Another reason for a new and improved protocol is the massive number of spammers and anti-piracy organizations that abuse the BitTorrent protocol, either to make money or to bust people who download infringing material. The new protocol will be designed with these potential problems in mind.

The protocol will most likely use the .p2p file extension compared to the .torrent extension BitTorrent uses right now. The good thing is that the .p2p files will be backwards compatible which should ensure a smooth transition from .torrent to .p2p files.

It will be interesting to see whether other BitTorrent sites will support the new protocol. Erik from Mininova, the most popular BitTorrent site at the moment, told us they will absolutely support the new protocol. We at TorrentFreak are of course a bit concerned about these new developments since we owe our name to BitTorrent, but we wish The Pirate Bay crew the best ;)

The new protocol is still in the development phase, but the initial release is planned for sometime early next year. More features and information about the new protocol, which is still nameless at this point, can be found at the protocol design page.

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

Many people wondered how they were caught at all, while others claimed they had no knowledge of such a game and stopped to consider that their router security may have been compromised. If security features are not enabled on a router, anyone can easily fall victim to an authorized connection. In this case, it’s feared that someone may have accessed an unsecured router, downloaded and redistributed even just a tiny piece of this file via BitTorrent or eMule, with the router’s owner getting the blame.

Lawyers representing the game’s publisher state as fact that a full copy of a game must have been uploaded to their monitors for the infringement to be flagged – clearly the lawyers have no idea how a protocol like BitTorrent operates. It would be virtually impossible to download a large file in it’s entirety from just one source and the time it would take would prove totally impractical. There is a very real probability that a tiny transfer of a few hundred kilobytes can trigger legal action against an alleged infringer, a transfer easily achieved by someone accessing a victim’s router for just a few seconds.

People who are using this defense are now starting to receive letters, part of which reads;

If it is your contention that at the relevant time you did all that you could to secure your network and PC but that, nevertheless, an intrusion occurred and that the infringing act complained of was perpetrated by a person or a person unknown who gained access to the network without your permission, please provide (in accordance with the Practice Directions for Pre-Action Protocol) all copies of the essential documents on which you rely.

In other words, forget ‘Innocent Until Proven Guilty‘ and start getting used to ‘Guilty! Now Prove Yourself Innocent!‘

In terms of evidence, the lawyer Davenport Lyons representing the publisher Zuxxez, demands to see;

1. A copy of the instructions accompanying the router
2. Evidence to prove the use of anti-virus software and firewall
3. Evidence detailing exactly how the computer was compromised.
4. Evidence to prove the victim took adequate measures to prevent the intrusion.

Despite the fact that producing evidence should be up to the lawyers when dealing with cases, quite how the production of a router manual will affect this case is unclear. Presumably you send off the manual for their tech people to look at, then they use the fact that your router is ‘easily secured’ or the fact that you didn’t read the book, against you.

The manner in which PC based anti-virus and firewall software protects an illegally accessed router is also unclear. More worrying is the implication in point 3 that the accused must give a technical report as to how the breach took place, something no-one but an expert could provide – clearly trying to put a fair defense out of reach for the less well-off. The reality of the situation is that an assertion by the accused that the claimed activity was not carried out by him, is sufficient.

As for point 4, I do not believe there is a legal requirement for an internet user to train themselves in security before operating a router and connecting to an ISP, nor has there been a decision in an English court to state that an internet subscriber is responsible for the actions of others whilst using his connection. Davenport Lyons have informed users that people in Germany are responsible for what happens on their connections but German law isn’t valid in the UK. This is another important point which these lawyers seem to have purposely overlooked and one which makes them appear to be attempting to misdirect people by quoting an irrelevant case from from a completely different country.

Furthermore, even though they demand ‘evidence’, don’t think for one minute that corresponding with these lawyers is something that can bear fruit. One unfortunate gentleman whose wife has been wrongly accused of distributing the game has been talking to Davenport Lyons via letter, trying to sort the matter out, until he received a letter from them with this paragraph;

….we consider that to enter into further correspondence with you on technical or evidential points is unnecessary and unhelpful and will serve only to increase costs. We are therefore instructed not to continue this circular correspondence.

So by this measure, trying to clear your name is deemed “unecessary and unhelpful’ by the lawyers, something which is considered by many as one of the cornerstones of British justice and a fundamental right of it’s citizens. Of course, if you’re a lawyer working on tight profit margins, any correspondence will cut into that profit. ‘Unhelpful’ indeed.

The letter finishes up;

‘If we do not receive a response from you within the next fourteen days we will take our client’s instructions regarding the issuing of proceedings against you’

“Instructions which could be to ‘drop it’…” says a regular Usenet poster on the issue.

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

But if we look at their advise to configure your BitTorrent client, it appears that Shaw has other intentions. One of their suggestions is:

“Set the KB/s LAN max upload speed [0:unlimited] value to 1.”

So they basically say: don’t share! I’m pretty sure that if you do this, sharing files wont be that “quickly and easily” anymore.

Shaw is obviously not a fan of BitTorrent. Apart from giving wrong advise to its customers, they also throttle BitTorrent traffic in general, like many other ISPs. Here’s my advise for all Shaw customers that want to use BitTorrent: Turn on protocol encryption, and try to find a better ISP, they’re not worth the money.

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