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Here's an odd twist that might give new life to the dying horse of music digital-right management. Microsoft has just been awarded a U.S. patent for a distributed DRM system -- it works over peer-to-peer networks -- which uses encrypted public and private keys as the licensing mechanism. This is significant because, while centralized music stores like Apple's iTunes have forsaken DRM, the Microsoft patent would enable peer-to-peer networks to reemerge as viable, albeit protected, content sources. The patent, number 7,594,275, is entitled simply, "Digital rights management system." Granted today (Sept. 22), it was filed in October, 2003, which undercuts...

Its ISP faced a $70,000 fine if file-sharing site was allowed to continue File-sharing site The Pirate Bay went down today after its Internet service provider, Black Internet, cut its connection to avoid being fined by the Stockholm district court. A 500,000 Swedish kronor (US$70,000) fine would be the result if Black Internet did not comply with the decision in the district court. "The decision was made by the district court on Friday, but reached us today and we have decided to comply. ... We are a small operator and we haven't got the financial resources to pursue such a...

Jury Awards $675,000 in Music Downloading Case BOSTON – A federal jury on Friday ordered a Boston University graduate student who admitted illegally downloading and sharing music online to pay $675,000 to four record labels. Joel Tenenbaum, of Providence, R.I., admitted in court that he downloaded and distributed 30 songs. The only issue for the jury to decide was how much in damages to award the record labels. Under federal law, the recording companies were entitled to $750 to $30,000 per infringement. But the law allows as much as $150,000 per track if the jury finds the infringements were willful....

* Obama evacuation plan leaked online * Lawmaker slams file-sharing software * More: Technology news and reviews SENSITIVE documents including plans for the emergency evacuation of US President Barack Obama and motorcade routes have been leaked on a file-sharing network, authorities say. Chairman of the US House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Edolphus Towns said the documents had been discovered with file-sharing program LimeWire. Other sensitive documents found with the peer-to-peer program included FBI files, medical records and social security numbers. Mr Town used evidence of the leaks to argue for the regulation of file-sharing programs. "As far as I...

Details about a U.S. Secret Service safe house for the First Family -- to be used in a national emergency -- were found to have leaked out on a LimeWire file-sharing network recently, members of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee were told this morning.Also unearthed on LimeWire networks in recent days were presidential motorcade routes and a sensitive but unclassified document listing details on every nuclear facility in the country, Robert Boback, CEO of Tiversa Inc. told committee members. The disclosures prompted the chairman of the committee, Rep. Edolphus Towns, (D-N.Y.), to call for a ban on the...

A federal jury Thursday found a 32-year-old Minnesota woman guilty of illegally downloading music from the Internet and fined her $80,000 each — a total of $1.9 million — for 24 songs. Jammie Thomas-Rasset’s case was the first such copyright infringement case to go to trial in the United States, her attorney said. Attorney Joe Sibley said that his client was shocked at fine, noting that the price tag on the songs she downloaded was 99 cents...

A bunch of states have been pushing forward with plans to add taxes on digital downloads. The state of Washington apparently passed just such a law, which is scheduled to go into effect on July 26th. Nate sent in a note, pointing out that under a strict reading of the details of the bill you could see how the state could go after unauthorized downloaders as "tax evaders." Now, that may not be the case (and it would be great if we could get someone from the state to clarify), but it seems that what Nate is likely referring to...

File-sharing sites help make popular acts more popular, finds a study. The research, by industry body PRS for Music, showed the most pirated pop songs tend to be those at the top of the music charts. There was little evidence that file-sharing sites helped unsigned and new bands find an audience, it found. It suggests file-sharing sites are becoming an alternative broadcast network comparable to radio stations as a way of hearing music. Long tail The study, carried out by Will Page, chief economist at the PRS, and Eric Garland, head of media tracking firm Big Champagne, looked at patterns...

