[Bradford] Fw: It Happened

[Nick Rhodes]

Cheers for that Steve.

I think its worth pointing out that joining a swarm is nothing more than
that; does not automatically imply downloading and uploading, which is are
activities that MAY happen after joining and are instigated direct with
other ip addresses.

On 25 February 2015 at 12:06, Steve Wilson <bradford-lug at swsystem.co.uk>
wrote:

> Probably biased - "other" signature used for transparency.
>
> There's lots of issues with copyright and file sharing. Plenty of the
> filesharing problems get highlighted frequently on torrentfreak.
>
> We've seen the "speculative invoicing" business start out here in the UK
> with ACS law making it famous after davenport lyons using copyright laws to
> have any criticism of their business model removed. To know how this works
> you need to know how bittorrent works. trying to keep it simple enough to
> understand, each "torrent" has a hash and people sharing this join a swarm.
> Anyone can join this swarm and IP addresses are shared so others know where
> they may be able to get other parts of the torrent they're trying to
> download. This is where the business model really starts to get flaky.
>
> The IP taken from the swarm then has it's ISP identified, and a court
> orders them to identify the customer using the IP at the given date/time.
>
> Then the letters normally show up on the doorstep, usually threatening
> legal action but you can make it go away for a couple of hundred quid.
>
> This has moved over to the US, where adult entertainment companies now
> send threats for sharing titles with dubious names, would you want to be
> taken to court for downloading something with a dodgy title?
>
> The real problem with this is that an IP address does not identify a
> person, there's a pretty good chance the account holder is probably the
> offender but there's also the possibility that someone's using your wifi or
> maybe a friend came round at that time and had left their torrent program
> running on their laptop without realising. Based on the IP address alone
> there is no proof that it was the account holder.
>
> The UK has some wierd laws round this, the common tactic against sites,
> oink was a good example, is to use fraud laws as the sites are "passing
> off" copies as legitimate downloads. I don't believe anyone downloading
> from torrent sites believe their getting a legitimate copy personally.
>
> Site blocking's a joke and so easy to circumvent with proxies/vpn etc, but
> beware of the multi billion dollar industry if you show them it is.
>
> Steve Wilson
>
> IT Team Leader - Pirate Party UK
>
> Pirate Party UK is a political party registered with the Electoral
> Commission.
>
> On 25/02/2015 10:24, Nick Rhodes wrote:
>
>  And don't forget the abuse of power that certain legal entities show.
>
> I have personally received 3 legal threats, incorrect allegations of
> breach of copyright for trying to resell retail boxed software :/
>
> Cheers, Nick.
>
>
> On 25 February 2015 at 10:00, Robert Burrell Donkin <
> robertburrelldonkin at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> On Wed, Feb 25, 2015 at 9:43 AM, Nick Rhodes <nick at ngrhodes.co.uk> wrote:
>>
>> <snip>
>> lots of good stuff
>> </snip>
>>
>> > In both UK and US as soon as money gets involved it becomes a more
>> completed
>> > situation (including profiting from add on tracker listing sites),
>> > potentially criminal, but I've never been able to fathom the exact
>> > legalities for UK or US in for-profit circumstances.
>>
>> Digital Britain was *really* close to being lost during wash-up (I
>> think if a few more people with Labour MPs had contact them, Labour
>> would have been forced to withdrawl it), and many of the technical
>> criticisms we made over the drafting appear to have been taken into
>> account by the civil service when drawing up regulations and by their
>> glacial implementation of some provisions. In the country, it is often
>> easier to force through poorly thought-through legislation than it is
>> to get the enforcement to stick.
>>
>> I suspect that the current state of UK law is now deeply ambiguous at
>> best. Given DB did not attempt to reconcile it's innovations with
>> existing bodies of statues and case law, my best guess is that the Law
>> Lords will one day need to clarify a lot stuff including the issues
>> raised by Nick.
>>
>> So yes, the authorities much prefer to be able to use the clear,
>> well-tested, predictable criminal law. Given current budget
>> constraints at the Crown Prosecution service - and the wide
>> confiscation powers enjoyed by the police - I would think very
>> carefully before choosing using a criminal case to clarify the law.
>>
>> In theory, I could be banned for download software to which I own the
>> copyright. In this case, I might consider contesting the case but I
>> would first need to dispose of all my movable assets, quite my job and
>> defend myself in person.
>>
>> Robert
>>
>
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