The Scene is known for its aversion to public file-sharing, but nonetheless it’s in large part responsible for much of the material out there today.

The goal of most Scene groups is to be the first to release a certain title, whether that’s a film, music or software. While there is some healthy competition The Scene is also a place where lifelong friendships are started.

A few days ago, on October 17, the Scene lost Goolum, a well-respected member and friend. Only in his late thirties, he passed away after being part of the Scene for more than a decade.

As a cracker Goolum, also known as GLM, was of the more experienced reverse engineers who worked on numerous releases.

Through the years Goolum was connected to several groups which are now retired, some for more than a decade. To honor their fallen friend, the groups ZENiTH, Lz0, SLT and MiDNiGHT have made a one-time comeback.

Below is an overview of their farewell messages, which honor him for his cracking skills but most of all as a friend. Our thoughts go out to Goolum’s friends and family.

ZENiTH: THUNDERHEAD.ENGINEERING.PYROSIM.V2014.2.RIP.GOOLUM-ZENiTH (NFO)

ZENiTH, a group that retired around 2005, mentions Goolum’s loyalty and the love for his daughter.

“Goolum has been in and around the scene since the Amiga days but had never been a guy to jump from group to group, but stayed loyal and dedicated to the few groups he was involved in.”

“We are all proud to have been in a group with you, to have spent many a long night sharing knowledge about everything, learning about your daughter who you where very proud of, and all the projects you were involved in.”

Lz0: CEI.Inc.EnSight.Gold.v10.1.1b.Incl.Keygen.RIP.GOOLUM-Lz0 (NFO)

Lz0 or LineZer0, split from the Scene last year but many of its members are still actively involved in other roles. The group mentions the hard time Goolum has had due to drug problems. LzO also highlights Goolum’s love for his daughter, and how proud he was of her.

“We all knew that he struggled in life – not just economical but also on a personal level and not the least with his drug issues. One of the things that kept him going was his wonderful daughter whom he cherished a lot. He often talked about her, and how proud of her he was. He was clear that if there was one thing in life he was proud of – it was that he became the dad of a wonderful girl.”

“We’re shocked that when finally things started to move in the right direction, that we would receive the news about his death. It came without warning and we can only imagine the shock of his family. It’s hard to find the right words – or words for that matter. Even though it might have appeared as that he was lonely – with few friends, he knew that we were just a keyboard away.”

SLT: PROTEUS.ENGINEERING.FASTSHIP.V6.1.30.1.RIP.GOOLUM-SLT (NFO)

SLT or SOLiTUDE has been retired since 2000 but returns to remember Goolum. The group notes that he will be dearly missed.

“You will be missed. It is not easy to say goodbye to someone who you have known for over a decade, trading banter, laughs, advice and stories. You leave behind a daughter, a family and a group of friends, who will miss you dearly.”

“As the news have spread, the kind words have poured in. Solitude is releasing this in honor of you, to show that the values we founded the group on is the exact values you demonstrated through your decades of being in the scene. Loyalty, friendship and hard work. Our thoughts are with you, wherever you may be.”

MiDNiGHT: POINTWISE_V17.2.R2_RIP_GOOLUM-MIDNIGHT (NFO)

MiDNiGHT hasn’t been active for nearly a decade but have also honored Goolum with a comeback. The group mentions that he was a great friend who was always in for a chat and a beer.

“Life won’t ever be the same again my friend. We could sit and chat for hours and hours, and even then we knew each other well enough that nothing more was required than a beer, a rant and a small *yarr* and we’d know it would all be good.”

“This time it’s not good mate. I am here, you are not. I can’t even begin to express how this makes me feel – except an absolute sadness.”

…

RIP Goolum 1977 – 2014

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

As a hosting provider and search engine Google inadvertently plays a role in distributing the compromising shots, much to the displeasure of the women involved.

More than a dozen of them sent Hollywood lawyer Marty Singer after the company. Earlier this month Singer penned an angry letter to Google threatening legal action if it doesn’t remove the images from YouTube, Blogspot and its search results.

“It is truly reprehensible that Google allows its various sites, systems and search results to be used for this type of unlawful activity. If your wives, daughters or relatives were victims of such blatant violations of basic human rights, surely you would take appropriate action,” the letter reads.