Pirate Bay lawyer demands retrial, saying judge was biased in file-sharing case STOCKHOLM (AP) -- A defense lawyer in the Pirate Bay file-sharing case said Thursday he will demand a retrial after the judge admitted he was a member of copyright protection organizations. A Stockholm court last week convicted four men behind the notorious Web site of helping others commit copyright violations and gave them one-year prison sentences. They also were ordered to pay damages of 30 million kronor ($3.6 million) to entertainment companies, including Warner Bros., Sony Music Entertainment, EMI and Columbia Pictures. Peter Althin, who represented Pirate Bay...

A court in Sweden has jailed four men behind The Pirate Bay (TPB), the world's most high-profile file-sharing website, in a landmark case.Frederik Neij, Gottfrid Svartholm Warg, Carl Lundstrom and Peter Sunde were found guilty of breaking copyright law and were sentenced to a year in jail. They were also ordered to pay $4.5m (£3m) in damages. Record companies welcomed the verdict but the men are to appeal and Sunde said they would refuse to pay the fine. Speaking at an online press conference, he described the verdict as "bizarre". "It's serious to actually be found guilty and get jail...

Broadband operator Bahnhof is continuing to destroy the IP address details of its customers in an open and fully legal bid to undermine Sweden's new anti-file sharing laws. Bahnhof CEO Jon Karlung, a vociferous opponent of the measures that came into force on April 1st, has said he is determined to protect the company's clients. The new file sharing law is based on the European Union's Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Directive (IPRED) and allows courts to order internet operators to hand over details that identify suspected illegal file sharers. As such, the law enables Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to retain...

So what can be said about the year 2008 in file-sharing? It’s been a long year for the P2P community. While there were no earth shattering events on the scale of 2006’s raid on The Pirate Bay, there were enough developments that kept things interesting.

In October of this year, Newzbin reported that it was anticipating legal action against its Usenet indexing service by a yet unnamed entity. Over a month later, Newzbin reports that it has been sued by the MPA (Motion Picture Association). The MPA is the international version of its US-based counterpart, the Motion Picture Association of America. According to Newzbin, the indexing service has been suspending some reports due to complaints - something that community members have noticed over the last several months. "You may have noticed that recently we suspended a number of existing reports. This was done after receiving...

RIAA v. The People: Five Years Later September, 2008 On September 8, 2003, the recording industry sued 261 American music fans for sharing songs on peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing networks, kicking off an unprecedented legal campaign against the people that should be the recording industry’s best customers: music fans.1 Five years later, the recording industry has filed, settled, or threatened legal actions against at least 30,000 individuals.2 These individuals have included children, grandparents, unemployed single mothers, college professors—a random selection from the millions of Americans who have used P2P networks. And there’s no end in sight; new lawsuits are filed...

The $222,000 verdict against Jammy Thomas for copyright infringement by P2P is no more. U.S. District Court Judge Michael Davis dismissed the verdict (PDF), saying it was based on the faulty “making available� theory of distribution. Thomas will face a new trial, in which the RIAA will have to prove actual distribution. The decision means the RIAA now has zero wins at trial, Wired notes. RIAA’s “making available� theory would hold that someone has distributed copyright material merely by creating the potential for distribution. Under the RIAA’s theory, it need not show actual distribution. The judge soundly denied this legal...

Any P2P experts/insiders on the FR forums here? I've been trying for several months to catch an "open registration" period at Demonoid, but it's always closed. The Demonoid FAQ says it's open for a couple of days each month, usually the first day or two of the month, but that wasn't true this month -- or last month -- unless it's only for an hour or so each time. No matter when or how often I check in, the registration is always closed. Any inside info on when the registrations are likely to be open? I'd ask if any of...

WASHINGTON - A federal jury in Big Stone Gap, Va., convicted Daniel Dove, 26, formerly of Clintwood, Va., on one count each of conspiracy and felony copyright infringement, Acting Assistant Attorney General Matthew Friedrich announced today. Dove was an administrator for EliteTorrents.org, an Internet piracy site that, until May 25, 2005, was a source of infringing copyrighted works, specifically pre-release movies. Elite Torrents used BitTorrent peer-to-peer (P2P) technology to distribute pirated works to thousands of members around the world. The jury was presented with evidence that Dove was an administrator of a small group of Elite Torrents members known as...

