torrent

TorrentFreak pegs top pirating universities in U.S.

Restricting access to Web sites such as The Pirate Bay and KickassTorrents has been a long-standing practice for universities in both the U.S. and United Kingdom.

Suffering under the strain of heavy traffic due to students streaming films and downloading gigabytes of data via torrents, academic institutions have attempted -- often in vain -- to curb the trend.

But when the next episode of "Game of Thrones" isn't out for another week and has been broadcast already in another country, the temptation is no doubt difficult to resist.

Universities are not unaware of this and have … Read more

AT&T set to start six-strike anti-piracy campaign?

Alleged documents obtained by TorrentFreak assert that Internet provider AT&T has begun internally training its personnel in a new anti-piracy campaign.

Warning notices will begin to be sent out on November 28, according to the documents. If subscribers are caught downloading content protected by intellectual copyright -- including videos, games and music -- they can expect to have access to frequently visited Web sites blocked.

So, can a subscriber expect a court summons to arrive in the mail? Perhaps not, at least, for now. Instead, you'll have to complete an "online copyright course," according to … Read more

Researchers say Gainesville, Fla., is America's 'pirate capital'

No metro area in America pirates more music than Gainesville, Fla., on a per capita basis, according to data-tracking firm Musicmetric.

Musicmetric also reported that of the 97 million BitTorrent files downloaded across the United States in the first half of 2012, about 78 percent were albums and 22 percent were individual songs. The company says that if most albums have 10 songs on them, the number of tunes pirated tops 759 million.

Gainesville, located in north Florida, is home to about 124,000 people. The city is also home to the University of Florida, which has nearly 50,000 … Read more

Domains seized from Demonoid BitTorrent site up for sale

Three key Demonoid domains are now up for sale, less than two weeks after the BitTorrent site was taken down in a coordinated effort.

The Ukraine-based site was taken offline earlier this month apparently when local authorities contacted its Internet service provider, Colocall, and forced the ISP to shut down the service's servers. Demonoid was among the Web sites included in the U.S. government's "Notorious Markets List," which was created to identify "markets, including those on the Internet, which exemplify the problem of marketplaces dealing in infringing goods and helping sustain global piracy." … Read more

Google must delete 'torrent' from autocomplete, court says

The French Supreme Court has ruled that Google may have to censor the words "torrent," "RapidShare," and "Megaupload" from its instant and autocomplete searches, according to TorrentFreak.

In its ongoing court case with French music industry group SNEP, Google has been accused of implicitly allowing copyright violations for not filtering out these words. The SNEP alleges that when users type in names of well-known musicians in Google search, file-sharing sites get added on with the autocomplete feature.

"We are disappointed by the court's ruling," a Google spokesperson told CNET. "Google … Read more

Porn studios accused of shafting enthusiasts

People have needs.

There are those who attempt to make money out of satisfying those needs. And there are those who attempt to make money out of offering to hide people's embarrassment at having those needs in the first place.

Currently, certain porn producers -- normally rather nice people -- are being accused of the latter ruse.

Allegations are being laid that these porn producers are involved in shaking down alleged illegal downloaders, who may not be illegal downloaders at all.

According to Wired, the scheme is blessedly direct. Porn producers locate the IP addresses of those they believe … Read more

Torque turns BitTorrent into a Web app

A new way to manage your torrents puts a bit of Torque in your Web browser. Debuting today from the company that makes uTorrent and BitTorrent, the alpha version of BitTorrent Torque creates rudimentary torrent controls in JavaScript that can be run from your HTML5-compliant browser.

In a blog post announcing Torque, BitTorrent developer Patrick Williams explained that Torque works by providing a JavaScript hook to a custom BitTorrent client backend. From there, developers can write apps that use Torque's APIs.

Currently, there are two extensions for Torque. One is Paddle Over, which integrates drag and drop file transfers … Read more

Judge dismisses piracy suits, says IP address doesn't confirm state

A California judge has dismissed 15 lawsuits against John Does accused of sharing pirated adult movies on BitTorrent, saying the court lacks jurisdiction because the geolocation tools relied on don't always accurately identify the state in which the IP address is located.

In order to serve Internet service providers subpoenas to find out which individuals are behind IP addresses linked to alleged pirated content on BitTorrent, the lawyers for plaintiff Celestial needed to convince the judge that the IP addresses are located in California. But the judge said he was not persuaded that the geolocation tools had a high … Read more

Download this, Mr. Jones

Numerous entertainers have had serious flirtations with digital distribution, but the band Counting Crows has taken its infatuation a step further -- straight into the BitTorrent universe. (Legally, that is.)

The Counting Crows BitTorrent bundle (download), released today, includes songs, art, and liner notes from their latest album Underwater Sunshine. It's available to torrent freaks everywhere -- with the approval of both the band and its label.

"I don't know why everybody's not doing it," said Counting Crows lead singer Adam Duritz during a phone conversation with CNET. He noted that even at his band'… Read more