TorrentFreak

Just over a week ago, a meeting was held behind closed doors between the Australian Attorney General, ISPs, and representatives of major media conglomerates. As we reported when the meeting was first announced, it seems the meeting is a followup to the threat made by AFACT about a three strikes policy. The meeting, which took [...]

All around the world Hollywood is influencing politics and law enforcement, mainly through local anti-piracy groups. Aside from lobbying, they also employ private investigators to track down and bust copyright infringers. Today, one of them spills the beans. Gavin “Tex” Warren reveals how he was instructed to boost statistics, link piracy to drug trafficking, and manipulate the police in order to secure more interest for the war on piracy.

The anti-piracy lobby group AFACT just championed a study which claims that nearly all of the popular files on BitTorrent point to infringing material. Although the study in question is probably not far off, the press-release of the anti-piracy group has been met with more doubt than ever before. Slowly journalists are starting to reflect on the ongoing propaganda stream from anti-piracy outfits, and some are even brave enough to call them out on it.

Last month we reported on a threat made by AFACT to Australian ISP’s – talk to us on a ‘graduated response’, OR ELSE. Since no-one apparently took the offer up, the ‘or else’ has appeared, in the form of the Australian Attorney General. The Australian has confirmed that Attorney-General Robert McClelland will be holding a [...]

Following an ultimatum set by AFACT, Australian ISPs have until the close of business today to comply with veiled threats from the big Hollywood studios to help them tackle online piracy, or else. As one ISP confirms it won’t respond to threats, another is trying to form a coalition to fend off the movie companies. Pirate Party Australia describes the moves by Hollywood as “extortion”.

Under the banner of the Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft, the big Hollywood studios are flexing their muscles down-under. If the latest rhetoric is to be believed, the country’s ISPs have less than 48 hours to commit to talks on a graduated response system to tackle illicit downloads. Failure to comply, they warn, will result in yet more legal action of the type being suffered by iiNet.

After a pair of unsuccessful attempts at making Aussie ISP iiNet responsible for the copyright infringing activities of their users, the Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft is refusing to give in. The Hollywood-backed group is now taking its case to the High Court, claiming that two of the three judges in the appeal did not apply legal tests correctly.