Peer-to-peer traffic management was a hot topic at this year's NXTcomm convention in Las Vegas, as keynote speakers and telecom industry panelists highlighted new methods for handling P2P traffic crunches. ISPs' methods for managing P2P traffic have come under intense scrutiny in recent months after the Associated Press reported last year that Comcast was actively interfering with P2P users' ability to upload files by sending TCP RST packets that informed them that their connection would have to be reset. Because the RST packets did not appear to be sent directly from the company, critics accused Comcast of deceiving its customers...

This is one of the most frightening things I've learned in a long time. Over in the US, a bill has passed the House of Representatives and is heading to Congress – with a huge amount of support. The PRO-IP bill, H.R.4279, significantly increases the state's power to detect and prosecute IP infringement, carrying with it a whole host of new law enforcement positions and capabilities. It establishes an IP Czar, someone with the job of overseeing zealous action on behalf of copyright and trademark owners, and includes such powers as the ability to seize equipment if it contains just...

NEW YORK (AP) -- You're used to paying extra if you use up your cell phone minutes, but will you be willing to pay extra if your home computer goes over its Internet allowance? Time Warner Cable Inc. customers -- and, later, others -- may have to, if the company's test of metered Internet access is successful. ADVERTISEMENT On Thursday, new Time Warner Cable Internet subscribers in Beaumont, Texas, will have monthly allowances for the amount of data they upload and download. Those who go over will be charged $1 per gigabyte, a Time Warner Cable executive told the Associated...

WASHINGTON--A prominent Senate Democrat on Wednesday said federal and local police should use custom software to monitor peer-to-peer networks for illegal activity, and he wants to spend $1 billion in tax dollars to help make that happen. At an afternoon Senate Judiciary subcommittee hearing about child exploitation on the Internet, Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.) said he was under the impression it's "pretty easy to pick out the person engaged in either transmitting or downloading violent scenes of rape, molestation" simply by looking at file names. He urged use of those techniques by investigators to help nab the most egregious offenders....

In the climactic scene of the Oscar-nominated film "There Will Be Blood," Daniel Day-Lewis's ruthless oil tycoon explains that he has drained all the valuable oil off a neighbor's land. "If you have a milkshake and I have a milkshake and I have a straw ... and my straw reaches across the room ... I drink your milkshake! I drink it up!" There could be no more apt analogy for the looming threat now facing our broadband infrastructure. Today, a few savvy Internet users - the bandwidth tycoons in this broadband Wild West - are effectively draining everyone else's Internet...

Last night we told you about Qtrax, a new P2P service aimed at combating illicit P2P by offering a legit service that compensates artists and labels via enforced advertising. In that story we briefly noted that Qtrax didn't appear to have all of its ducks in a row: the company was saying that it had signed all four major music labels, when it appeared that they hadn't. At the time it was rather unclear, however, because Qtrax told both Reuters and Wired that it had the necessary signatures. When midnight came and went last night without an official launch, it...

From today, feel free to download another 25 million songs - legally   Adam Sherwin, Media Correspondent, in Cannes   After a decade fighting to stop illegal file-sharing, the music industry will give fans today what they have always wanted: an unlimited supply of free and legal songs. With CD sales in free fall and legal downloads yet to fill the gap, the music industry has reluctantly embraced the file-sharing technology that threatened to destroy it. Qtrax, a digital service announced today, promises a catalogue of more than 25 million songs that users can download to keep, free and...

New federal legislation says universities must agree to provide not just deterrents but also "alternatives" to peer-to-peer piracy, such as paying monthly subscription fees to the music industry for their students, on penalty of losing all financial aid for their students. The U.S. House of Representatives bill, which was introduced late Friday by top Democratic politicians, could give the movie and music industries a new revenue stream by pressuring schools into signing up for monthly subscription services such as Ruckus and Napster. Ruckus is advertising-supported, and Napster charges a monthly fee per student. The Motion Picture Association of America applauded...

