Then along came P2P file-sharing, particularly BitTorrent, which in the final half of the last decade turned the whole thing on its head to become porn enemy number one. But something much more threateningly accessible was on the horizon.

‘Tube’ sites, so named due to their similarities with YouTube, appeared thick and fast offering huge libraries of content previously uploaded by their users. Some of it was amateur material but much of it was pirated content owned by existing porn companies. Paysites had their sign-up processes and credit cards while Tube sites offered everything for free, and often just one click away.

While some studios initially chose to fight these ‘Tube’ sites, these days its common to see studios advertising on them, promoting content via short clips and longer offerings via partner programs. For example, YouPorn’s program claims to have 400 partners including big companies like Vivid.

But having partnered with the Tube sites, the studios had another problem to deal with – file-sharing forums that rely on cyberlocker sites to serve up illicit content to their users.
While these are often dealt with by companies such as Takedown Piracy who remove millions of links on behalf of the industry, earlier this year another anti-piracy outfit appeared with more aggressive aims.

According to XBIZ, the Adult Content Industry United Foundation (ACIUF) was formed by paysite-owning companies with the aim of cutting off piracy higher up the branch.

“We build a program which allows us to analyze a pirate,” said Siep R. Kuppens, president of International Media Company, the paysite owner leading the ACIUF.

“With this, we can see where they take the content, say to at least 60 smaller pirate sites. Kill the big ones and the little ones go as well. For example, if we prove that file hosting companies have stolen content, we can take proper action. The hosting company will have no other option than to block the site. If they pop up somewhere else, we will repeat the action. One by one we will go after them.”

Just this week, we learned that ACIUF has a familiar name in its sights – a cyberlocker called Oron. Among its other users, this file-hosting service is a favorite among uploaders of pornographic material and is used extensively by members of several adult-orientated file-sharing sites.

ACIUF’s Madalina Manolache told TorrentFreak that they intend to put Oron out of business by cutting off the site’s revenue by restricting its ability to sell premium accounts. To this end ACIUF applied pressure to the CCBill payment processor. It worked, and then some.

“[CCBill] can no longer provide transaction services to businesses operating a file locker model,” said Gary Jackson, CCBill’s managing vice president.

This week ACIUF stepped up the battle by going after Acquiro, Oron’s latest payment processor. ACIUF say that with support of Mastercard, Acquiro has now also withdrawn its services from Oron. Oron have reportedly already moved to a new company, but ACIUF say they will keep following them. Oron did not respond to a request for comment.

ACIUF say they have big ambitions which of course will cost money to realize, but according to the anti-piracy group, funding is not a problem. That is because – and this will certainly raise eyebrows – the cost of their operations has been covered by an interesting donor.

The cash has come from a company called Manwin, the owners of YouPorn, PornHub, XTube, Tube8, ExtremeTube and SpankWire. According to ACIUF, Manwin wanted to keep their involvement quiet, but ACIUF “decided to give Manwin the credit it deserves.”

“The Adult Content Industry United Foundation (ACIUF) is happy to announce Manwin’s support in the ACIUF fight against piracy, and illegal filehosting. With no other expectation than achieving the objectives, Manwin has made a standing donation that will help cover the operational cost,” ACIUF said in a statement.

What provokes discussion here is that Oron and ‘Tube’ sites face similar issues – both are at the mercy of their users when it comes to uploaded content. There can be little doubt that both Oron and sites like PornHub and YouPorn (and indeed YouTube) contain large amounts of infringing content. But what they have in common is that they all respond to DMCA takedowns in order to operate within the law.

Not surprisingly, ACIUF’s Madalina Manolache sees a difference between Tube sites and cyberlockers like Oron.

“Oron indeed uses the excuse the (stolen) content is uploaded by their users and they have no control over what is uploaded,” she told TorrentFreak. “But the truth well-known by everyone is that they are paying those users (at least the big uploaders) for uploading the infringed content and asking money from others to download it; they are operating using a criminal business model. They are instigating users into uploading new and desired materials and they are doing it well – because they are paying good money.”

Of course, similar arguments have been made by other content owners against sites such as Megaupload, in which they insist that the mere existence of a user upload rewards program necessarily points to a business model hell-bent on infringement. Lawyers representing Megaupload bitterly dispute that assertion.

So that brings us back to the business models of sites like YouPorn and PornHub, that at least in their early days survived almost exclusively on content uploaded by users, much of it copyright infringing. As noted earlier though, the atmosphere has changed since Manwin started sucking up Tube sites in 2010 and 2011, with the company now encouraging other tube site owners to help the adult industry through mechanisms such as partner programs, rather than “simply aiming to make content freely available to all.”

