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CipherCloud used DMCA Takedown on StackExchange discussion of their cryptography

meta.crypto.stackexchange.com

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Re: CipherCloud used DMCA Takedown on StackExchange discussion of their cryptography

#81

Post by Dylan16807 »

caf wrote: post #75
dangrossman wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not how it works. If StackExchange wants safe harbor from being sued itself, it must put the content back online if it receives a counternotice. YouTube doesn't have this problem because it's not receiving DMCA notices in the first place. One can't send a counternotice when there was never a notice to begin with. Since Google gives all the major media companies direct access to their system, they don't have to…

Sure it is. Upon receiving the counternotice, StackExchange can just say "OK, we're no longer have the question offline because of the DMCA notice; as a separate matter we have decided that we decline to host this question" . To believe otherwise would be to believe that a DMCA notice and counternotice somehow privileges the subject content above all other content on the site.

Just like in many states you can fire an employee for no reason but you can't fire them for a discriminatory reason, you are in violation if you take down the content from the notice despite the counter.

Re: CipherCloud used DMCA Takedown on StackExchange discussion of their cryptography

#82

Post by pyre »

gcb0 wrote: post #68
pyre wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lawyer sending a 'copyright' claim over a trademark dispute (for example) would have to argue that they are an idiot about the law (I would think).

no, but someone contesting this would have to prove that the original request was ill intentioned. which is pretty much impossible to prove.

Using the same example, if it's a lawyer that sends a bogus takedown notice (at least in clear-cut cases), you could always notify the relevant bar association to look into the idea that this person might be unfit to practice law in that area (either too stupid of the law to be allowed to practice, or abusing it and needs to be stopped).

Re: CipherCloud used DMCA Takedown on StackExchange discussion of their cryptography

#83

Post by AnthonyMouse »

tptacek wrote: post #71
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>You really think torrentfreak/isohunt/et al wouldn't just start filing suits over every single DMCA request they receive? What do they have to lose? Money? Time? It wouldn't make any sense for them to litigate the cases they would obviously lose when they could choose the subset of cases where the take down issuer clearly has no copyright in the material in question -- which is the whole idea. You're also giving the…

You're not following his reasoning to its conclusion. The people who run Isohunt surely don't want to spend their time writing court filings. But they'd be sitting on top of a mountain of potential claims, which would prove lucrative if even a tiny percentage resulted in damages. Unscrupulous law firms would notice and send Isohunt offers; at some point, it would become irrational of Isohunt not to accept one of them…

Isohunt is the intermediary. If they don't like a takedown notice then they can just not execute it; they don't need any redress from the courts. The plaintiffs with standing should be the end users who posted the material that was removed.

>But they'd be sitting on top of a mountain of potential claims, which would prove lucrative if even a tiny percentage resulted in damages.

Setting aside that Isohunt is the wrong party, yes, there are a mountain of take downs from which some small percentage should result in damages. But you can identify those cases ahead of time -- you know perfectly well you aren't going to win a case where you posted Fast & Furious 6 to Isohunt and Universal Studios issued a take down for it, there is no point in even trying. And if you do try then you're effectively admitting your own liability for copyright infringement when you have to assert you posted that material in order to get standing to sue.

The cases lawyers will want to take are the ones they think they can win -- and as long as they're right, that's what they're supposed to do. That's the whole idea.

Are you arguing that the situations where the take down is in a grey area (e.g. fair use) will create too much litigation? I don't really see that happening. On the one hand, the existence of penalties would create a disincentive for copyright holders to wantonly issue take downs in questionable cases, and if there was no take down then there is nothing to litigate. Then, in the consequently much reduced number of edge cases, in order to claim a take down was fraudulent a plaintiff would have to admit in court to posting the material and thus to liability for copyright infringement if the take down was legitimate.

Re: CipherCloud used DMCA Takedown on StackExchange discussion of their cryptography

#85

Post by jared314 »

betterunix wrote: post #79
jared314 wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm still trying to find performance numbers that prove it impractical. Otherwise, it just sounds like a problem that could be mitigated by clustering.

Here are some results from a research team that has been on the forefront of FHE implementations; note that this has been improved on significantly since last August, but you are still looking at minutes of computation for relatively small functions: http://www.iacr.org/cryptodb/archive/2012/CRYPTO/presentatio... Also, throwing "clustering" at every problem is misguided. Not all problems are easily parallelized: http…

Don't forget Amdahl's law and Gustafson's law on the limits of parallelizing when the problem isn't P-complete. Either way, I disagree with your conclusion that it is misguided.

Re: CipherCloud used DMCA Takedown on StackExchange discussion of their cryptography

#86

Post by CodesInChaos »

DMCA'd CipherCloud discussion on stackexchange online again (minus images). The Copyright part of the notice only covered the images and stackexchange apparently didn't consider the text part of the posts a ToS violation.

I expanded my analysis, but you'll need to check the original material for evidence since the embedded images were subject to the notice.

http://crypto.stackexchange.com/q/3645/180

Re: CipherCloud used DMCA Takedown on StackExchange discussion of their cryptography

#87

Post by troels »

dangrossman wrote: post #59
troels wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But surely neither is Stackexchange obliged to host any discussions online. So this content may never reappear - counterfiling or not.

That's not how it works. If StackExchange wants safe harbor from being sued itself, it must put the content back online if it receives a counternotice. YouTube doesn't have this problem because it's not receiving DMCA notices in the first place. One can't send a counternotice when there was never a notice to begin with. Since Google gives all the major media companies direct access to their system, they don't have to…

OK, that makes sense (in a twisted way). But then, aren't Google and the media businesses balancing on the edge of something very nasty here? They have effectively made their own legal system alongside the real one. I'm not entirely sure how the US legal system works, but it sounds like something an EU court could strike down on.
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