However, for the paranoid movie industry the UK does provide somewhat of a unique worry. While the incidence of cams coming from Britain is particularly insignificant, there is no such thing as an “illegally cammed movie” in the country, because, believe it or not, camming a movie is not illegal.

Earlier this year, boss of Vue Cinemas Tim Richards wrote about his dilemma.

“We call the police and the police aren’t interested,” said Richards. “So we ask (the pirates) to leave and they leave typically with their cameras and sometimes with their film intact.”

With the law about as much use as a chocolate teapot, cinema chains are resorting to implementing their own “laws” to stop the virtually non-existent cammers and, just like enforced DRM, all they do is annoy paying customers.

Jeremy Nicholas describes himself as “an award winning TV and radio broadcaster, after dinner speaker, compere and media trainer.” Like many of us, he also enjoys a good movie.

After work on Wednesday this week, Jeremy went to watch the new Bruce Willis movie at a cinema belonging to Cineworld, the UK’s second largest multiplex chain. Like most people on his way home, Jeremy had items on his person that enable him to do his job – one of them was a Sony laptop, an item too expensive to risk leaving in the car, particularly since it contained his current work projects, “plus some half baked book ideas.”

Because he had his laptop with him, Cineworld refused him entry.

Jeremy pointed out that his laptop has no camera feature, or additional hardware to record movies. Then, as if it is any of their damn business, cinema staff then enquired why he had bought it to the cinema at all. He duly explained he was on his way home from work.

Cinema staff then conceded Jeremy could be let in, but only if they could take his laptop from him. However, the cinema offered no receipt for the hardware, so Jeremy declined.

“So despite them treating customers with suspicion, as though were are all bootleggers, we have to trust them to get our equipment back,” said Jeremy.

“I was looking forward to watching the new Bruce Willis film. I wondered what Bruce would do under pressure,” he continued. “I wasn’t wearing a white vest, but decided I wasn’t standing for any nonsense and called for the manager. After a short time a small boy appeared. Sorry I said, I want to see the manager.”

But the small boy was the manager, who told Jeremy that they were acting on new “guidelines” from FACT – the MPAA-funded Federation Against Copyright Theft, which advised banning laptops.

Although the manager said Jeremy could go in with his laptop after all, a query was raised over his cellphone which did have the ability to record a movie. He could take it in, he was told, as long as he had no intentions to cam Bruce Willis with it.

“Not the most rigorous interrogation and one that a determined bootlegger probably could have passed,” said Jeremy.

And then, just to show how ridiculous this ban is, Jeremy said as he was being questioned, a number of suspects customers walked past with handbags and rucksacks, any of which could’ve contained recording equipment.

But Jeremy enjoyed the movie in the end.

“‘Surrogates’ is about a future world where people have been replaced by robots. Everything ran smoothly for a while, but in the end it all went wrong because the robots were efficient but lacked humanity. Cineworld should show this to their staff as a training movie. (As long as none of them try and record it),” Jeremy concludes.

Perhaps it’s time for Cineworld to remove the statement below from their website:

Founded in 1995, our philosophy has been to provide a modern, clean environment that makes “cinema going” a pleasurable experience, which in turn encourages frequent return visits.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

ISPs wouldn’t be expected to play copyright cops, but instead decisions about disconnections under a 3 strikes regime would be made by the Copyright Tribunal, which would give those wrongly accused a chance to put their side of the story. This was generally accepted as a fairer way of going about the issue.

However, the Federation Against Copyright Theft has indicated that it is unhappy with the proposals and would prefer a “streamlined” process of justice, which would mean people could be disconnected without the full hearing in front of an independent body as suggested by the Economic Development Ministry.

FACT director Tony Eaton says that his organization doesn’t have a problem with judicial process – as long as it’s on their terms.

“The concern is that we send out 1000 infringement notices, and then someone says, `The way to stall this is let’s all go to arbitration’, and a year later we could still be going through that same process,” Eaton said.

“Do we get to the point where we have 1000 cases to be heard by the Copyright Tribunal? If everyone brings their lawyer, we will only do five in a day,” he added.

By anyone’s measurement, even given the lack of accuracy inherent in some anti-piracy evidence, 100% error rate and 100% appeals is a little pessimistic to say the least and to suggest everyone would bring a lawyer is absurd – the cost would be hugely prohibitive. Nevertheless, Mr Eaton said he would prefer to be able to present evidence in bulk to the tribunal – in search of corresponding disconnections in bulk, no doubt.

The discussion document for the amended Section 92a was open for submissions until August 7 and according to Ministry of Economic Development spokesman Joshua Herron, many of those submissions show opposition to disconnecting people from the Internet, period.

InternetNZ, a non-profit organization dedicated to protecting and promoting the Internet, said it is “absolutely opposed to the inclusion of termination of Internet accounts as a penalty for copyright infringement.”

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

Founded way back in 2003 – a light year in BitTorrent terms – UK based FileSoup is one of the original torrent sites and has built a solid reputation while keeping a surprisingly low profile, particularly considering its status. It has already outlived The Pirate Bay by around 9 months and is believed to be the oldest community still around today.

