One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves • Hacker News Board

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#11

Post by rick888 » Sat, Apr 09, 2011, 5:36 PM UTC

wulczer wrote: post #6

rick888 wrote: post #5

This is interesting, because it works on the same principal as software piracy: The original isn't "stolen" it's merely copied. The original is still intact. I'm wondering if the same people that are so zealous and pro-piracy would be fine with someone taking their site and duplicating it.

Very interesting comment. For me the line is profiting from the copied content/software. I am opposed to people selling pirated movies on the streets and not so to people downloading and watching them in their homes.

So, if I copied your startup (website, graphics, and name), and didn't make a profit on it (even if you were charging), it's okay?

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#12

Post by rick888 » Sat, Apr 09, 2011, 5:37 PM UTC

larrik wrote: post #7

rick888 wrote: post #5

This is interesting, because it works on the same principal as software piracy: The original isn't "stolen" it's merely copied. The original is still intact. I'm wondering if the same people that are so zealous and pro-piracy would be fine with someone taking their site and duplicating it.

IS IT the same principle? Usually pirated software distributors don't claim original authorship. I'm not saying that the "merely copied" argument is correct, I'm just saying that I think the situations are different.

The main argument for 'piracy is not stealing' is that there is still an original copy.

Just like with the OP's site.

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#13

Post by guylhem » Sat, Apr 09, 2011, 5:41 PM UTC

throwa_way wrote: post #4

"I don’t make idle threats. I have all kinds of information about this person, and I’m going to be keeping an eye on him, this particular domain, and any other domains run by him or his host that access my servers." ^ Still the wild west indeed.

??

So what's your proposal to deal with such a problematic behaviour?

The guy is quite nice - he only made the thieve risk his reputation by the consequences of his own action. He didn't involve anything like law enforcement, the hosting company or the banners network - which would have cost them time thus money.

All he did is take some of his own time so that the scraper would get the "accusing" version of the website next time. He fixed that at his own expenses.

I believe many of us wouldn't have been that nice. And yes I believe he should keep an eye on this thief, because from what he said (the games didn't play) the guy didn't spend a lot of time on that borked job.

For all we know, this might be his full time job - copying websites, replacing copyright notices and authors, making money out of it with banners. All he needs is a process that scales well financially to be a "scamtreupreneur" (Couldn't find a word so I made up one. Do I get karma claims on that word?? :-))

With bots, selecting target websites etc. it might be possible to make a living out of it while true entrepreuneurs are starving in bootstrapped companies :-/

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#14

Post by RossDM » Sat, Apr 09, 2011, 5:45 PM UTC

guylhem wrote: post #13

throwa_way wrote: post #4

"I don’t make idle threats. I have all kinds of information about this person, and I’m going to be keeping an eye on him, this particular domain, and any other domains run by him or his host that access my servers." ^ Still the wild west indeed.

?? So what's your proposal to deal with such a problematic behaviour? The guy is quite nice - he only made the thieve risk his reputation by the consequences of his own action. He didn't involve anything like law enforcement, the hosting company or the banners network - which would have cost them time thus money. All he did is take some of his own time so that the scraper would get the "accusing" version of the websi…

I don't know if the poster was criticizing the owner's response; I read it as just an observation about the state of things. Also, you're right - the thief got off easy.

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#15

Post by russellperry » Sat, Apr 09, 2011, 5:46 PM UTC

You'd also think a cisco engineer up to such shenanigans would know enough to use an anonymous/proxy whois registration.

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#16

Post by boctor » Sat, Apr 09, 2011, 5:49 PM UTC

It'd be interesting to hear the technical details of how the switcheroo was accomplished

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#17

Post by _delirium » Sat, Apr 09, 2011, 5:54 PM UTC

rick888 wrote: post #12

larrik wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IS IT the same principle? Usually pirated software distributors don't claim original authorship. I'm not saying that the "merely copied" argument is correct, I'm just saying that I think the situations are different.

The main argument for 'piracy is not stealing' is that there is still an original copy. Just like with the OP's site.