While no legal action has yet been taken, some celebrities have also sent individual DMCA takedown requests to Google. On September 24 Jennifer Lawrence’s lawyers asked the search engine to remove two links to thefappening.eu as these infringe on the star’s copyrights.

This means that both the thefappening.eu main domain and the tag archive of Jennifer Lawrence posts no longer appear in Google’s search results.

Whether this move has helped Lawrence much is doubtful though. The site in question had already redirected its site to a new domain at thefappening.so. These links remain indexed since they were not mentioned in the takedown request.

The good news is that many of Lawrence’s pictures are no longer hosted on the site itself. In fact, the URLs listed in the takedown request to Google no longer show any of the infringing photos in question, so technically Google had no obligation to remove the URLs.

A prominent disclaimer on the site points out that the operator will gladly take down the compromising photos if he’s asked to do so. Needless to say, this is much more effective than going after Google.

Photo via

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

There are many different VPN providers to choose from and endless configuration, pricing and location issues to consider. Those aside, current attitudes suggest that going with one that claims a zero logging policy, where it’s impossible to link any activity with a particular user, is a good starting point for a selection.

Proxy.sh is one such provider, but last weekend the company openly announced that it would install the Wireshark network monitoring tool on one of its servers in order to identify an individual who had been accused of harassing someone’s daughter. Surprised that the company would do so without a court order, on Monday TorrentFreak published an article on the topic.

We contacted Proxy.sh for comment and it soon become clear that they were unhappy with our general position that monitoring a user without a court order isn’t something that a VPN service should engage in. After discussing the matter with them all week we’d like to present our findings.

It’s an interesting situation in which legalities are important but the company’s ethical policy holds the real power. Interestingly and despite placing restrictions where other VPNs do not, Proxy.sh maintains that their policy makes users more secure, not less. The issues could be extremely important for users of all VPNs, no matter which provider they choose.

Brief background to last Saturday’s decision to monitor a user

Proxy.sh received a complaint “from a desperate family, with support of its lawyer and a third party IT expert” that a user of Proxy.sh was allegedly using Proxy.sh’s Illinois server 1 to “harass” a female.

“We were given backup of a rootkit-infected Android mobile with logs about one of our network’s node. Information retrieved via the rootkit-infected mobile was then utilized to harass the minor,” Proxy.sh told TorrentFreak.

The decision to monitor

In response to the complaint, Proxy.sh activated its “ethical policy” which forbids, among other things, racist, drug-related and pornographic activity, pedophilia and politically and/or religiously sensitive conduct. Proxy.sh say that in order to qualify as a breach the activity in question must be physically or morally harmful to an individual, not a company or corporation.

In Proxy.sh’s view the alleged activity against the female amounted to an ethical policy breach and without any court order it began monitoring a US-based server to identify the alleged perpetrator. In a matter of hours the alleged hacker apologized and Proxy.sh shutdown their monitoring.

The Ethical Policy and where the line is drawn

Given that Proxy.sh is setting standards by which users need to abide or risk being monitored in the event of a complaint, we dug a little bit deeper. Is porn banned if someone is ‘harmed’ by it? What defines harm? Are objectionable religious or political views a risky prospect? Where is the line drawn and how are users expected to know?

It turns out that porn is acceptable and what Proxy.sh meant to say is that they ban videos depicting “the death of a person, or snuff movie.” It’s not clear, gore fans, whether torrenting Faces of Death is out of the question.

On the religious front we posed a situation that affected TorrentFreak earlier this year when we reported on porn downloads taking place in the Vatican, a piece which apparently offended some residents of Northern Ireland. Is that outlawed too?

“With your story on the Vatican, we would be against your activity if you quoted the name of the guy who downloaded porn, and subsequently suggested action should be taken against him. As long as you have kept it general and with respect for all individuals, this is no problem for us,” Proxy.sh explained.

So we get the general idea – Proxy.sh isn’t going to sit around and do nothing if customers of their service hurt individuals. But the question is this – as a service provider and carrier of information, should they be getting involved at all and are they doing so based on the mere allegations of third parties?

How easy is it to have a user monitored?

“First of all, you need to get in touch with a lawyer to characterize the crime in a legal context. Then, you need to get in touch with a forensic IT expert who can gather evidences of your misfortune (in computer meaning). Then you all three need to get in touch with us to report a complaint,” the company explains.