But even now, with Manwin apparently striving for tube-site legitimacy and seeming to make a decent job of it, sites such as PornHub still carry infringing content, content potentially belonging to ACIUF anti-piracy initiative members. So is there a conflict of interest on the cards?

ACIUF say that despite the cash donation from Manwin, apparently the company “did not require immunity” from ACIUF actions, although biting the hand that feeds may not be in the anti-piracy group’s interests.

“All we can say about this is when [Manwin] donates money to ACIUF to bring down major pirate sites and major cyberlockers, we will gladly use it to bring Oron down,” ACIUF conclude.

But when it comes to Oron, the hawks are already circling. On Wednesday, adult studio Corbin Fisher filed a $34.8 million copyright infringement against the site and its operators, XBIZ reports.

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

Downloading music illegally, or watching a movie online without paying, was okay with a much smaller group, 18 and 13 percent respectively.

In fact, hiding your online porn viewing habits from your spouse is still more morally accepted than downloading a movie or music album without paying for it. Of the respondents, 18 percent thought that is was fine to secretly watch porn in a marriage.

At first sight the results of the survey are not really that surprising. Downloading music and movies without consent from the copyright holders is in violation of the local laws in New Zealand and watching porn obviously isn’t. Still, a closer look at the findings reveals some remarkable inconsistencies.

Firstly, most of the adult entertainment is actually viewed on sites that are dominated by copyright infringing content. So, many of the people who watch porn online are actually pirating as well, without realizing it.

Another remarkable finding was that people seem to be fine with copyright infringement if it’s on a video streaming site such as YouTube. Of all respondents, 31 percent said that it is morally acceptable to stream copyrighted TV-shows on YouTube, while only 13 percent believed that downloading copyrighted video was morally okay.

Thus, streaming copyrighted content is somehow perceived as more acceptable for some odd reason. The 5 percent difference between the moral acceptability of music and video downloading is another mystery that is left unexplained.

Overall, this survey shows how malleable peoples’ perceptions are when it comes to copyright issues online, with approval rates swaying back and forth between different types of media and the various distribution platforms.

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

Over the last couple of weeks we’ve reported how parts of the adult content industry is aiming to tackle sites which they believe are involved in the illegal distribution of their intellectual property.

Titan Media advertise themselves as ‘the premier creator of all-male erotica’, (aka ‘gay porn’) and they are also cracking down on sites and individuals who they say are illegally using their content.

Previously, after the CEO of anti-piracy company BayTSP refused to chase porn file sharers saying: “We don’t want to be known in the porn space”, companies like Titan had to go it alone, even going as far as complaining directly to KaZaA in 2004.

No stranger to taking (or at least threatening) legal action against P2P in more recent years, Titan has previously targeted sharers on the eDonkey and other networks, including several blogs.

Now, according to industry publication AVN, Titan Media has shut down what it calls ‘an online gay porn piracy ring’, which in reality were half a dozen blogs (some hosted by Google) carrying links to gay porn stored on sites such as Rapidshare.

The lawsuit filed in the Northern District of California names Gilbert Michael Gonzales (aka ‘MikeyG’) as the brains behind the operation, also listed 21 ‘John Doe’ as defendants and alleges copyright infringement of 45 Titan Media productions.

President of Titan Media, Keith Webb told AVN: “The message we are sending is that you can run, but you cannot hide. Mr. Gonzalez thought he could hide behind anonymous blogs and postings, but he was seriously mistaken. People need to realize that nothing they do online is anonymous. Every single posting, upload, download, or page view is tracked and recorded, and can eventually be traced back to the individual. Mr. Gonzales taunted us in his online blog postings to try and catch him and shut him down…so we did. If you steal Titan Media property, we will identify you and we will prosecute to the fullest extent of the law.”

Back in 2004, Titan admitted tracking down those it said infringed its copyrights and threatening them with legal action. However, as an alternative to a messy and costly lawsuit, it offered alleged file-sharers an amnesty in return for them taking out a valid subscription to Titan Media’s products. Titan did not immediately respond to emails requesting a comment so we are unable to confirm if this is still the case.

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

Their theory is that if you take out part of the source, the torrent sites won’t have any content for others to download.

According to a source, the site ijsklontje.nl was a very important source of latest release porn NZBs: “It’s the biggest Usenet pr0n (porn) posting community. It’s been going for years, everyone into Usenet knows about it.” Indeed, a quick search on Binsearch.info for ‘ijsklontje’ reveals a huge amount of porn.