I do think that's true, which is why I'd call this something like "plagiarism" rather than "stealing". The issue isn't that anyone's had an item removed from their possession (as with theft), but someone is trying to pass off someone else's work as their own. Like if I were to publish a novel, but lift large parts of the novel from an existing novel. I guess you could colloquially say that I've "stolen text" from that novel, much as people say that Microsoft "stole" the recycling bin from Apple's trash can, but plagiarism seems to get at the underlying issue more directly.

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#18

Post by dctoedt » Sat, Apr 09, 2011, 5:54 PM UTC

If the OP's planted information identified the wrong guy, then that guy, who was wrongly accused of being a willful copyright infringer, might be able to sue successfully for libel.

Otherwise, though, one legal irony about this posting sort of tickles me:

* Suppose that the (human) scraper were to sue the OP for libel. And leave aside for now the fact that (at least in the U.S.) truth is usually an absolute defense to a defamation action (although that's not the case in false-light or invasion-of-privacy cases).

* The OP should win, it seems to me, if for no other reason than that it was the scraper, not the OP, who published the putatively-libelous information about himself. Presumably, if the scraper himself had not copied and published (what he thought was) the OP's site, then the supposedly-libelous information would have stayed hidden in the OP's server, never seeing the light of day.

Of course, I could imagine some judges thinking that the case was like the spring-gun cases you read about in first-year torts class: If you booby-trap your vacant house with a shotgun to protect against burglars, you can be liable to a burglar who gets shot, even though he's breaking the law by breaking in.

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#19

Post by dwwoelfel » Sat, Apr 09, 2011, 6:18 PM UTC

russellperry wrote: post #15

You'd also think a cisco engineer up to such shenanigans would know enough to use an anonymous/proxy whois registration.

Or use someone else's name, which may be what the owner of the site actually did. How can we know that the whois information is valid?

Re: One Way to Deal with Internet Thieves

#20

Post by jedsmith » Sat, Apr 09, 2011, 6:18 PM UTC

Okay, I'll take the alternative view: this is embarrassing for the OP.

What worries me is that the OP found the name Bart Burns on the WHOIS for the domain, and assumed (a) that's who registered the domain, and (b) that the information he found via a quick Google is actually Bart Burns. I can change the information on my domain to be whoever I want, particularly if I'm a scammer. Whatever I put in NameCheap's panel shows up minutes later. If someone doesn't believe me, I'll alter the registration on one of my domains. Just ask.

More interesting than that, however, is that the OP is completely aware that there are avenues of recourse for this and that he is technically able to determine who hosts the scraped domain. Rather than pursue those avenues of recourse, however -- said facilities have been keeping the Internet from devolving into a "wild West," at least in ARIN and RIPE regions -- this guy had to take a play from 4chan's book and attack possibly the wrong guy. If everybody did what the OP does, you're absolutely right: the Internet would be a wild West.

As an administrator at a very large ISP, I am completely aware that some people lose faith in abuse desk contacts. At my employer, we receive countless abuse complaints and we handle every single one. This is a pattern you will observe in ARIN and RIPE regions, but less so for APNIC and other parts of the world (with exceptions). Particularly for someone hosted with JustHost, a DMCA complaint gets the job done in hours. If it doesn't you can go after the ISP. I was never a fan of the DMCA, but this is a prime example of a use case for it.

Above everything else, though, even if the OP is right about the identity of the scammer, calling out the scammer's employment means the OP could be attacking his family. If I were the aforementioned company I'd cut my losses and terminate the employee for bad PR. Now the OP has potentially hurt the suspected perpetrator's family based on actions his family is probably not even familiar with. Because he copied the HTML for a site I've never even heard of. That's icing on the cake, to me, because I protect my family. With teeth.

In short, I am totally unimpressed by the OP's vigilantism and I am equally disappointed that it is so popular in this forum. Demonstrating this sort of arrogance to Hacker News is probably a good way to burn your bridges at the innumerable employers and business contacts that frequent the site.