Based on the above it’s far from clear how someone can carry out a religious or politically damaging ‘crime’, much less gather and present proof of it, but it seems that at the least there is some overlap in Proxy.sh’s ethical policy and the law, although in what country’s legal system (possibly ProxyLand’s) remains a blur.

However, with these gray areas identified we asked the company this – does its ethical policy create uncertainty as to what is acceptable behavior when compared to a provider that doesn’t try to govern use of their services other than in accordance with a specified country’s law?

“Of course. There has always been some uncertainty in policies and terms. We do not think we are an exception here and we are happy that you take the time with us to define them more in depth. All the people who have got in touch with us with questions about our terms or policy know that we have always answered transparently and as openly as possible to make them even more understanding on case-by-case basis. It is actually good policy before you turn to any VPN provider, to come and ask it precise questions you need answers for.”

In any event, if a third party complaint passes muster the company is openly prepared to monitor the alleged perpetrator’s VPN connection. That said, Proxy.sh says it will transparently announce that event on its website, something other providers do not.

Is transparency on monitoring better than complete silence?

“Of course. We are sons of anarcho-capitalism. We believe in the sovereignty and self-consciousness of individuals, not of those of States or other entities such as agencies or corporations. We also especially value transparency. We believe this is what terribly lacks in today’s world,” Proxy.sh says.

“Here at Proxy.sh we offer users the full choice of both knowing and deciding to opt out (or simply switching to another node part of our network) when an intervention needs to take place. We do not believe this choice should be left only to governments and VPN suppliers themselves, but rather to the entire customer-base; in other words, to everyone involved.”

Just because you can, does it follow that you should?

In addition to all the wonderful people online there are obviously some hateful individuals too. But is it a service provider’s job to appoint itself judge and jury over their behavior, no matter how objectionable? How does Proxy.sh respond to people who say that as a privacy service provider they should simply keep out of their customers’ business?

“This is a very good question and actually the onus behind our move. To us, a service provider that acts in a jurisdiction where law enforcement is of quality should not feel responsible for interfering with any ethical or legal matter, as the jurisdiction in which it operates is supposed to provide all the necessities. I am thinking here of the United States of course who can through subpoenas directly access the infrastructures of the businesses incorporated in its economy,” the company says.

“On the other side, a service provider that acts in a jurisdiction where law enforcement may unfortunately not be of quality (for various reasons and by various aspects), should in turn feel responsible for interfering with some ethical or legal matters, to prevent the loophole it uses to avoid legislation it finds unacceptable (e.g. DMCA) from being turned into one that avoids pretty much any sort of legislation.”

Conclusions

Aside from setting up your own VPN service, Proxy.sh says that realistically VPN users have a couple of choices.

“You now face two options: choose a provider that tells you when it will intervene on its network (even though you can’t be 100% sure it will actually tell you all the time), or choose one that actually never tells you anything.

“I don’t know about you, but for me I actually prefer one that at least keeps me updated about some, especially when one states that he does keep me updated about all of them,” Proxy.sh concludes.

The big question is this – what are customers happy with?

A VPN provider who states clearly no logs and no monitoring/logging but may or may not be forced behind the scenes to do so anyway? Or one that claims no logs, some monitoring/logging based on ethics, but promises to keep people informed?

Would customers prefer it if their VPN provider took the stance of a mere carrier and kept out of their business completely, or would subscribers be more happy knowing that their provider is taking an ethical responsibility for the data flowing through their networks in order to reduce harm?

The decision, is yours….

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Our general conclusion was that in the absence of third-party auditing, at the moment it is probably a case of a user assessing a VPN provider’s attitudes, relying on feedback from existing customers, and then making an educated decision on perceived risks versus potential benefits.

It appears that the article’s timing was coincidentally spot on. On Saturday VPN provider Proxy.sh, a company that has built up a decent reputation with good pricing, quality of service and a no-logging policy, made a surprise announcement. It concerned a server the company operates out of Illinois in the United States which had been temporarily shut down and reopened.

“We are unfortunate [sic] to announce that there have been abuse complaints about hacking activities on our U.S. Illinois 1 node. We have been saddened to learn that these actions were harmful to individuals (human beings). As a result, we will open this node again and monitor it with Wireshark for a period of 7 days,” Proxy.sh announced.