Yesterday, visitors to the ijsklontje.nl forum were greeted with a sad message with suspicious timing:

Hello fellow members of IJsklontje

After 3 years the staff had to decide to stop all activities on this forum.

The busy life of admins and moderators is the main reason.

This forum has been brought to the top by lots and lots of hours by many staffmembers, posters and spotters. It doesn’t deserve to melt bit by bit …… So we stop at our highest level and get on with our real lifes.

We made an example for many other usenet forums, the groups are now filled by many posts from other places than IJs, so there will be no shortage of erotic binaries.

We would like to say thanks to all who made IJsklontje to the world’s most famous erotic usenetforum….

Sorry for this sad thread, we are mentally broken as well… we love you all and may you all live to see the dawn.

We salute all our friends… maybe we will see each other at other places.

Staff IJsklontje

At this stage, it has been impossible for us to verify if this shutdown is in fact the result of some legal pressures from the porn industry but judging the amount of gloating on the GoFuckYourself forums, it’s difficult to see it any other way:

ServerGenius breaks the news:

Hello everybody….as I have posted before Usenet Piracy Forum IJSKLONTJE
the site is now shutdown. This will be a HUGE blow to a lot of other piracy sites on the net as many torrent sites used this place as their main source for content.

He goes on to acknowledge the non-profit nature of the community:

I do know that these guys and their site didn’t generate them a lot of revenue
unlike a lot of other sites……as big and popular as they were they didn’t advertise or took advantage of their traffic in any way that would have made them a lot of money…….which probably made their decision to close shop a lot easier for them take….

and then makes some comments about the BitTorrent sites he believes he’s starved of content by closing ijsklontje:

….however a lot of others sites that feeded from their content do/did make money indirectly of them…..so them closing still hurt quite a few others than them in their income revenue…….and writing this down….makes me feel a little warm and happy inside

ServerGenius says he has a hit list – the sites ‘youporn’ and ‘megarotic’ are on it apparently.

As one of the forum posts quite rightly points out, closure of this site will not stop the digital flow of erotic pirate binaries. Even if this action does turn out to be the first victory for the porn industry, it will prove very quickly to be a short-lived one as the file-sharing hydra strikes again.

Stay Tuned

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

Plan A: Starve the Internet of Pirate Porn

ALL Major Content Producers / Studios / Big Brand names IN HERE NOW!!!!

Hit me up, I have extremely important information regarding content theft, distribution of both Interactive Online Media as well as DVD movie releases. I’m onto a major site that is one of the main sources in distributing new fresh stolen content on a daily basis on usenet but also most torrent sites grab their content from this source to add it to the torrent networks. I not only have info but also everything needed to legally deal with them and to get them permanently shutdown. I’m not joking, I’m not bullshitting I already have taken all the steps needed to get them shutdown…..but want to collect as much evidence from companies who their content is listed before getting them closed down. Doing so will ensure they’ll stay down…..I will assist every step that’s required to get this done properly I need you to confirm on the content that’s yours and your approval to include that info in the documentation to be used to whipe them out.

ServerGenius (SG) reveals the plan to stop porn piracy and starve torrent sites:

I’m after a forum which is very active releasing adult content by using usenet…..The site offers .nzb downloads for its users to download everything without having to look for it……..it’s a usenet for dummies kinda thing as well as a community for quite a few of the bigger release teams that do porn.

The forum is also used a LOT for the torrentsite owners as their main source for new releases……example: Shane’s World releases a new DVD today……it’s ripped, uploaded and added with all the info, screen shots and full dvd-rip tomorrow…..same day or day after…..same content is listed on sites like: puretna.com, empornium.us and many others.

Do I make this up? No I don’t, are you sure about that? Yes I am…… I have logs and any other info that will backup everything I claim….how did you get all this info? Believe it or not, they gave it themselves to me…….but more about that later…..

So the plan seems to revolve around taking down a single NZB site (a site which simplifies UseNet downloading) so that adult trackers immediately lose their source material, just like that. The problem with this plan is – well, everything really. 1) Taking down an NZB site doesn’t remove the content from Usenet. 2) There are lots of other NZB sites and sites which enable you to make your own NZBs. 3) Experienced Usenet users don’t need NZB sites. 4) Releasers have multiple sources, not just Usenet. 5) They’re discussing their take-down plans on the open internet. People read and report on such things.

