MPAA Sets Up Fake Site to Catch Pirates 617
thefickler writes "Media Defender, a company which does the dirty work for the MPAA, has been caught setting up 'dummy' websites in an attempt to catch those who download copyrighted videos. The site, MiiVi.com, complete with a user registration, forum, and "family filter", offered complete downloads of movies and "fast and easy video downloading all in one great site." But that's not all; MiiVi also offered client software to speed up the downloading process. The only catch is, after it was installed, it searched your computer for other copyrighted files and reported back."
Entrapment or Honeypot? (Score:2, Insightful)
OTOH, it's not like the people who would have been caught by this were innocents. I dislike pirates only a bit less than I dislike the scumbag tactics the MPAA and RIAA have been using to try to catch them. I'd have liked to see how they were trying to entice people to pirate movies and how their site was set up before I judged how wrong this was on a scale from 1 to 10.
--Greg
elsapo (Score:1, Insightful)
EULA (Score:2, Insightful)
A Modest Suggestion (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Entrapment or Honeypot? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Will we see justice? (Score:3, Insightful)
Unfortunately, I'm so jaded that I truly believe no one will get so much as a slap on the wrist over this.
I'm guessing, in the US at least, if they setup the site properly there would be nothing illegal about it. They could host "pirated" movies that the copyright owners gave them permission to use in this fashion; the EULA could specify that they are are allowed to search your machine for files and report back what is found and use the information in any manner they pleased.
Of course, I would also guess a defendant would get little sympathy for the "I was tricked" defense.
WTF? (Score:4, Insightful)
Without huge data transfers, they can't fully check a file, so the best they can do is spy on your file names, and steal your documents, not any media files though, I hope people get sued for this I really do, so the MPAA gets screwed with the huge countersuit.
Re:uh oh.... (Score:2, Insightful)
You shouldn't be downloading "full movies" from these types of sites anyway. It's clearly illegal and only lets the MPAA say "See? These people are just common thieves like we've said all along". I mean, come on! You never bought a copy of the movie, so you can't be claiming "fair use, blah, blah, blah..." Good riddance to those who get busted, this may be dishonest of the MPAA, but it's also dishonest of you.
Re:Entrapment or Honeypot? (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem here is that a person may download and install the program with no intention of copyright violations. However, their computer is scanned likely without their knowledge for other, very possibly legal, files. You'd have to read the agreement, rather than click-through it like usual to know this. If they did not warn of complete scans and information being sent back to their servers, then they probably have committed some sort of computer crime.
I've ripped my CDs into .mp3 files, as have millions of others with movies and other media. What is their reaction to seeing these files? Are you going to receive their threatening letters in the near future? God only knows, but frankly, it shouldn't be tolerated in the least.
Hell, if they want to charge you with "theft," charge them back with breaking and entering.
Got Ethics? Perception of RIAA/CRIA vs. MPAA (Score:5, Insightful)
Here in Canada, we have CRIA, which actually managed to get a tax slapped on all recordable media, mp3 players, etc.. Ostensibly, the money collected form this tax is supposed to go to the artists whose incomes are reduced by the evils of all Canadians. It's anyone's guess what CRIA actually does with the loot. Their books are not public. The last time I checked, they weren't paying out bupkiss to indie artists, but aren't they our victims too? As a Canadian, all I see is my money being taken away because I'm a criminal by default and given to the buisness equivalent of the mafia. Bravo!
I've been boycotting all RIAA/CRIA affiliated labels for years. The way I see it, every penny spent on one of their artist delays the inevitable and gives them another opportunity to do irreparable harm to our laws. However, I still go to the cinema and buy DVD's. Why am I not as concerned about the MPAA? Perhaps it's because they have, to date, not stooped to quite the same levels as RIAA in going after their own customers, even though they're already the scum of the Earth behind the scenes.
Here's a word to the MPAA. Take a look at the mess RIAA has made of its affairs. You don't want to go down that road.
Re:Entrapment or Honeypot? (Score:5, Insightful)
on the other hand they also installed spy ware on users computers without letting them know ahead of time - that is aginst the law in some states - it is on the same lvl as alotof the viruses out there.
and if they try to doge the the fact that "they" put it out there by saying it was this "company that does the dirty work" then you point the finger and say - hey did this company have distrubution rights? if not then they are in alot of trouble - if so then they gave the stuff away - and if they say that the company doesn't have distrbution rights but what they where doing wasn't violating the their copyright then well damn many people will be happy to see them say that cause that can be applied so many ways..
all and all this was EXTREAMLY STUPID of them - and i can only pray that they get their asses burned when they try to take someone to court from this thing
Entrapment or Honeypot?-"/." court now in session. (Score:1, Insightful)
Which court would that be? The court of public opinion, or the legal one?
