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Alleged founder of world’s largest BitTorrent distribution site arrested

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Re: Alleged founder of world’s largest BitTorrent distribution site arrested

#261

Post by lkjhgfdsa57 »

revelation wrote: post #37
msie wrote: post #22

So Bittorrent is decentralized but you need a centralized index of the available torrents? Is this correct? Can you find anything without a site like KAT? TIA.

The Freenet project ( https://freenetproject.org/ ) has decentralized messaging (Frost) but the problem was/is spam and DOS by malicious actors eating up the (already little) bandwidth. There is a successor (Freetalk?) which when I tried it had some novel features to combat that, i.e. solve captchas to gain "trust" and a "web of trust" where you can vouch for users and similarly receive trust.

The FMS decentralized message system in Freenet is spam resistant using a web of trust. Some Frost users have recently migrated to using it more since the frostbite bug caused problems

Freetalk is dead/stalled due to development issues.

ksk@tvtorrents on Freenet mirrored kat tv specific magnet links and files but they've stalled due to the kat api being down.

Re: Alleged founder of world’s largest BitTorrent distribution site arrested

#262

Post by Segfaulter »

mSparks wrote: post #256
CaptSpify wrote: post #3

As an American, I wish we would stop doing this. It isn't effective, and it's a waste of time/resources that could be better spent elsewhere. I'd even argue that its counter-effective to progress. Instead of punishing people for making more efficient systems, we should reward them, and try to integrate.

am i the only one to walk away from this story thinking there must be a better way to handle large transactions than banks and cryptocurrencies.

Gold and diamonds?

Re: Alleged founder of world’s largest BitTorrent distribution site arrested

#263

Post by eggy »

tomp wrote: post #226
eggy wrote: post #145

Aside from the legal technicalities here, I mostly ponder the future of IP. I think Napster positively affected the music distribution world in the long run. I am not very black-and-white on this issue, however, since there are many contradictions by both sides. I read the majority of comments here on HN about dated business models, big corporation dislike, the old executives don't understand the new market, etc...,…

The main difference is that Zara uses piracy to earn money, whereas most other pirates don't. That's the general model of copyright that I support - it's legal to copy anything for non-commercial use.

Per the arrest of the torrent site runner in today's news, it seems he may have made millions in ad revenue on the torrent site.

The copying for non-commercial use is sometimes a moving boundary: For instance, you download a PDF of a technical book that is extremely expensive, or plain not available in your country, but you use it to just study on your own.

All the way to you download some video, sound, music, code, or book and incorporate it into your YouTube channel or your site that generates revenue for you. Now it is blurred IMO.

If you are parodying something, you may get away with it, but if you are leveraging it to avoid doing the work to generate the content yourself, you are stealing. It is commercial usage in this case, but many disagree it seems, but then point the finger at Zara mainly just because their a company. The actions of their lawyers are definitely illegal and low tactics, but just remember, it was most likely a very low wage designer that lifted the artwork from the indie artist's site. He/She will most likely or was already fired. Zara will be fine.

Re: Alleged founder of world’s largest BitTorrent distribution site arrested

#264

Post by CM30 »

tomp wrote: post #226
eggy wrote: post #145

Aside from the legal technicalities here, I mostly ponder the future of IP. I think Napster positively affected the music distribution world in the long run. I am not very black-and-white on this issue, however, since there are many contradictions by both sides. I read the majority of comments here on HN about dated business models, big corporation dislike, the old executives don't understand the new market, etc...,…

The main difference is that Zara uses piracy to earn money, whereas most other pirates don't. That's the general model of copyright that I support - it's legal to copy anything for non-commercial use.

Don't most torrent sites run advertising? Yes some of that likely goes to maintain the server, but I doubt it all does in most cases.

A lot of sites distributing content like this are set up as for profit ventures.

