TorrentFreak

After revealing that employees at Hollywood movie studios are pirating movies themselves, we now move on to some other high profile organizations. As it turns out, the Big Three record labels are also using BitTorrent to pirate movies and software. And they’re not alone, we also found plenty of pirates at the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Justice, the U.S. House of Representatives and at various European Parliaments.

BitTorrent is used by millions of people every day, including people who work at major Hollywood studios. Those who are said to be suffering the most from online piracy are no stranger to sharing copyrighted files themselves. New data reveals that employees at Paramount Pictures, Warner Bros., Disney, Sony Pictures and 20th Century Fox are openly pirating movies, games and other forms of entertainment while at work.

In a case lasting more than three years, a web designer who admitted that he had been contracted to work on the now-defunct StudentBay torrent site was cleared after the court found there was no evidence to suggest he had actually run the site. But in a turnaround the Court of Appeal ruled yesterday that the designer must’ve known the site would be put to infringing use and found him guilty of copyright infringement offenses.

BitTorrent Inc., the company behind the popular file-sharing clients uTorrent and BitTorrent, is distancing itself from online piracy. BitTorrent Inc. emphasizes that their software has a wide range of legal uses and that the company doesn’t support those who use their tools to pirate. “We do not endorse piracy. We do not encourage it. We don’t point to piracy sites,” BitTorrent CEO Eric Klinker says.

Last Friday a pair of leading BitTorrent sites and a handful of streaming and linking portals had their domains put on hold by EURid, the European Registry of Internet Domain Names. Fresh information this week from a source familiar with the situation suggests that someone filed a complaint against the sites with the prosecutor in Brussels. In response, some of the affected sites have been taking steps to mitigate the effects of what could be pending legal action. .

Several BitTorrent sites including Torrentz and Fenopy have had their .EU domains put on hold by EURid, the European Registry of Internet Domain Names. The new status for the domains, forcibly applied by EURid within seconds of each other yesterday afternoon, suggests that legal action against them might be pending and prevents the owners from making changes.

New data published by the Canadian broadband management company Sandvine reveals that BitTorrent traffic increased by 40% in North America over the past half-year. During peak hours BitTorrent is credited for more than a third of all upload traffic, while Netflix accounts for 28 percent of all downstream traffic during the same period.