The search warrant for the owner of FileSoup was issued under Section 109 of the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 and authorized the gathering of any evidence related to the illegal distribution or file-sharing of copyright films. Notably, since 2005 FileSoup hasn’t operated a tracker but links to metadata which links to material hosted elsewhere. It has never hosted any copyrighted content.

Known online as TheGeeker, the owner of FileSoup was arrested and taken to his local police station. The charge: Suspicion of downloading copyrighted movies. He told TorrentFreak that his site had been under FACT investigation since February this year.

“I asked them [police] while still at home if I could contact a member of my family so that someone could come and make sure my dog was catered for, they said that I couldn’t. On the way to the police station I asked if they could contact someone to take care of the dog or if I could make a phone call, they again said I could not,” he recalls.

But the police’s lack of sympathy for Geeker’s pet was just the start. He says that before being put in a cell he was given a ‘Notice Of Entitlements’ sheet, a document explaining how a prisoner should be cared for. One section explained:

Keeping in touch: As well as talking to a solicitor and having a person told about your arrest you will usually be allowed to make one phone call. Ask the police if you would like to make a phone call. You can also ask for a pen and paper. You may be able to have visitors but the custody officer can refuse to allow that.

But Geeker soon discovered that things were different in his case. “I asked again as I was put in the cell, if I could contact someone or make a phone call, I was told no I couldn’t do that, I asked why and was told that the Inspector had put a block on any and all communication from me to anyone.”

Each time an officer called on Geekers cell, he asked permission to let someone know of his arrest. He also asked to contact his lawyer. Seven and a half hours later and both were effectively still being denied.

Around 4:45pm a policeman appeared in Geeker’s cell with a 12 page list of items seized from his house, and demanded a signature that would indicate that the items were his. Of course, it was impossible to say if the items they had in custody were indeed the ones on the list, so Geeker declined and the policeman stormed out of the cell.

“What do they take me for, a complete idiot!” says Geeker. “No one in their right mind would have signed to say any of these items were their property, especially if they’d not been there when it was seized!”

At 5pm Geeker was finally allowed legal representation, where he questioned that surely “downloading” was a civil issue, not a criminal one. However, the movie industry anti-piracy group FACT are known to frame things differently. In previous cases they have insisted that donations are profit and therefore constitute a criminal copyright offense. It is probable they have done the same thing at FileSoup and this could be why Geeker was arrested and not sued.

Geeker then had an interview with two police officers which was recorded on a machine which malfunctioned throughout the interview. In common with other FACT-run cases, the nature of BitTorrent proved difficult for law enforcement to grasp, with Geeker having to explain how everything worked – including what URLs and domain names are.

Upon leaving, Geeker was informed that in common with other cases in the UK such as that against TV Links, the private anti-piracy group FACT was in charge of his seized property, not the police.

Geeker was eventually released on police bail a little after 19:30 with his offense listed as “Distribute Article Infringing Copyright”. He must return to the police station in October.

Geeker says his home was a mess. “I got back home just before 8pm to find my belongings had been turned upside down, the dining room was a like a whirlwind had gone through..[]..they’d turfed out all the drawers of the desk, chucked back what was of no interest to them, left a pile of paperwork scattered across my desk and table with wires everywhere, talk about a nightmare!”

And Geeker’s dog was pretty upset too. “My dog was extremely traumatized, he’d been barking almost non-stop all day long the neighbour told my Dad when he went over at about 6:30pm to feed the dog as I hadn’t got back yet. My dog rarely barks at anything, now he barks at the least little thing, I am SO annoyed that they have done this to him!”

The FileSoup site remains open. Stay tuned.

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

Nevertheless, following an investigation by UK Trading Standards, the Federation Against Copyright Theft (FACT) and the police, the admin was arrested. At the time, FACT claimed that he was detained due to “offenses relating to the facilitation of copyright infringement on the Internet.” Except there was a problem.

There is no criminal offense of ‘facilitation of copyright infringement’ under English law. There would have been at least a civil offense if TV-Links had hosted the videos themselves, but they did not. Sites like YouTube and Dailymotion did, but the police or anti-piracy groups didn’t go after these giants. Indeed, the police themselves seemed to disagree with FACT’s reasoning for the raid, saying that the admin had been arrested for “supplying property with a registered trade mark without permission.”

…which raised another problem. The Trade Marks Act 1994 (specifically section 92) was designed to deal with physical, real-world counterfeit goods. Supplying links, if anything, could only be considered a service – definitely not a sale of physical goods. Getting a conviction on these grounds would be tricky, if not impossible. Considering the problems highlighted above, it’s no surprise that the TV-Links case has disappeared from the news radar.

TorrentFreak tracked down the now ex-admin of the site, 26 year-old Dave Rock, for the lowdown on this important case which seems to ask two questions: Can someone be held responsible when 3rd parties merely link to copyright works that are hosted by someone else, and furthermore, does this constitute a criminal offense under an act designed to protect physical goods?

