MovieX BitTorrent Tracker VIP Donations ‘Stolen’
Written by enigmax on January 10, 2009After two of its founders were arrested by Australian police, the 400,000 member MovieX tracker hasn’t seen the end of its troubles. Although it survived the arrests, the site’s vital uploaders have been jumping ship and now, with the site offline again, it appears its finances have been plundered too.
At the 400,000+ member site MovieX, 2008 was a year to remember – for all the wrong reasons. At the start of December, two administrators of the site were arrested by Australian police. After the arrests, everything went very quiet. The pair, who are known to be brothers, were due to appear in court just before Christmas. So far, their fate has gone unreported.
In the meantime, the understandable uncertainty at the site is causing problems. Administrators aside, on most sites it’s the uploaders that take most of the risks and these have been moving away from MovieX, with some leaving to share on a site started by ex-staff. But it’s not just the threat of diminishing content causing problems, they can be overcome as memories fade. There is the old demon too – money.
After the arrrests, one of the claims against the site was that those running it were making money. A statement said that AUS$54,000 (US $35,000) had been seized, with the implication this substantial amount was generated on the site via member’s ‘VIP Donations’, which gave access to direct-download material.
After the arrests, the site reappeared in just a few days. The police and anti-piracy agencies made a point of not naming the site in their press releases, which indicates they had some idea this would happen. Despite the quick revival, the site’s finances were in turmoil but according to claims being made by the new administrators, a UK-based user stepped forward to help handle the donations in future.
Two days ago MovieX disappeared, only to reappear yesterday with yet more gloom. The site hadn’t been busted again, but the person alleged to have been responsible for donations, known as VIPxXx, had deleted himself from the MovieX database. It seemed a strange move, until it was discovered that he had also made a charge back on all the server bills previously collected and paid in his name. MovieX administration strongly believe he has stolen the money.
MovieX claim to have discovered the real identity of VIPxXx and have his photograph, various personal details and IP address on the site’s temporary homepage. TorrentFreak contacted his alleged girlfriend but as yet we have had no response.
An administrator at MovieX told TorrentFreak, “The site will be back. We are working on getting the servers back online as we speak.”
He also told us that there is something that MovieX members can do to help. “We are asking all our VIP members who have paid to PayPal account shooting.shared@gmail.com (PayPal name: Ali Sar) to make a dispute for unauthorized payment,” while going on to apologize for the downtime.
It is hoped that the funds will be returned to MovieX and that will be the end of the matter.
Previously: Windows 7 Beta Rollout Fails Without BitTorrent
Next: Coda.fm – A Refreshing Music Torrent Site
95 Responses
I guess that the word "donation" is very much a semantics game here.
"TorrentFreak contacted his alleged girlfriend but as yet we have had no response."
What kind of journalism is that?
"payment for arrest"
Since the last torrentfreak article about moviex the majority of the uploaders have gone to more secure ddl site setup by x-moviex admins and with approx 95% of moviex uploaders. Moviex uploaders left because of the disgusting way in which we were treated by the moviex admin in attempts to cover up and asked to do things which were far above our lines of duty. Moviex admin have been very scarce on the ground since the arrest and members have been leaving in hundreds. The drop in peer-seed ratio shows this clearly. Vip-xxx is young and lost his temper frequently on the shoutbox, becoming unpopular. THe admin that are there are predominately the ones know posted least on the site.
Moviex is disgracing itself by staying online and continuing this farce on a large semi-private tracker.
I never like that place anyway. And now they are asking for more money? LOL
Haha. Serves them right.
Great journalism, that's what.
I am (was) a MovieX supporter. Sad to hear about all these troubles but I guess it's not the most savoury business to begin with so you have to expect unsavoury characters to be involved. Having said that, what is this new site called? I'm sort of going through withdrawal here.
If they keep trying, harassment.
Seriously guys, going after someone's girlfriend, alleged or not, is low.
Some people just seem to have been absent when luck was being distributed. I wonder just how many 'personal army' requests have been made using the details mentioned?