Plan B: The Solutions to BitTorrent Sites

Ron Cadwell CEO of CCBill (processer of credit card transactions for porn sites) weighs in with some ideas of his own:

I was reading a post that Raw Alex (very smart guy) made in another tread that got me thinking on how you could stop the Torrent sites. You need to attack them like the Spam Groups did on spammers. They went after the backbone providers (Level 3, Sprint, ATT etc). If you could get 7 out of 10 of the major providers to blackhole them they are dead.

The question is how do you do that? Simple.

1. You get a group of adult webmasters to file DMCA notices by the truck load or allow you to file them on their behalf to the backbone providers. The laws are very specific on Damages and what an ISP must do if a proper DMCA notice is files. (Be Very Annoying Here)

2. You start sending them URL’s like what Raw Alex showed about Child Porn. This is a HOT topic and no backbone provider that is a PUBLIC COMPANY would want to be associated with Child Porn Traffic?

3. Each of the large adult hosting companies have a good relationship with 1 if not more major backbone providers. We can also put pressure on their Abuse Departments to blackhole them also due to the complaints?

I am not sure if it will work but if you put enough pressure on them and the fear of newspapers/major companies finding out about it they will want to distance themselves very quickly from these sites.

Bingo Problem Solved

Not even the mighty MPAA/RIAA with their gargantuan anti-piracy budgets seem to have thought of this plan, however Ron Cadwell felt that spamming DMCA notices is the way to go:

With a little programming I am sure A1R3K’s new group could put an online system that could make it very easy to send hundreds of complaints a day to each backbone provider and really put the pressure on them to black hole the sites.

Drunkspringbreakgirls sees no complications and is eager to get on with it:

We need to make a list of all the torrents, which backbone they are using and then we can all start contacting their abuse departments of the providers.

RawAlex steps in with his way to take down The PirateBay:

Swedish embassies based in the US are great places to drop off DMCA notices. Their government not wanting to take action on obvious copyright violation is a real issue, and raising this issue to this level may in fact make a difference.

…and continues:

…with due respect, 90% of the companies providing the actual connectivity are either based in the US or are owned by US companies. As such, to a greater or less extent, they can be touched by a DMCA because they have responsibilities as good corporate citizens in the US.

Example, is piratebay.org – “hosted” by p80.net, which is (shock) registered at Directnic. That would be a good place to send a DMCA.

P80.net is getting their connectivity (the route I get) from sprintlink. Spring comes up with an address in Kansas.

There are all sorts of fun places to deal with on this issue. If P80 / port80 / rix internet is not going to remove connectivity from pirate bay (and like pirate bay will try to hide behind lax swedish laws) then you get the US based companies that provide their connectivity to take the action that US law obliges them to take……

…Piratebay is hiding in Sweden because they know pretty much anywhere else they would get escorted to a cell with Bubba for recreation for the next few years. Again, shows a consciousness of guilt. If they thought they were right, they wouldn’t be hiding under the ice in Sweden.

….unless the guys from PirateBay happened to be a) Swedish and b) not hiding and c) not breaking any Swedish law.

Brokep, one of the founders of The Pirate Bay is not really impressed by these plans. He told TorrentFreak in a response: “We welcome the porn industry to contact us, we need more updates for the legal page, hasn’t been any fun legal threats for a while – and the porn industry have a good sense of humor, just look at the movie names they copy and remake.”

The porn industry certainly isn’t getting much sympathy from the guys on Digg either. Kikkomann felt that torrents provided great publicity for their stars while str3ama felt that the adult industry had some infringement issues of it’s own to deal with.

homesickalien couldn’t understand how the porn movie business could ever lose any money: “it’s not like they’re shelling out millions to some a-list actors or spending loads on CG effects” he said. “All you need is a $50 hooker, a dv camcorder and a dvdburner. the porn industry couldn’t lose money if it tried to.”

However, the industry maintains that it loses 4% of its total worldwide revenue to piracy. ButterBuddha feels they should proceed with caution:

“The fight for that 4% will ruin the industry…”

The full discussions on GFY can be found here and here.

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

In an attempt to stop these sites from spreading their content the porn industry organized an anti-piracy conference. AVN quotes Andrew Blake, one of the 65 adult industry representatives at the conference and director of Studio A Entertainment: “What I’m getting out of this [conference] is that this is so pervasive, and we all kind of laughed when they came for the record industry , ‘Eh, couldn’t touch us’ , but here it is, a lot of people on the verge of extinction almost, from a business point of view.”

The adult industry representatives that took part in the three hour anti-piracy session estimated that they lose approximately $2 billion a year thanks to piracy, about 4% of their total income worldwide. The main consensus was that P2P networks, and BitTorrent in particular, posed the greatest threat to the porn industry.