Peer-to-peer (P2P) poisoning company MediaDefender has sent a flurry of takedown notices and legal threats to P2P web sites that are facilitating the propagation of a 700MB archive of internal MediaDefender e-mail that was leaked onto the Internet this week. The e-mails, which were obtained by a group that calls itself MediaDefender-Defenders, reveal that the company attempted to deceive the public after the disclosure of its affiliation with the MiiVi site and was providing information about file-sharing network users to the New York State Attorney General's office. MediaDefender is now in damage control mode and hopes to slow the spread...

WASHINGTON--Politicians charged on Tuesday that peer-to-peer networks can pose a "national security threat" because they enable federal employees to share sensitive or classified documents accidentally from their computers. At a hearing on the topic, Government Reform Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) said, without offering details, that he is considering new laws aimed at addressing the problem. He said he was troubled by the possibility that foreign governments, terrorists or organized crime could gain access to documents that reveal national secrets. Also at the hearing, Mark Gorton, the chairman of Lime Wire, which makes the peer-to-peer software LimeWire, was assailed for...

Written by Liz Gannes Posted Thursday, June 21, 2007 at 4:31 PM PT I’m at the Supernova Conference in San Francisco, where the coolest thing I’ve heard about is Pando’s new streaming P2P video service. The company will allow publishers to offer their videos to be watched while being downloaded, which could be a real boon for encouraging long-form internet TV. Downloaders will have to have the Pando client, which has been installed 8.5 million times since it launched last year. The price is a head-turner; about half a cent a gig, Pando CEO Robert Levitan told me today. (Update:...

I asked one of the few conservative Republican senators who stuck with President Bush on immigration to assess how Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell handled the issue. Asking not to be quoted by name, he replied: "If this were a war, Sen. McConnell should be relieved of command for dereliction of duty." Not only did the minority leader end up voting against an immigration bill that he said was better than the 2006 version that he supported, but he also abandoned his post, keeping off the floor during final stages of Senate debate.

"A Washington woman sued by the RIAA has asked the Court to award her attorneys fees, after the record company plaintiffs (Interscope Records, Capitol Records, SONY BMG, Atlantic Recording, BMG Music, and Virgin Records) dropped their case against her after two years of litigation, in Interscope v. Leadbetter. The brief submitted by her attorneys (pdf) pointed out the similarity between Ms. Leadbetter's case and Capitol v. Foster. In the Leadbetter case, as well as Foster case, the RIAA sued the woman solely because she had paid for an internet access account, and then later in the case attempted to plead...

Warner Music CEO Edgar Bronfman made a startling admission when he sat down for a Second Life interview with Reuters: his kids have pirated music. Well, they've probably pirated music—Bronfman doesn't sound too sure. "I'm fairly certain that they have, and I'm fairly certain that they've suffered the consequences," he said, though he later confirmed that he had caught at least one Bronfman child using P2P software. Naturally, his kids were forced to cough up thousands of dollars to the RIAA to keep from getting sued. Right? Of course not; Bronfman told the reporter that he disciplined his child, but...

Peer-to-peer (P-to-P) file-sharing software developer Lime Wire has countersued the biggest record companies, charging them with anti-competitive behavior. The suit, filed Monday in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, follows the closing of most of the popular file-sharing Web sites due to lawsuits initiated by record companies. It also comes on the heels of a suit filed by 13 record companies against Lime Wire, accusing the developer of music piracy and demanding damages that could amount to $476 million. Lime Wire now charges the record companies with colluding to create a monopoly over the digital...

Grokster, the free music-swapping website that prompted a legal battle ending in the US Supreme Court, agreed to shut down its service under a settlement with the US music industry, industry officials said. Grokster will shut down its peer-to-peer (P2P) network that had been accused of massive copyright violations, prompting a lawsuit that ended with the highest US court ruling that it contributed to piracy, according to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). "This settlement brings to a close an incredibly significant chapter in the story of digital music," said Mitch Bainwol, chairman and chief executive of the RIAA....