I really hope MovieX goes down for good now. I've never liked them after I noticed their users free-leech from the public swarm.
not surprised at admin stealing the money and using for own personal use,this is the second private site that ive been on that this has happened to,(the former bitnation)
power=greed,thats why i NEVER "donate" to the private sites i am on, cause you REALLY DONT KNOW where your $$$ goes ,its like when a homeless person asks for $20 for food and then you give it to him thinking he will use it for good, when he really uses it for evil(drugs,alochol,etc)
this will also hurt other private sites that really use their donations for server costs ,contests etc cause im SURE donators that got screwed over by movieX will not "donate" to another private site again…………
I know i wont……………
hey Charax. I'm not sure if you checked the moviex front page, but her picture and links to her Bebo page are there. That makes her part of this story. I merely sent her a single email asking her if she knew that her face and personal details are on there, linked to an alleged theft. I would want to know, wouldn't you?
damn I had an account there lol. Just goes to show all you idiots who think private trackers are somehow uber better.. they can be taken down just like the rest.. but then they have a nice listing of all the members and mabye IP's.
BTW ENGIMAX the 'DISCOVERED' link in the article goes to a 404.
well in that case moviex are *really* low. If they have his details, they should post HIS details, not hers.
I've done plenty of reprehensible things in my time, but you don't post an innocent person's details publicly to get back at someone they know, that's indefensible
(I'm getting a 404 from Moviex, so if all you did was let her know about her details being online, I apologize)
"The resource requested could not be found on this server!"
the page with the 'offenders details' has been removed
Good job whoever "stole" them, serves them damn right.
It's the people that "donated" that are really out of pocket.
MovieX leeched from the bittorrent community. Read here http://torrentfreak.com/moviex-leeches-from-bitto...
I am glad they are going under. The bittorrent community does not need such trackers.
http://www.moviex.info/+www.moviex.info&hl=en&ct...target=”_blank”>http://74.125.47.132/search?q=cache:rFCeB8ntB1QJ:...Brings” target=”_blank”>http://www.moviex.info/+www.moviex.info&hl=en&ct...Bringsup a google cache of what happened. Of course the pictures are down… but the rest of the personal info is still there.
http://www.moviex.info/+www.moviex.info&hl=en&ct...target=”_blank”>http://74.125.47.132/search?q=cache:rFCeB8ntB1QJ:...
ack.. just look up http://www.moviex.infoon google.com and hit the cached link for the second result down
So this link doesn't work? http://74.125.77.132/search?q=cache:Cw6HZtlWoHQJ:...
Oh, it did! Next time, just copy/paste the link and ignore all the XHTML.
So vipxxx took few hundred bucks and ran?`Well i hope he wasn't planning on retiring quite yet…
what tracker did you guys go to? i might be interested in getting involved again.
uh, he took 35k and ran, actually.
Anyone know what site it was that has been started by ex-staff? If they've reformed from the old (and dead) moviex.info then I would like to be a part of it tbh.
All I know is they are not doing torrents.
Hope it does come back.
"Good job whoever "stole" them, serves them damn right. "
amen.
Live by the sword, die by the sword. If you steal, then expect to be stolen from. Don't feel sorry one bit for them.
They should be paying ME for all the seeding I did before I noticed the bs tracker tricks they were pulling. Screw them, screw the stupid users paying to download from public swarms, screw the old admins, screw the new admins, screw their girlfriends, screw beebo, and screw battlefield 2, as if that has anything to do with anything
I'm a noob. I'd rather be a noob than a pretenshus know all like Noobcake.
Awesome ;) … good for you. I'm not really trying to piss people off but it happens sometimes. I have nothing against noobs – I was one at one stage after all – but it is funny when people get annoyed by being called that. It just seems stupid to me when someone says "it is anathema to the principles of piracy". Like he's referring to some unwritten law or something when in reality many people pay to pirate. He's like people that think websites run themselves for free because he's never paid. Anyhoo…
You've made a stupid mistake there mate: the site wasn't taking in $35,000USD a month – that seems to be you own sensationalist fiction: to quote TF:
"Investigators close to the inquiry claim the site generated around AUS$10,000 (US $6,450) each month, with many users donating $10 a month for VIP access to direct-download material, which was separate from the site’s BitTorrent tracker. Other bank accounts connected to the site are currently under investigation."
Out of that monthly bill they had costs of servers (anyones guess but this was not a small website: 400,000 users allegedly and quality hosting costs aren't cheap) and Rapidshare accounts for donators.
The same article also claims that an account was seized containing $35,000 USD.