Re: Alleged founder of world’s largest BitTorrent distribution site arrested

#265

Post by [deleted] »

kybernetyk wrote: post #212
josho wrote: post #18

I find it interesting that a Polish man was charged by US laws, rather than under Polish law. I think he opened himself to US law by hosting the servers at one point in the US. Regardless, it is rather fascinating that his first visit to the US could potentially be from extradition.

>I find it interesting that a Polish man was charged by US laws, rather than under Polish law. Recent Polish policy is to become _the_ continental European ally to the US. So I guess this guy's fate is rather bleak as the Polish authorities will do everything they can to please the US. He will get extradited and probably will spend the rest of his life behind bars.

[deleted]

Re: Alleged founder of world’s largest BitTorrent distribution site arrested

#266

Post by LeonM »

> “Vaulin is charged with running today’s most visited illegal file-sharing website, responsible for unlawfully distributing well over $1 billion of copyrighted materials,” Assistant Attorney General Caldwell said in the statement.

I can't keep myself from giggling and thinking about this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GZadCj8O1-0

Re: Alleged founder of world’s largest BitTorrent distribution site arrested

#267

Post by sverige »

SturgeonsLaw wrote: post #202
tn13 wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> to serve a few multinational corporations that feel their profits are severely cut due to copyright infringement, meanwhile posting record earnings. That almost sounds like a Bernie Sanders level paranoia of words profits and corporations. Honestly share-worthy content exists because of these entities in first and I will never fault HBO, Adobe or Microsoft going after those who are pirating their software. I think…

> I will never fault HBO, Adobe or Microsoft going after those who are pirating That can mean very different things depending on your definition of 'going after'. If they chose to engage someone in a civil suit and could prove realistic damages, then in principle I wouldn't have a problem with them attempting to protect their IP. But using the force and authority of the United States government (Homeland Security inv…

>But using the force and authority of the United States government (Homeland Security involved in enforcing IP infringement? Really?)

Homeland Security is in the copyright infringement business now. They've been added to the standard FBI warning at the beginning of all movies, probably as a way to make themselves feel better after all those mean TSA groping memes made people laugh at them.

Re: Alleged founder of world’s largest BitTorrent distribution site arrested

#268

Post by CyberDildonics »

MichaelGG wrote: post #206
CyberDildonics wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not only can bitcoin be tumbled, but think about the scenario where it is exchanged for another crypto-currency like litecoin then exchanged for bitcoin at another site, then exchanged for cash. Good luck tracing that.

> Good luck tracing that Subpoena the trading sites? An active adversary would be running the trading sites, though I doubt they'd waste that info on a low-level case. LocalBitcoins says they retain all messages for 180 days, up from their previous 90. Is that purely for internal disputes? Sure, if you're not doing anything illegal enough, you can get away with simply using sites in multiple jurisdictions and hoping…

The crypto currency exchanges could be in any country, I don't think it is any solace to be able to send out subpoenas to sites completely outside the banking system.

Re: Alleged founder of world’s largest BitTorrent distribution site arrested

#269

Post by downandout »

syshum wrote: post #204
downandout wrote: post #113

This will be interesting to watch. Torrent sites only host torrent files; I'm sure he'll argue that the DMCA requests were invalid because the people filing them didn't own copyright to the torrent files, which were the only thing that the site distributed. Where do we draw the line? Do we prosecute people for posting a magnet link? If a movie studio puts an MP4 of a not-yet-released film on its servers, is it illega…

>>> Torrent sites only host torrent files; They do not even host those any more All of the Torrent Sites are only Indexers of Magnet Links, no different than google. The BT Client then takes the Magnet Link, downloads the torrent file from peers in the network. When you Click on a download link from KAT nothing is downloaded from their server, it is simply a protocol link that tells your BT client what file you want.…

I always use magnet links, but I thought KAT offered multiple formats for each link, including the magnet link but also the torrent file. In any event, I agree with you that this is an incredibly slippery slope the government is going down here. They are also taking a significant risk in filing this case, as an acquittal will set a precedent that operating a torrent site does not constitute copyright infringement.
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