By Andrew Orlowski Published Thursday 9th September 2004 13:36 GMT P2P jail bill moves forward By Andrew Orlowski Published Thursday 9th September 2004 13:36 GMT HR.4077, the Piracy Deterrence and Education Act, has been approved by the United States' House Judiciary Committee. The bill specifies up to five years' jail for anyone making over a thousand copyrighted works available for download. That's if the infringer is profiting from the action: ordinary P2P users would face up to three years simply for making their collections available. Thwarted by the courts, copyright holders and their lobby groups, notably the Recording Industry Ass. of...

An Oregon woman accused of illegal peer-to-peer downloading has countersued the Recording Industry Association of America, contending that the music trade group illegally invaded her privacy, searched her computer without her permission, and conspired with other companies to engage in "extreme acts of unlawful coercion, extortion, fraud, and other criminal conduct." At least one other defendant sued for downloading music online has sought to use laws typically applied to organized crime to countersue the RIAA. The lawyer who brought that case in New Jersey courts last year said Monday that his client had declared bankruptcy, and the case was no...

File-Sharing Doomed, Warns Exec Peer-to-peer file-sharing companies in the U.S. will cease to exist in their current forms over the next few months, the president of MetaMachine, the company responsible for the eDonkey software, predicts. Speaking at a Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, Sam Yagan said that in order to avoid expensive litigation, file-sharing companies will have to change their models to become similar to iTunes or the new Napster or face expensive legal battles. MetaMachine won't be an exception. "Because we cannot afford to fight a lawsuit--even one we think we would win--we have instead prepared to convert eDonkey's...

Has anyone read the recent Wired (NOT YET ONLINE)about bloggers in Iraq? Made me wonder about Darknet and p2p among the military in the middle east. Since the folks in the military are resourceful and make do with what they have I wonder about the presence of networks between soldiers. Do any freepers have any info about file sharing (of music, radio shows like Rush or others, movies, or other time occupiers) in Iraq? I personally view this story as military ingenuity not a IP issue... they're in a war zone the fact that a soldier may download a copywritten...

WASHINGTON--Congress remains reluctant to rewrite copyright law in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark decision on file-swapping--but Internet pornography on peer-to-peer networks is likely to be a legislative target this fall. At a hearing convened Thursday by the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee, Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., said that she and a bipartisan group of senators were "very concerned" that peer-to-peer software makers were not taking "active steps" to stop copyright infringement by filtering pornography from minors using the software. "If you don't move to protect copyright, if you don't move to protect our children, it's not going to...

Grokster and StreamCast Networks can be held liable for copyright infringements committed by users of their peer-to-peer file-sharing software, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Monday. The decision in the case Grokster v. MGM is a major win for the motion picture and recording industries, which took the case to the nation's highest court after losing in lower courts over the past two years or so. Lawyers for the plaintiffs--Motion Picture Association of America, the National Music Publisher's Association of America, and the Recording Industry Association of America--asked the court to recognize that the Grokster and StreamCast's Morpheus P-to-P (peer-to-peer)...

Supreme Court Rules Against File Swapping update The Supreme Court handed movie studios and record labels a sweeping victory against file-swapping, ruling Monday that peer-to-peer companies such as Grokster could be held responsible for the copyright piracy on their networks. In a unanimous decision, the justices ruled companies that build businesses with the active intent of encouraging copyright infringement should be held liable for their customers' illegal actions. "We hold that one who distributes a device with the object of promoting its use to infringe copyright, as shown by clear expression or other affirmative steps taken to foster infringement, is...

New research revealed at the ELSPA International Games Summit suggests that British consumers are aware of the industry's position on counterfeit goods, but do not support its initiatives to cut down on the rate of piracy. Highlights of a study to be released next week, called Fake Nation, were discussed at the summit by researcher Dr Jo Bryce, a senior lecturer in psychology at the University of Central Lancashire. One of the key findings of the study was that consumers consider piracy to be a normal part of life, and that they do not share the view of the industry...

Researchers at Microsoft's computer science lab in Cambridge have developed a peer-to-peer filesharing system that they say overcomes the scheduling problems associated with existing distribution protocols such as Bit Torrent. The researchers claim download times are between 20-30 per cent faster, using their network coding approach, than on systems that only code at the server, and between 200 and 300 per cent faster than distributing un-encoded information.Naturally, Microsoft is very keen to stress that this technology should be used for distributing legitimate content. It even put that in italics in the press material. The basic principle of the system, dubbed...