"Everyone on the site has had their details taken by the Feds in Australia. They will share the details with US & European Anti-Piracy Police. So beware!"
Evidence for AU Feds having these "details" is where… ? Please provide some evidence of this because it doesn't make sense to me seeing as the site was hosted overseas from Australia – just to start with…
What is – Owners being arrested. Owners asking staff to lie on their behalf. Staff pulling out left right and center. What me to carry on mate, I will be more than welcome to
If you bothered to read the thread you'd already know that instead of wasting your time floundering around and not knowing.
lol never like this site anyways…
"It is anathema to the principles of piracy…"
That's still a dumbass thing to say you dumb noob. Obviously I hit a raw nerve with you ;). Truth hurts? Would you rather I called you a know-nothing twit posting grandiose statements about a subject he knows nothing about?
"suppose you're a complete know-all? "
By no means do I know it all but in comparison to you I know much more. Which is why you think I'm a cheeky gobshite apparently.
Eppy and Yvonne set up a (free) invite only ddl site when they left
Yeah, that's a pretty low way of increasing speeds on the tracker… members benefit, Pirate Bay users lose since they can't download files from MovieX users.
I agree. There are plenty of private trackers out there that are functioning quite well without leeching from other trackers without the users of the other trackers knowing. MovieX isn't one of them, and I'm sure the bittorrent community will survive without it.
The site was not and never has been in the hands of the feds/police/law enforcement officers – whatever you want to call them. The comments that saying this is or has been the case, are complete BS
Trust me, I am InTheKnow
vipxXx was a gormless idiot who wound up the large majority of the members of X. I pissed my sides laughing when I saw that he had been made a red.
I have heard that a few people on X go to the same university as him, so could be very interesting.
I just hope for his sake that the MX allegation is not true. If it is that I would not him.
£35k I never knew these sites were so lucretive! I noticed it was going down the pan in the last few weeks since the bust. But I never knew about it leeching from public trackers. TBH the whole donating thing stinks. It is anathema to the principles of piracy. Contributing to the server costs is one thing. But £35,000??
MovieX people were always making up some BS about the justification for their leeching from public trackers… you never could get a straight answer from those people about the justification for it. They were all engaged in some sort of mass delusional belief that the fact that they uploaded the torrent to a tracker, and seeded it enough to get a few copies out, meant that they could then leech off of everyone else who didn't know enough to delete their tracker from the list.
Sure enough, once they are the victims and not the thieves, they seem to think that stealing is wrong. A lesson learned… :)
whats the website that was started by exstaff?
yeh we all wanna know wot this new site is
http://www.forumya.net
Oh shit, son.
I'm sure they've lost the will to live now knowing that you and your one braincell don't feel sorry for them.
is that the real site?
anyone got any invites?
i seed like theres no tomarrow
0neguy47@gmail.com
I don't really see anything wrong with contacting her: it's not as though she can't just say "no comment" is it.
"when a homeless person asks for $20 for food and then you give it to him thinking he will use it for good, when he really uses it for evil(drugs,alochol,etc)"
So true, so true. I've got into the habit of saying something along the lines of "No, but if you come with me I'll buy you some food". Never once has my offer been taken up :)
"Just goes to show all you idiots who think private trackers are somehow uber better.."
No, they're just better is all.
"they can be taken down just like the rest."
Yes. What has that to do with anything – I've never seen people claim otherwise, have you?
Right… so that's why it's happened at other sites is it?
"It is anathema to the principles of piracy…"
Says who? An complete noob such as yourself?
Unfortunately that's just the nature of public and completely open trackers: anyone can use them.
Didn't your teachers learn you not to use "an" as a prefix to consonant? If I wanted to pay to download movies, I'd go to Blockbuster! If I wanted to donate, it would be to some more deserving cause such as the Palestinians of Gaza. So I'm a "noob"! So? I suppose you're a complete know-all? Or just a cheeky little insignificant laptop gobshite!
That told him lol he's probly only a kid. I agree with you m8. £35g's from donnations, jeez!. Drug dealers don't make that much. I wanna know the site that the moviex mods moved to?.I'le miss the films though. FREE GAZA!