The paragraph requires very little explanation except to underline the fact that a VPN provider has just confessed to spying on customer traffic. Shock of that aside, there was no mention of any legal process, court order, police action or other similar outside influence compelling Proxy.sh to do so.

Bizarrely the VPN provider then went on to give the alleged hacker a public warning.

“If you are the hacker, please stop your activities and leave our network. You are not welcome here. Our heaven is reserved to those who are not harmful to other human beings. If you do not leave, we will find you and report your activities to NGO and press officers,” Proxy.sh continued.

Then, in an attempt to let other customers know that they shouldn’t worry, Proxy.sh gave the following assurances.

“For all others, the heaven is still safe for you, dear ones. We will completely remove Wireshark after 7 days and restart the node so that everything is erased (RAM-switch). All other nodes are left unaffected by these actions,” they conclude.

Providing Proxy.sh’s announcements were roughly around the times that the sniffing software was deployed, the company was capturing packets on its Illinois server between 19:46 on Saturday evening through to Sunday morning at 06:35. At this time the VPN provider posted an update to say that Wireshark had been removed.

A source told TorrentFreak that the monitoring was triggered after Proxy.sh received a complaint from someone who claimed they were being harassed by a Proxy.sh user. The VPN provider then allegedly took it upon themselves to try and sort out the problem. It’s not clear what happened next but apparently the person responsible for the abuse was either found or stepped forward, prompting an apology and an end to the matter.

While some may argue that Proxy.sh was only trying to act responsibly by ending the abuse and acted properly by giving advance notice to its customers that a server would be monitored, the episode is likely to be damaging to the company.

First of all, the announcement was made on the company’s website, hidden away from easy viewing. Users of the VPN were very unlikely to view the message as the service is accessed through software on their computers. Second, the correct avenue for dealing with these issues is through law enforcement or the courts and the realization that a provider spied on its users (and admitted it) simply because it felt like doing so is quite remarkable.

TorrentFreak approached Proxy.sh for an official statement but we have yet to receive a response.

Update: Statement from Proxy.sh

“We are very opened about our activities and we do not support or promote activities that may be harmful to human beings. We have been contacted by a family about someone using our network and harassing their daughters. As per stated in our ethics policy, we condemn activities that are harmful to human beings.

We will only intervene into our traffic when we believe there have been activities infringing our ethical terms – that is when activities harmful to human beings (not corporations or entities) are taking place on our network. In such case, we do not privilege law enforcement agencies but rather communication, transparency and assistance from NGOs.”

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

The crack was Hollywood’s worst nightmare as it opens an “analog hole” that allows everyone to copy digital video, including pay-per-view streams. Intel, the developers of HDCP, were also outraged and promised to crack down on abusers of the key.

“There are laws to protect both the intellectual property involved as well as the content that is created and owned by the content providers. Should a circumvention device be created using this information, we and others would avail ourselves, as appropriate, of those remedies,” Intel warned.

Soon after the master key was published the first circumvention devices were put on the market but neither Intel or the Hollywood studios took any action against manufacturers or retailers. That position has now changed.

Yesterday Warner Bros. and Intel’s daughter company Digital Content Protection filed a lawsuit at a federal court in Ohio against the technology company Freedom USA and its CEO Alex Sonis. The Hollywood studio and the chip maker accuse the Ohio company of copyright infringement and violating the DMCA’s anti-circumvention provisions.

Freedom USA, which also operates under the names AVADirect and AntaresPro, makes several devices which allow consumers to convert HDCP-encrypted digital signals to analog signals. This means that users could potentially record pay-per-view broadcasts, including Hollywood movies.

“Warner Bros. requires the use of HDCP in many of its distribution licenses for pay-per-view, video-on-demand and other premium digital content delivery services to which Warner Bros. licenses its film and television programming,” the movie studio writes in the complaint.

According to Warner the bypassing of HDCP leads to more pirated copies being made available, which in turn decreases the demand for legal movies.

“When HDCP is circumvented, the risk of unauthorized copying and redistribution of the content formerly protected by HDCP is dramatically increased,” Warner Bros. writes.

“This damages Warner Bros. because the unauthorized and uncompensated reproduction and distribution of Warner Bros. copyrighted content decreases the demand for such content through legitimate distribution channels, such as home video, video-on-demand, premium broadcast channels and the like.”