Re:Entrapment or Honeypot? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:uh oh.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:uh oh.... (Score:2, Insightful)
What of it? This is your justification? It's still dishonest. And still against the law.
Re:WTF? (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:uh oh.... (Score:1, Insightful)
You shouldn't be downloading "full movies" from these types of sites anyway. It's clearly illegal and only lets the MPAA say "See?
Downloading should not be considered infringing, or "illegal", because it really is no different than picking up a book found on the street. Besides, there is no sure way for a person to determine the copyright status of a file.
Re:Dateline NBC: To catch a paedo (Score:5, Insightful)
FRAUD AND LIES! (Score:5, Insightful)
And if they spy on your computer otherwise with software that doesn't clearly indicate this in the license agreement, doesn't The Computer Fraud and Abuse Act come into play? Could MediaSentry go down Big Time over this little misstep?
Re:MPAA Free - New World Order 2.0 (Score:1, Insightful)
Arrrr..
To be honest, this spam is getting old. I prefer the "I CAN'T BELIEVE IT'S NOT HORSECOCK!" spam because at least that made me giggle a little inside when I read it. Even the GNAA posts were better than this stupid globaltics spam.
Re:Entrapment or Honeypot? (Score:3, Insightful)
I know most slashdot'ers look at it the other way but I have always thought that hosting the files is not the issue, that person has done nothing. The downloader is the one actually making the copy, writing out a new file.
How is the downloader suppose to determine if the file being offered is infringing? If people are just expected to assume that everything is illegal then browsing the web pretty much becomes impossible.
Re:uh oh.... (Score:2, Insightful)
To say copying data is the opposite just confuses the issue. Copying data is not related to theft, in any way. Thieves in Bizarro World do not copy data. They give things to people. And then Bizarro Superman busts them for it.
I knew they were fake... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Entrapment or Honeypot? (Score:2, Insightful)
Second, what is the point of an application searching my computer to see what copyrighted material I have on it? I ripped my entire CD collection and most of my DVD collection to my file server in the last few years. They would see almost six terabytes of copyrighted material on my machine - ALL of it legitimately owned and purchased by me. What are they going to do, see the enormous number of hits from their software and send the police after me for owning too much content?
Playing with fire, they are (Score:5, Insightful)
Practically 100% of the files on your computer are copyrighted. Even if those files are music or movies, their mere presence doesn't indicate a breach of copyright. And unless they're transmitting a significant portion of those files back when "phoning home" - and thus running afoul of copyright law themselves in the process, to say nothing of computer trespass laws - merely mentioning the title of a work in a filename or in metadata doesn't authenticate that file as containing what the filename or metadata suggests that it does.
Re:uh oh.... (Score:3, Insightful)
I think this implies that you simply shouldn't copy the file then, not that you can.
The internet works by copying information from one computer to another so the default is to assume that everything can be copied. If this were not true then even simple web browsing would be impossible.
Two words (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:uh oh.... (Score:3, Insightful)
Additional: It's fine if you copy my wallet's contents and give it to your friends. But if you or any of your friends were to use those contents in a way that could be construed as fraud, you can expect to be strung up by your shorts and your curlies.
Related to another comment: Filesharing is the opposite of theft in that you are providing copies of something to others at no cost. In contrast, theft is removing from someone's posession something without paying.
Of course, there *are* costs; bandwidth ain't free, whether it's charged per bit or a monthly fee.
Re:Entrapment or Honeypot? (Score:5, Insightful)
The really funny thing is (Score:3, Insightful)
Transporter_ii
Re:uh oh.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Now of course the criminal action they will have been likely to commit is invading the privacy of 'minors', which is of course where child molester comes from.
Also where children where using the parents computer and the RIAA agents failed to ensure that the person entering the contract was legally entitled to enter the contract, that failure of jurisprudence results in criminal trespass and technology crimes with regards to hacking computer networks.
There is also the question of fraudulent misrepresentation as well as entrapment. These people really need to feel the full weight and measure of the law, a few years cooling the heels in jail, should wake them up to the fact that they are not above the law.
Re:uh oh.... (Score:5, Insightful)
If I watch a TV show live, It's okay. (Even if I don't watch the commercials.)
If I record a TV show with a VCR and watch it later, It's okay.
If I record a TV show on a DVR and watch it later, It's okay.
If I have a friend record a TV show (VCR or DVR) and give me the recording so I can watch it later, It's okay.
BUT...