It's a direct download site as far as I'm aware. There are no torrents. Like the VIP on moviex. I hate all the hassle with Rapidshare. All the multiple download crap. Anyways I think the signups'll be closed by now.
this site is ridiculous, ran by kids ;/
Well, there are at least several software solutions that make grabbing multiple files off rapidshare (and similar filehosters) literally as easy as copying the whole list of links to the clipboard.
After that they're automatically queued and start downloading. Even if you have no membership it's still way faster than public torrents in almost all cases plus it's a lot more secure. However, seeing as RS accounts cost so little it's a great way to get extremely fast speeds IMO
BTW, if you want filehoster downloads there's far better sites that are open like rlslog.
money taken was nearer 1k not 35k where this guy gets his figures from i have know idea. The Vip donations area had only been reopened about a week and may of the people who payed are claiming back through paypal, so it looks like he could end up with a fiver and a fat lip!
I'm a noob. I'd rather be a noob than a pretenshus know all like Noobcake. Going around leaving snotty comments on peoples posts thinking he knows every thing about everything. Hiding behind a com-pew-tor. The frozenbird guy was just giving his opinion Hey buddy, no one likes a smart ass! If moviex was taking in 35 big ones a month in donations. Hell that's over $50,000 half a million dollars a year! I disagree about anathema to piracy. $600,00 pa is piracy! @Celticbhoy666 Where I come from drug dealers do make that much. It seems tha moviex owners, the Rama Bro's lied to people on the site about what was going on & a lot of people were very pissed about it. Everyone on the site has had their details taken by the Feds in Australia. They will share the details with US & European Anti-Piracy Police. So beware!
moviex is/was a great site, just a shame the original adminstrators got busted, and some unkown greedy muppet was brought in to cause more mayhem of a decent site!!!!
With regard to the forumya.net site, does anybody know how to get an invite??
Why would have they gaved him ALL their money? If he was in charge of donations for few weeks i wouldn't have gave him anything more than what he needed to pay server bills.
All i know is that Rama and his site spouted lies from the beginning. It has been confirmed. If the site had been honest then non of this would have happened.
isnt that the same site that was stealing peoples bandwidth when the tracker url was in with the piratebay one and they took peoples upload speed but didnt let them download lol im glad the turk stole there cash and hope he gets away with it and has a good time :)
IF anyone makes >>>>>>> "donations <<<<<< YOU not that SMART !!…Period!
Demonoid.com – STILL #1………[ movieX/ is just a wanna be ]
Demonoid.com – STILL #1………[ movieX/ is just a wanna be ]
Demonoid.com – STILL #1………[ movieX/ is just a wanna be ]
Demonoid.com – STILL #1………[ movieX/ is just a wanna be ]
Yeah. What PBW said…
Drugs & alcohol aren't evil. Pair of fucktards like you might just be tho'…
lol =]
It'd be nice if we (TINW) could just hit 'NubCakes' with the ban-hammer. I can't stand the needle-dick since he posted a URL to a russian snuff movie.
Netscum, pure & simple…
To all the people whining about moviex seeding from other trackers then why not go after all the other tracker sites who do the same thing…they all steal from each other as far as seeders.
Moviex was the only place that I knew of for the vip direct download movies and software, the only place i trusted anyways…over 75% of the other sites like it were either complete scams or their websites were infested with shit that even a anti-virus can't stop thier page from downloading automatically to your computer.
Oh and for the fucktards that believe that the vip was somehow taking away from their torrents read a book dumbshit..get a clue about what your talking about…the vip was all about downloading the files directly from file hosting providers like rapidshare, megashare, and netload.
It's a shame that they are gone I just paid for 6 months of their service about a month ago… And don't believe the shit about paypal giving money back they don't do refunds on virtual services or products.
If anyone could get me an invite to the new website please email me at …rachal1391@inbox.com…
I am very disappointed in the way this whole thing has been handle. This could come back to bite the entire community right in the ass, especially private trackers. I could sit here all night and rant about it but the mature/intelligent people can figure it out so I’m not even going to waste my time.
yeah keep reading idiot, they then might have your last known IP, and dont tell me 'thats impossible', you would be SO surprised.
So please, learn how to read, then hit yourself in the face.
Also, the content on private trackers is hardly comparable to public these days. I should know I have had memberships at demonoid, oink, and some of the classics back in the day you probly would have no clue about since your probly a Nub just like your name states. So keep thinkin you somehow have a golden key to 'Better' content. I download mostly from public rather than private because often times the private doesn't have it.