It all starts on the morning of 18th October, just five days before the police raided OiNK. Dave had some unwanted visitors. At 06:20, two police officers, three FACT members, and around five Trading Standards officials descended on Dave’s home. Fortunately for him, in his case the media wasn’t tipped off, so there were no photographers and reporters outside his house. Alan Ellis of OiNK was not so lucky.

“The police and Trading Standards officers were always polite and professional, I wasn’t man handled like you see with the over acting police on the TV,” Dave told us. “I was arrested as soon as I opened the door, not cuffed and was allowed to grab a few bits, like my wallet and phone. They seized my laptop, my old PC and annoyingly, my girlfriends PC too, along with random CDs and four or five old hard drives, ranging between 8GB to 15gb.”

When we asked Dave what was on the search warrant, he said: “They ticked Video Recording Act 1984 – Section 16A and Trade Marks Act 1994 – Section 93. But, thinking about some of the questions during the interview I got the impression they were looking for DVD copying kit or they hoped to find this type of thing. FACT’s website always boasts about DVD pirate busts.”

The police officers then took Dave to the station where he was questioned. Not by the police, but by people from Trading Standards and FACT, a well known private anti-piracy company-come-lobby group. Quite why a private company is allowed to directly question someone in a criminal case that they may wish to prosecute privately is another question, and one that many people will find unpalatable.

It seemed that both outfits were disappointed, they must have expected more than just hyperlinks. In common with thousands of forums around the world, Dave didn’t know any of the TV-Links staff personally, and obviously didn’t know anything about the users. Almost 75% of the site’s visitors came from China, 10% from the US and next popular was the UK, at just 3.8%. Hardly a threat to Great Britain Ltd, but of course the implication was that Dave was making money. The reality was that he was receiving around $2 to $5 per day in donations from random site users, which he used to cover the server costs.

After six hours, Dave was released – without being charged and with no restrictions. Now, well over a year later, not much has changed. For the last 6 months or so, Dave has had no contact with the police and no contact through his lawyer with FACT or (Gloucester) Trading Standards. In fact, GTS has no further involvement in the case and has deferred to FACT, just in case they want to make a private prosecution. But, everything has gone very quiet.

TorrentFreak asked Dave if it had ever been raised that he was arrested under laws ill-placed to deal with the situation. He told us, “When it comes to law there isn’t really any point arguing after the point, you need to concentrate on identifying [in this case] how FACT will interpret the current law and, if/when this ends up in court, how they will use it to their advantage.”

Until then, it just seems like a waiting game. “I guess you could call it being in limbo, but recently I haven’t given it much thought, I’m just getting on with my life,” Dave told us. “The only thing that’s a little annoying is that FACT still have all the gear seized by GTS, apparently they’ve been given it for “forensic analysis”. Do I hear you cry ‘breach of Data Protection Act‘, for passing private data to a private company? Again this is something we are still looking into.”

So how on earth did TV-Links end up on the radar in the first place? Why was such significance put on the site and why did the response include a raid with so many people in attendance from the police, government trading standards and Hollywood-funded private company FACT?

“One thing I’d like to mention, Gloucester Trading Standards were always polite and professional,” said Dave. “In my eyes they were led up the garden path by FACT. My personal opinion is that Gloucester Trading Standards were lead to believe I was copying and selling DVDs. But, when they entered my home they only found crappy old PC gear, Laptop and no DVDs, and lost all interest – if they were ever interested in the first place.”

Despite the lack of interest and indeed grounds for a conviction, it doesn’t change the fact that TV-Links is gone as a result of the above actions. Why did it even find a place in people’s lives in the first instance? Dave believes it’s down to sheer lack of choice. “TV-Links and other linking sites are only around because the big media companies haven’t supplied the viewing public with any viable alternatives, at least until recently in the UK. The BBC iPlayer is very good, but it’s a shame it’s only 7 days of TV.”

So, with the authorities backing away, what are the chances of TV-Links making a comeback? “Running the site did take up all of my free time, it was good fun running it but I’m happy I now have my evenings and weekends free,” Dave told us. He has no intention of bringing the site back, particularly since a TV-Links.co.uk replacement site popped up many months ago at TV-Links.ws.

Finally, when sites are busted, many people are interested in exactly how the owners were tracked down by the authorities. With TV-Links, the techniques weren’t mysterious at all. They didn’t need to be. The reason why it was so easy is the very reason Dave felt free to run the site in the first place:

“To be honest I didn’t really attempt to hide my ID, as under UK Law linking to another site isn’t illegal, so I didn’t see the need.”

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.

“This is the first time dogs have been used anywhere in the world to search for counterfeit DVDs and the results were amazing. With the cooperation and assistance of FedEx and Customs we were able to properly test the dogs in a live situation and prove that they can work in a busy working environment.”

Lucky and Flo

The MPAA is quite happy with their new “watchdogs”, and says the dogs are a “highly effective” tool.

“The MPAA is delighted with the immediate success of this initiative which has opened up a new and highly effective means of detection for counterfeit discs.”

Article from: TorrentFreak, check out our new blog at FreakBits.