connecting with powerful ears seems relatively high.

 

If nothing else, an anti-piracy group venturing this far into ‘enemy’ territory, seeking to disrupt ASNs rather than simple IP addresses, adds a new dimension to this evolving battle.

 

Over the past several weeks, many people have toyed with the latest ChatGPT release and we’re no exception.

 

The technology is impressive but has plenty of shortcomings, as is to be expected at this early stage. Still, for the TF headquarters, it offers a nice excuse to take Christmas Day off.

 

That’s certainly progress.

 

Our question: Write a Christmas story for TorrentFreak that explains the role online piracy has in today’s society.

 

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The response:

 

Christmas is a time for joy and celebration, but it can also be a time of reflection and contemplation. For many people, the holiday season is a time to think about how technology has changed the world and its impact on society.

 

One area of technology that has had a huge impact on the world is online piracy. It has been around for almost two decades and has changed the way people access and enjoy media.

 

Online piracy has allowed people to share and access large amounts of content without having to pay for it. This has led to a decrease in the traditional revenue streams of media companies, such as music labels, movie studios, and television networks.

 

At the same time, online piracy has also provided unprecedented access to large amounts of content to people who might not otherwise have been able to afford it. In many cases, it has allowed people to enjoy content that would have otherwise been financially out of reach.

 

In recent years, online piracy has become a hot-button issue. There has been a lot of debate over the ethics of piracy, with some arguing that it is wrong to take something without paying for it, while others argue that it is a form of free speech.

 

No matter what side of the debate you fall on, it is clear that online piracy has had a major impact on society. From providing access to content to reducing the revenue streams of media companies, online piracy has become an integral part of today’s digital world.

 

So this holiday season, take a moment to reflect on the impact of online piracy and how it has changed the way we consume media. There are sure to be many debates and conversations about it in the future, so get involved and share your opinion.

 

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Ed. Not bad. The AI apparently doesn’t know that online piracy has been around for more than two decades. It is not yet aware that we disabled the comments either. Let’s see how it does next year.

 

Screenshot below is from the OpenAI (Playground).