The defendant is accused of selling devices that allow for this circumvention. Although the earlier referenced leaked master key is not mentioned, the complaint does explain that the devices are capable of decrypting HDCP.

“The [device] transmits HDCP-protected content to non-HDCP devices by performing HDCP decryption, without the authorization of either the copyright owner of the HDCP-protected content or DCP, and by avoiding, bypassing, removing, deactivating, and/or impairing the HDCP authentication process,” the complaint reads.

Both Warner Bros. and Intel accuse Freedom USA of violating the DMCA’s anti-circumvention provisions, and the movie studio also holds the company responsible for the copyright infringements that were induced by these devices.

Both plaintiffs ask the court to prohibit these devices from being sold and want to be compensated for the damages they’ve suffered.

Considering the ongoing debate on the legality of these circumvention devices for fair use, this case is going to be one to watch. Aside from the “piracy” element brought up in the complaint the devices sold by Freedom USA also have legitimate uses, such as connecting a new set-top box to an older TV or monitor.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Anti-piracy group CIAPC (known locally as TTVK) said they’d tracked the man’s Internet account to the unlawful sharing of a single music album by local artist Chisu. To stop matters progressing further all he had to do was pay a settlement of 600 euros and sign a non-disclosure document.

However, he chose not to pay and true to their word, last Tuesday CIAPC escalated the matter. The police turned up at Aki Nylund’s house and upon discovering that the man’s 9-year-old daughter (now 10) had done the sharing, confiscated her Winnie the Pooh laptop.

“I got the feeling that there had been people from the MAFIA demanding money at the door,” Nylund explained.

There was outcry. Everyone from the girl’s father, the artist in question, the general public, and even Finland’s Minister of Culture had complaints to make about the heavy-handed and disproportionate action.

General feeling was that this mess could be an opportunity for a more sensible look at copyright enforcement, but today those hopes have been pushed aside.

The father of the now-10-year-old has agreed to pay a cash settlement to CIAPC of 300 euros, exactly half the original demand.

“We are very happy,” says CIAPC chief Antti Kotilainen. “In a way, we just continued the original negotiations from where we left off.”

In return CIAPC have withdrawn their request for a pre-trial investigation and the police have closed the file.

“We reversed the call for an investigation because we reached an agreement with the girl’s father,” Kotilainen said.

While Aki Nylund will be glad that the case is closed and his daughter’s property will soon be returned, the payment of a cash settlement effectively puts this case back to square one.

Little wonder that CIAPC are pleased with the outcome. Over a single instance of petty file-sharing their demand for cash has been satisfied, via the use of the police and public purse, and despite the outcry.

With this victory under their belt CIAPC will almost certainly be back with more cash demands in the future. Alternatively, we could see them insist that the government seriously considers a three-strikes style infringement system. This settlement has almost guaranteed that.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Ok, the event was hardly comparable to the military-style raid at the Dotcom mansion, but it was still an example of a disproportionate show of force by the police at the behest of copyright holders.

Of course, while Dotcom’s children were undoubtedly affected by the action at their home in January, they weren’t the prime targets. In contrast and quite unbelievably, in this week’s debacle the unlucky daughter of Finland’s Aki Nylund was. But despite being a common-sense disaster, this week’s screw-up could be some of the best news we’ve had all year. And here’s why.

If the police targeted the admins of one of the biggest torrent sites in the world this week or rounded up some heavy pre-releasers or similar, people might complain but it would hardly come as a surprise. The writing has been on the wall for a long time in that respect and the backlash from the public would be almost non-existent.

But in what kind of parallel universe does a professional, western police force think it’s appropriate, proportionate and a good use of tax-payers’ money to send officers to a citizen’s home for a petty file-sharing issue, one involving the downloading of a single music album?

And worse still, Finland’s police were only called in to deal with the issue when the father of the child refused to pay a cash demand of 600 euros sent by anti-piracy outfit CIAPC on behalf of Warner Music for what amounts to, at most, a civil offense. Rightsholders should be able to protect their interests, but using the police – and the public purse – to enforce an unofficial ‘debt’? This just gets better.

But before we go any further, we should acknowledge the correct assumption by those attempting to protect the police that when the officers arrived at the house they had no idea that they would be targeting a child. Agreed, they had absolutely no clue. What they did have was ‘evidence’ collected by an anti-piracy group based on a simple IP address.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is a perfect example of just how useful this ‘evidence’ is.