Several countermeasures were discussed during the meeting. One of the suggestions was to create an MPAA/RIAA equivalent for the adult industry that helps to track down pirates and pursue legal action.

Greg Piccionelli, a Los Angeles based attorney with a professional interest in porn, explained the benefits of such an overarching organization: “If a neutral party does it [suing pirates], then they’re the face. And it shields the various parties that are being damaged. We believe that there is a substantial amount of interest, especially now that what is finally beginning to happen is that virtually every producer of content now is feeling the pinch of this rampant piracy, and it’s only got to get immeasurably worse as the technology improves.”

There are also more amateuristic ideas to fight porn piracy. For example, Megan Stokes from Shane’s World announced that they are launching a forum where content owners can post screenshots of pirated content. Somehow Stokes thinks that these screenshots could be of great help in upcoming court cases: “It’s for any kind of stolen content, because with the time-stamp and the screenshot, it’s something that we can start using as evidence in court cases.”

Stokes further stresses that the adult industry has to take action before it’s too late. “I really think studio owners need to stop turning a blind eye,” Stokes said “This isn’t going to go away, and just to sit and complain and do nothing doesn’t solve anything, and at this point, in five years, because of this, there’s a lot of people who are going to be disappearing from the business, if they don’t take a proactive stance.” Stokes is probably right, but taking screenshots of BitTorrent sites is the most clueless solution to the problem I’ve ever heard.

Update: How the Porn Industry Plans to Wipe Out BitTorrent

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

This film tries to simplify its drug abuse message with an analogy of kids putting together a contraption out of Lego blocks. Although the metaphors often don’t make sense, the visual impact of the film is stunning and could easily be quite popular with individuals consuming illicit drugs. Also, like most anti-drug films, this could be a tempting introduction to drugs for some youths yearning to escape their “boring” lives or to rebel against their parents.

Perversion for Profit I (Ca. 1965)

Anti-pornography film produced by financier Charles Keating, linking pornography to the Communist conspiracy and the decline of Western civilization. Keating is pretty serious about it. Here’s a quote: “We must seek to deliver ourselves from this twisted, torturing evil. We must save our nation from decay, and deliver our children from the horrors of perversion.”

Perversion for Profit II (Ca. 1965)

Another quote form this anti-pornography film: “Now, you might ask yourself, why this sudden concern? Pornography and sex deviation have always been with mankind. This is true. But now, consider another fact. Never in the history of the world have the merchants of obscenity, the teachers of unnatural sex acts, had available to them the modern facilities for disseminating this filth. High-speed presses, rapid transportation, mass distribution. All have combined to put the vilest obscenity within reach of every man, woman and child in the country.”

Alcohol Is Dynamite (1958)

Teens Bud and Jack, eager to get some alcohol from the liquor store, ask the adult to buy it for them. Instead, the adult tells them a story of three teenagers who learn the hard way that “alcohol is a violent narcotic.” In true Sid Davis form, the story ends with one innocent teen being killed and one who becomes an alcoholic bum, leaving the others to deal with guilt from their night of reckless abandon.

Last Prom (1980)

A near epidemic of alcohol-related deaths on prom night spurred this film’s release. While alcohol does play a role in the graphic, yet fake carnage we see on the screen, you gotta wonder about that dangerous tunnel. Filmmakers realized that teens would fail to identify with even a slightly dated message; this film was later remade to update the fashions, although the story stayed the same. The school chorus soundtrack makes this film even creepier

Human Reproduction (1947)

Though this sex education film concentrates on presenting the anatomy and physiology of human reproduction in sober medical terms, its release kicked off a controversy in many American cities and towns over the legitimacy of sex education in the public schools. The film is narrated from the point of view of an adult who tries to decide how to answer his son’s natural questions about sex and reproduction. With excellent diagrams of the reproductive process.

As Boys Grow (1957)

Sex education film aimed at teenage boys, with the coach of a freshman track team as authority figure and teacher. How does the male reproduction system work, why does it work that way, and what can we do with that thing.

How Much Affection? (1957)

How far can young people go in petting and still stay within the bounds of personal standards and social mores? You like someone, he or she likes you, everything seems to be fun, but suddenly you find yourself in a position where your physical urges fight against your reason.

A Case For Beer (Ca. 1970)

An educational film about the dangers of selling beer to underage youth. The film is intended for convenience store owners, very informational indeed. Don’t be tricked, or you will lose your license and never sell anything again.

Thanks Archive.org and BEN

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