Tired of you 'leet' noobs thinkin you know what your talking about in P2P.
I’ve never been a MovieX user and I always delete their tracker from any torrents I grab. I do find this news sad however seeing as 99% of the high-def material I download from public trackers tends to originate from MovieX. Hopefully someone out there will be kind enough to take up the slack by seeding the latest high-def TV shows and movies, the number of which have sharply dropped off over the past several days.
It's not "stealing" bandwidth, it's "sharing".
bandwidth wants to be free.
Who might have my last IP? I wont say it's impossible… I never did.
"I should know I have had memberships at demonoid, oink, and some of the classics back in the day you probly would have no clue about since your probly a Nub just like your name states."
Your probably a private user wanna-be who has linked his ego to how he gets his content by the sounds of how angry your getting and calling me a noob. Which probably means you have low self-image and tend to desperately attach yourself to some activity you do. But we'll never know will we, so who cares? I don't.
Also rattling off names like Demonoid doesn't prove jackshit as that place is more or less an indexer for TPB you stupid twat. I manage to find most content I want on private trackers and it comes down a lot faster and I don't have to worry about fakes or content claiming to be something that it isn't – they're better. Try grabbing a full season of say the Soprano's, like I did, off TPB – I waited over 1 month to get a 42 GB torrent, it's pathetic. But that's just me – I can't help it if you can't do that although that does say something about you.
I tend to use Usenet to grab much stuff anyways these days and just seed back.
Right first off it wasn't 35K like ppl keep saying it was: £/$ 700 (can't remember) and 450 Euros …so about a grand really. NOT 35000K. reason I know …I was told by the one remaining admin of the site I keep intouch with and was left holding the bag so to speak.
£1000 or £35000 – if money was paid into his account and the allegations are true, then he thieved not off MX but the people who paid the money – as the site is no longer there. You can word it how you want, but he is allegedly nothing but a thief and if the rumours are true that he goes to a certain university, good luck to him
Demonoid is not bad in a pinch, still a lot of torrents with out descriptions, give it a 3 out of 5.
MovieX, I dumpt a couple years ago, the whole spamin Vip/rapid share thing seemed so amateur like, a lot of torrents with out descriptions or rip specs, when i caught wind of the TPB tracker issue that was it….2 out of 5. don't miss em.
if you researched you would find most of the sites that accused moviex of leeching ened up issuing an apology to moviex as this was an untruth
LMFAO
Your a fucking idiot
If anyone can send me an invite, that will be great. My email is WillCambal@gmail.com.
an invite would be great! if anyone is able, send to bluecrow628@yahoo.com
I'll third that request!(if anyone is listening), an invite would be great!!! I'm startin to get the shakes..>!
If anyone is on the inside – vacant-space@hotmail.com
i like movieX….. fuck Vip-xxx i'll hack hes comp and stole everything i can from him and make hes life like hell..! hope movieX will be back soon.. and that bastard will get killed
The new site is pretty awesome and has tons of neat stuff. I am very glad it is invite only too(tends to weed out the morons).
I am willing to trade an invite key for an hd-torrents.org invite. I figure if you have a key to hd-torrents.org (Which I have been trying to get for months) you atleast know what the real deal holyfield is. Reply here with your email and I'll contact you.
P.S No BS neither, be ready to hop on ventrilo or call me from a fukin house phone because I'm not going to get fuk'd over…… I'll provide screenshots if needed.
Thanks
Tacker and site are back up
would love to get an invite, or does nayone know another good site that indexs and rates megashare links?
Xeryhp…
I have an invite to hd-torrents.org for you as a trade :) please send me your addy to stevetiler@live.co.uk. can you send me a screen shot of you logged in on say the home page. thx man. can't go back to X
Xeryhp…
I have an invite to hd-torrents.org for you as a trade :) please send me your addy to stevetiler@live.co.uk. can you send me a screen shot of you logged in on say the home page. thx man. can't go back to X
Xeryhp…quit trading our invites dumbass. As as we figure out who you are you won't be a member of that site anymore.
Xeryhp is a fucking wanker and should be shot you cunt
tosser
Responses are closed
All remaining responses will continue to be archived. Use the TorrentFreak forums if you want to discuss something.