If the evidence could actually identify an infringer it would seem likely that CIAPC would’ve seen the face of a 9-year-old child and thrown their 600 euro claim in the trash. Yes, anti-piracy groups do rely on a certain amount of public fear to make their strategies work, but we’ve spoken to CIAPC a number of times and they don’t seem evil. This is the kind of publicity they can do without.

And they’re not on their own.

Chisu, the artist cast into the middle of the scandal, has been forced to defend herself after she faced accusations that she was somehow involved in targeting the child. She wasn’t – and this has been confirmed by her label Warner Music – but she herself said that she doesn’t need this kind of attention and felt compelled to offer an apology to her young fans.

Of course, groups like CIAPC and others like them are trying to positively influence the younger generation. With their taste for popular music they are the customers of tomorrow, but scaring them into submission isn’t going to work.

Interestingly, one of the toughest companies in the world when it comes to IP enforcement is Disney and it was revealed this week that our 9-year-old pirate had a taste for their products. However, when her Winnie the Pooh laptop was taken away by police on Tuesday for analysis, the Disney imagery was associated not only with the joy of children, but with corporate (and by extension) state bullying.

So, all in all, especially considering the upset endured by the little girl and her family, this week’s events have been a disaster for the copyright lobby in Finland.

Almost universally the cash demands made to the girl’s father are being viewed as MAFIA-like extortion tactics. Furthermore, the fact that CIAPC can get the police to jump over a single album download has the Finnish public looking on in disbelief. Officers’ time could be spent on much more serious issues, surely?

Additionally, IP address evidence has been shown to be as flimsy as ever – unless of course CIAPC magically knew they were targeting a child and in which case they fully deserve the ‘bully’ label bandied around this week. One of these scenarios is true, and it’s a loss / loss situation for the copyright lobby whichever way you cut it.

Finally, the artist who was being ‘protected’ by this action has seen her reputation damaged by it instead. Aside from scaring little girls, and using the police for a small and private matter, this is perhaps the biggest travesty of all.

Add this all together and what you have here is a 9-year-old martyr who doesn’t know how important she is. She’s sad today because she doesn’t have a laptop, but tomorrow is another day and her suffering will not be in vain.

Because the public are angry, politicians will be nervous too, and uncooperative politicians are bad news for tougher copyright law. But in the short term anyone sent a “pay-up-or-else” letter from CIAPC (if they even dare to send any more) will be thinking long and hard about paying. The chances of the police coming next time must be slimmer than last week.

And the fact that they will be able to thank a child for that is why this is some of the best news all year.

Update: According to her father, some kind person has gifted Julietta (that’s the girl’s name) with a brand new MacBook Pro.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

The message in the US from mainstream rightsholders is designed to be educational, but more aggressive companies carry out the same process but with a sting in the tail – a request for cash-settlement to make potential lawsuits go away.

One such request for cash landed on the doorstep of an Internet account holder in Finland during the spring. Known locally as TTVK, Finnish anti-piracy group CIAPC sent the man a letter informing him that his account had been traced back to an incidence of online file-sharing.

To stop matters progressing further the man was advised to pay a settlement of 600 euros, sign a non-disclosure document, and move on with his life. He chose not to give in to the demands of CIAPC and this week things escalated as promised.

Tuesday morning the doorbell of the family home rang around 8am and the man, who works in the hospitality sector, had quite a shock. Police were at his door with a search warrant authorizing the hunt for evidence connected to illicit file-sharing.

Surprisingly, the man isn’t a previously unknown Kim Dotcom-related “co-conspirator”, nor does he run a warez site or BitTorrent tracker. He is, however, guilty of having a 9-year-old daughter with a taste for pop music.

Having failed in her quest to put enough money in her piggy bank to buy the latest album from local multi-platinum-selling songstress Chisu, in 2011 she turned to the Internet, first via Google and then The Pirate Bay.

The girl’s father said the resulting downloads didn’t work so the following day they went to the store to buy music. Nevertheless, this week’s police visit shows that CIAPC mean business, no matter how young the targets or whether or not they also buy music.

In concluding their search, the police confiscated the girl’s file-sharing weapon of choice – her Winnie The Pooh laptop – and according to her father offered some final words.

