Anti-Piracy Company Wants to Sell Patents to Protect P2P
Written by enigmax on September 27, 2007Recently we reported that anti-piracy company Viralg is selling the patents to its technology on eBay for $1,000,000. Most people didn’t think it was value for money but Viralg have been in touch and they have a new idea - selling the patents to P2P’ers to help prevent some future anti-P2P technology.
When we reported on the sale of Viralg’s anti-p2p patents, not many people got excited by the offer.
However, after we published the article, Viralg responded to an email we sent earlier. It appears that they believe that the value of the sale doesn’t necessarily lie in the technology.
This section from the eBay auction gives a clue:
3. If your business is involved in developing and/or selling a P2P program, you can make it better and avoid any problems that this technology can give to your network.
A brief email from Viralg suggests that they feel that a ‘p2p related community’ might want to buy the patents - but why would p2p’ers want them?
Here are some details from the Canadian patent:
1. A method for limiting the use of unauthorized digital content in a content-sharing network in which digital content is distributed as files, wherein each file comprises content information and is associated with characteristic information and verification information, the method comprising:
(a) determining a first file whose content information is copyrighted;
(b) repeatedly distributing a second file in the content-sharing network, wherein the second file is associated with characteristic information and verification information that match the characteristic information and verification information, respectively, of said first file, and wherein the second file comprises content information that does not match the content information of the first file.
It seems that Viralg feel that their patent gives them the monopoly on a particular type of file corruption and that if these patents were bought by a pro-p2p outfit, they could get legal protection if anyone ever tried to use this technique against them.
Viralg told us: “Let say at some P2P related community buy those patent applications… after that no body can’t mess with hash codes…”
Maybe one million p2p’ers will put $1 each for these papers?
Ok, maybe not.
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46 Responses
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anything for keeping MAFIAA away ;)
(but wasn’t this little old technology…?)
ill throw in a buck if it really could give us some stance againt people putting those damn fake files up on the p2p networks. but if it doesnt work for BT, then it doesn’t really matter does it? since BT is the mainstream of p2p right now.
but if someone did buy it, could they turn around and make it open source? cuz if so, we could all just chip in a buck and then release it to the world.
but do they hold the patent to it truly? with all the patent lawsuits, with companies both having a patent for what is basically the same thing, and the lameness of software and intellectual patents these days, it wouldn’t be worth the paper it’s printed on.
These are worthless patents because anti-P2P companies that might violate the patents — like MediaDefender — operate completely underground. They sell a confidential service, but with their software, operation methods, and even identity kept secret to outsiders.
It’s now known that Mediadefender already violated those patents, but if not for the leaked emails and source code, no one would ever know.
It’s not easy to protect patents when violators like Mediadefender set up shell corporations and websites, hide behind proxies, falsify domain registration — and when caught, flat-out lie about everything they do.
It’s also questionable that an illegal act is even patentable.
I would give 1 dollar immidiately.
Fuck, I’ll give a dollar. Only in Canadian funds though. Fuck transfer rates. :P Sign me up!
Hey, we are PIRATES !!
We don’t BUY patents, we TAKE them !!
In fact, why should we even care about patents at all, we do what we want anyway …
Interesting on how many people actually are falling into this scam… Give it a few months and the truth of the “patent” they are offing will come to light. I feel sorry for all thoughs that actually do fall into this…
I smell a scam.
I can just imagine these guys collecting peoples money, and then finding out the IP addresses of those who donated, and then sending the MAFIAA after them.
Does anybody here REALLY want to trust an anti-P2P gang?
As shown from the release of the Media Defender emails, some anti-P2P gangs out there are not afraid to fight dirty.
Worthless
[quote]I smell a scam.
I can just imagine these guys collecting peoples money, and then finding out the IP addresses of those who donated, and then sending the MAFIAA after them.[/quote]
Are you joking?
“Uh, yes, RIAA, we collected some people’s IPs doing the horrible act of buying something we were selling on ebay. Sue them for that law that we have no proof they broke and has nothing to do with this sale!”
worthless
worthless.
[quote comment="175226"]Hey, we are PIRATES !!
We don’t BUY patents, we TAKE them !!
In fact, why should we even care about patents at all, we do what we want anyway …[/quote]
Worthless.
I’d put in a dollar. Hell I’d put in 10 bucks if we could prove it would actually help keep us safe. My real question though, is if they are even hinting that they might sell this patent to us, doesn’t that make them pro-p2p? I mean, even if they think they can make a buck off this, something really serious had to have happened to cause them to act like this. Maybe the MAFIAA rubbed them the wrong way. Either way, it’s an opportunity for us. But then again… if you think about it, if we could get together a million dollars to buy this… couldn’t we better use that to evolve our programs to a point that this wouldn’t be a needed investment? I mean, most programs pirates use are open source, and even if they are run by a commercial company, they are still operating on much less than even $10,000. But meh, that’s just my thoughts.
Viralg is a scam. His promise and his “fact” does not work. It is a retarded dude think he can cheat people to give him money. Viralg boy is a liar. Not that way sucker! Look at the “company” viralg. Testimonials has nothing to show you and contacts is just an e-mail. Fuck the assholes! Totally SCAM!
Count me on whit 20! Actually you don’t need to find MediaDefender it is enough to find Company who use this technology. If Film studio buy protection from MediaDefender and MediaDefender use patented technology Studio can be sue. If you have working movie hash and after downloading you get something else or nothing someone mesh whit hash. If Studio says at they only buy service and they don’t know at it violate those patents they must give up MediaDefender… and in second case even that don’t help.
Patent applications are very general like “verification information” can be some hash code but it can be something what not even exist yet.
Piratebay should buy this… I want to buy ticket in that law case :-)
Put donation site up I’m in.
[quote comment="175398"]Viralg is a scam. His promise and his “fact” does not work. It is a retarded dude think he can cheat people to give him money. Viralg boy is a liar. Not that way sucker! Look at the “company” viralg. Testimonials has nothing to show you and contacts is just an e-mail. Fuck the assholes! Totally SCAM![/quote]
Viralg “boy” can be what ever… but patent applications are real. You can see those in United States Patent and Trademark Office site as well as European Patent Office site. If you read those (and understand) you can see at effective antipiracy service can’t make without violating those.
Imagine buying the patents and then sueing organisations like MediaDefender for infringing on them.
Now who wouldn’t pay to see that?
It looks to me like their technology is on it’s way out.
They’re just trying to cash in before it’s completely obsolete.
Yeah, that sounds like a great idea - giving 1 mil to our enemies. Who knows what they’re going to invest that money in?
If the P2P community could raise a million dollars wouldn’t that money be better spent on our own ideas?
I don’t get how this is going to help us anyway? Detect fake files? Only idiots download fake files. Or are we going to sue the companies who are using this technology? As soon as they hear the P2P community has bought it, they’ll just switch to something else.
Don’t give these criminals a cent!
Idiots that think they are enemies, and that they will log ips of people who donated to buying something off of ebay…If their patent is held well, companies can no longer fuck with hash codes in torrents, and I think that is a very positive thing for the P2P community, if we all purchased it.
fire sale.
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