FEDERAL LAW ENFORCEMENT ANNOUNCES OPERATION D-ELITE, CRACKDOWN ON P2P PIRACY NETWORKFirst Criminal Enforcement Against BitTorrent Network Users WASHINGTON, D.C. - Acting Assistant Attorney General John C. Richter of the Criminal Division, Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for Immigration and Customs Enforcement Michael J. Garcia, and Assistant Director Louis M. Reigel of the FBI's Cyber Division today announced the first criminal enforcement action targeting individuals committing copyright infringement on peer-to-peer (P2P) networks using cutting edge file-sharing technology known as BitTorrent. This morning, agents of the FBI and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) executed 10 search warrants across the United States against...

See that silvery two-sided disc in the jewel case of Bruce Springsteen's new set? That's a DualDisc. One side CD, the other DVD, this hybrid could be the recording industry's best defense against music pirating and illegal downloading on peer-to-peer networks. "You can't manufacture a DualDisc at home. It just can't be done because ... there's all this content," says Thomas Hesse, president of global digital business for Sony BMG, which owns the Columbia label that released "Devils & Dust" exclusively on DualDisc. The only other high-profile artist to put out a DualDisc-only release was matchbox twenty frontman Rob Thomas,...

College kids looking for free music may have popularized Internet file-trading software, but the technology is now used by everyone from penny-pinching phone callers to polar explorers. Even the recording industry is changing its tune as labels that for years have waged a legal war against peer-to-peer companies are now allowing authorized uses of the technology. "I never thought you'd hear this from me, but the record industry has, mostly, been fairly cooperative," said Wayne Rosso, who is launching an authorized service called Mashboxx while the U.S. Supreme Court considers the entertainment industry's copyright suit against Grokster, his old peer-to-peer...

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The Supreme Court heard arguments Tuesday from representatives of major film studios and the recording industry who are seeking to shut down peer-to-peer services they say are costing them billions of dollars. One of the questions the court kept coming back to was this: What's more important — preventing potential copyright violations or allowing the market to come up with innovative new products? The case began when MGM and several record labels filed suit against StreamCast Networks and file-sharing network Grokster, arguing that they were intentionally created to allow people to illegally trade copyrighted material. That case was thrown out...

WASHINGTON, March 29 - The much-heralded Supreme Court showdown in the Grokster case between old-fashioned entertainment and newfangled technology found the justices surprisingly responsive on Tuesday to warnings from Grokster, the software maker that allows Internet users to share computer files on peer-to-peer networks, that a broad definition of copyright infringement could curtail innovation. Justice David H. Souter asked Donald B. Verrilli Jr., the lawyer arguing for the Hollywood studios and the recording industry, to envision "a guy sitting in his garage inventing the iPod." "I know perfectly well that I can buy a CD and put it on my...

Technology entrepreneur, Dallas Mavericks owner, billionaire, blogger and often blowhard Mark Cuban has pledged to finance P2P software maker Grokster's legal war with the major record labels and movie studios. The Supreme Court tomorrow will hear arguments surrounding Grokster and StreamCast's dispute with the media companies. Hollywood is hoping the high court will overturn two lower court decisions that said makers of decentralized P2P software cannot be held liable for users who trade copyrighted files. Cuban, who owns movie theaters and the rights to numerous TV shows and movies, has gone against his peers by saying P2P software should have...

If money is the root of all evil, then hackers are evil incarnate. According to a security intelligence firm, more than half the cyber-attacks conducted in 2004 were carried out by criminals interested in only one thing: money. iDefense, a Reston, Va.-based supplier of security intelligence to both corporations and government agencies, delved into its private database of more than 100,000 malicious code attacks to publish analytical findings publicly for the first time, said Ken Dunham, the company's director of research. Using that database, iDefense tallied a record 27,260 attacks in 2004. Over 15,000 of those, or some 55 percent,...