Tough new anti-piracy legislation that allows for sites to be quickly blocked by ISPs following allegations of copyright infringement has been passed by Russia’s State Duma. Opposition to the bill has been growing, not only from regular Internet users but tech giants including Google, who are alarmed that domains could be censored without the intervention of the courts.
Together with four other internet providers in the United States, Time Warner Cable is sending copyright alerts to customers who use BitTorrent to pirate movies, TV-shows and music. The goal of the “six strikes” program is to inform subscribers that their connection are being used to infringe copyrights while pointing them towards legal alternatives. However, Time Warner Cable is going one step further by warning users about the dangers of P2P software including identity theft, spyware, viruses and unsolicited access to porn.
The top 10 most downloaded movies on BitTorrent are in again, ‘The Hangover Part 3′ tops the chart this week, followed by ‘Dead Man Down’. ‘Iron Man 3′ completes the top three.
This week, the French authority Hadopi issued its first order of disconnecting the net for a person who shared culture and knowledge. Hadopi’s behavior is completely illegal. In 2009, the European Parliament made such disconnections unquestionably and explicitly illegal.
A new form of DRM developed in Germany alters words, punctuation and other text elements so that every consumer receives a unique version of an eBook. By examining these “text watermarks”, copies that end up on the Internet can be traced back to the people who bought and allegedly pirated them. The project is a collaboration between researchers, the book industry and the Government and aims to be a consumer-friendly form of DRM.
RSS feeds are a great tool for keeping up to date with the latest information across the web, whether that be plain news updates or other fresh content. Now a new website allows users to transform any RSS feed into a torrent-enabled RSS feed which can be imported into a torrent client for automated downloads of a limitless array of content.
New research commissioned by the Australasian Performing Right Association reveals that Australian file-sharers are more affluent and better educated than their non-downloading counterparts. One in three Aussie Internet pirates earn more than $100,000 and one in four enjoyed a university education. The results further confirm that pirates tend to be relatively young, with 44% of file-sharers under 30 years of age.
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Below are TorrentFreak's most discussed articles of the past month. Join the discussion if you like.
Left Quote“The Pirate Bay has been one of the most important movements in Sweden for freedom of speech, working against corruption and censorship.
Peter Sunde Left Quote
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