“It would have been easier for all concerned if you had paid the compensation,” the police advised

“I got the feeling that there had been people from the MAFIA demanding money at the door,” the girl’s father explained.

“At that point my jaw hit the floor and I wasn’t sure if I was awake or dreaming. So the investigator suggested, between the lines, that I empty my wallet and keep my family in hunger for the next two weeks so that they could get rid of the case? What the f––… is this how it goes? I could evade justice murder by skipping Christmas this year?”

“We have not done anything wrong with my daughter. If adults do not always know how to use a computer and the web, how can you assume that children or the elderly – or a 9-year-old girl – knows what they are doing at any given time online?

“This is the pinnacle of absurdity. I can see artists are in a position, but this requires education and information, not resource-consuming lawsuits,” he added.

Electronic Frontier Finland say that this week’s developments are an indication of just how far copyright enforcements issues have progressed in Finland.

“It is not in anyone’s interest, that in the name of the copyright, little girls are being harassed. This shows poor judgment, and consideration from TTVK and from the police,” vice chairman Ville Oksanen said in a statement.

However, there are signs that support might come from an unexpected corner. In a statement the artist in question – Chisu – said that she doesn’t want to sue anyone and that no artist needs this kind of media attention. Indeed, the criticism of the move on her Facebook page is fierce.

“I hope that the matter will be resolved soon and sorry to my 9-year-old girls,” Chisu wrote, pointing them to this free link to her music on Spotify.

Joonas Mäkinen of Finland’s Pirate Party welcomes Chisu’s comments but bemoans artists’ apparent lack of power to get anything done.

“It is sad to see how even the big artists have no idea what CIAPC / TTVK is doing in their name. And the worst part is that even after learning about this, like Chisu did just now and took part in the discussion on Facebook, they can’t stop it since all copyright protection and monitoring is centralized,” Mäkinen told TorrentFreak.

“I hope all musicians realize that the fan hunt that involves confiscating laptops and signing deals that require you to be silent about the payments are severely hurting the image of copyright and creators. Authors of works should actively rise up to say NO to what CIAPC/TTVK is doing if they wish to keep their fans,” he concludes.

CIAPC confirmed that the case against the 9-year-old is only the latest in a line of attempted settlements. Last fall a total of 28 Internet account holders settled with CIAPC, but of course we haven’t heard of the cases due to the confidentiality agreements recipients are required to sign.

Updated to correct attribution of comment to Joonas Mäkinen

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

This judge was caught on tape (included at the end), beating his then-16yo Cerebral Palsy suffering daughter back in 2004. The reason for the beating? She used Kazaa to obtain some music.

Now, after a year of investigation, (all while he has been paid $146,000/year) Judge-at-Large William Adams, of Aransas County, Texas is back on the bench and issuing judgements.

In its November 6 order, the Texas Supreme Court agreed with a deal between Adams and the Texas Commission on Judicial Conduct.

As part of that deal, a public warning was issued to Adams on September 5 2012, but no further punishments were levied aside from a minor pay cut to $144,000/year (€113,000)

Part of the difficulty was that since the beating happened in 2004, meaning that the statute of limitations for Criminal Child Abuse had expired when the video was published by Adams’ daughter in November 2011. The Texas Supreme Court did express reservations about his suitability for the bench, but did not feel strongly enough to remove him.

Adams is free to sit in judgement of others in his Rockport, Texas courtroom until 2014, when he is up for re-election to the post. However, physical domestic abuse cases, which comprised much of his docket a year ago, will no longer grace his court.

Let’s hope Copyright Trolls are also barred from there as well.

Warning: Some will find the video extremely upsetting.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Dotcom and Mona already had three children - Kimmo, Kaylo and Kobi.

The Megaupload founder was delighted to report the news and the now five-time father proudly posed with the new Dotcoms.

“Two healthy Kiwis were born yesterday. All good,” Dotcom texted TorrentFreak on Friday.

“When they asked me if I would like to keep the placenta (weird question) I said yes, and please send it to the FBI for forensic analysis so they can verify there is no pirate DNA ;-),” he added.

No names have been mentioned for the latest additions to the Dotcom household, but it’s a safe bet those on the shortlist begin with ‘K’.

Dotcom is currently preparing his defense against the indictment of the US Government, which he says will be “enlightening and maybe entertaining.” More news on this will arrive during the coming week.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.