If my 'friend' is an unknown person sharing a bittorrent, it's NOT okay?
Re:uh oh.... (Score:3, Insightful)
If you want to cover your ass, announce your intention in advance. That's what undercover journalists do, in case they should get busted while doing a piece on, say, prostitution.
Likewise, you can't go to a site offering clearly unlawful media content and think that you're not breaking any laws. You're there to get something you know is prohibited. "It's on the Internet, so I assumed I could have it" has never been a reasonable excuse. If you "find" a spreadsheet of social security numbers on the internet and store it on your computer, even if you don't commit fraud, you're not obeying the law, and you're in possession of unauthorized data and depending on what you have, may have committed a crime simply by having it.
Re:uh oh.... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:uh oh.... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:ARE YOU A COP? (Score:3, Insightful)
They're after uploaders, not downloaders. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Not to state the obvious, but . . . (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:uh oh.... (Score:4, Insightful)
So why is it a problem if the "really long cable" happens to be part of the public Internet? Well, a computer is involved. This creates a powerful Reality Distortion Field where normal laws and common sense absolutely do not apply, and any analogy with a non-computerised situation is null and void.
Re:uh oh.... (Score:5, Insightful)
OK, here's the short version: it's good that files on modern OS have access restricted to certain users, but that's not nearly enough. Instead access to files should be further restricted by process so that eg. Firefox only has permission to read/write to its cache, bookmarks, and download folders and that's it. If you need to upload, it should be forced to use a common API to beg the user for permission to even view uploadable files. Why? Well, exactly to stop this sort of exploit where a trojan promises to do something useful, but actually searches (using fancy new Spotlight and Windows Search, no less!) for files called "my CC#s" to send back to the mothership.
In other words, I think we should Sandbox Everything.
Apparently, SE Linux is trying to do something like this, but OS vendors need to find a way to make this whole process seamless and easy, so that I can right click on an application, go to permissions, and say, "This program I will allow to read my home directory, but only write to its own directories; that one I will let write anywhere, but read only itself" and so on.
It will be really hard to implement this in a user friendly way, but it is clearly the necessary next step in computer security. Apple, Microsoft, and (consumer oriented) Linux devs should start working on this now.
Guilt or innocence? It's irrelevant. (Score:5, Insightful)
Your answer is that it doesn't matter, they'll come after you anyway.
Are you innocent? They don't care. It's completely irrelevant, because you'll be given a choice: Pay us a couple of thousand dollars and this will be over with, or go hire a lawyer that is much more expensive and defend yourself. Pay attention the the news here, and read up on their tactics [blogspot.com]. The RIAA/MPAA has a history of going after people that it knows are innocent.
If you choose option #2, you'll waste all kinds of time and money, possibly even face financial ruin as a result of paying dozens of thousands of dollars. In the end, after the RIAA/MPAA's lawyers have extracted as much money from you as they can, the RIAA/MPAA will drop their case. It will all just silently go away, except for the bills from the lawyers.
You've mistakenly assumed that it's all about your guilt or innocence as an individual person. The real point is to keep up appearances for their extortion ring to continue to be effective. The real point is to scare the shit out of people so badly that whether you're innocent or guilty, you'll still pay up.
Let's not fool ourselves, this is organized crime, plain and simple, except that for now, it's still legal. (Organized "Legal," I guess you'd call it.) What can you do about it? Well, if the thought of paying a lawyer to defend you and, if you actually want damages from the RIAA/MPAA for screwing around with you, paying $114,000 to a lawyer (the amount that is at stake in the most famous to date case of Capitol v. Foster [blogspot.com]), then you need to support organizations dedicated to changing the laws to make this type of extortion illegal. I would suggest the Electronic Frontier Foundation [eff.org], who has a pretty good record of success, but at the very least, you need to write to your Congresscritters and let them know that the current situation is unacceptable.
Re:uh oh.... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Dateline NBC: To catch a paedo (Score:1, Insightful)
(I have never seen To Catch A Predator, but I am a bit confused about exactly what crime was committed if there are no children involved.)
Re:ARE YOU A COP? (Score:2, Insightful)
The law is murky on that point (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Dateline NBC: To catch a paedo/porn (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Dateline NBC: To catch a paedo (Score:4, Insightful)
This is great proactive behavior on the behalf of our government but i think we can do better, statistically speaking there is a percentage of people who will go to jail, the percentage is higher in some cities than others.. we could pro actively round up that number of people each year and put them in prison and save tons of police manhours.
OR even better put everyone in jail from age 8 on, and then the ones who exhibit good behavior can be released after 10 years or so (when they can become productive members of society, re:consumers/wage earners). Problem solved.