Posted on 05/11/2006 10:15:10 AM PDT by Uncle Fud
MPAA Trains Dogs to Sniff Out Pirate DVDs
Two black Labradors are being employed in the fight against piracy in the U.K.
Jeremy Kirk, IDG News Service Thursday, May 11, 2006
The Motion Picture Association of America is putting some bite behind its bark in its fight against illegally copied CDs and DVDs.
The movie industry group has funded the eight-month training of two black Labradors, called Lucky and Flo, who can now sniff out optical discs at customs points and other locations. The MPAA worked with its U.K. counterpart, the Federation Against Copyright Theft (FACT).
While dogs have long been used to detect illicit drugs, the new mission aims to slash away at the profits from movie piracy, which FACT estimates were $519 million in the U.K. last year.
The dogs were trained to detect the smell of chemicals used in the manufacture of optical discs, said Eddy Leviten, head of communications for FACT.
Last week, Lucky and Flo sniffed packages at the FedEx facility at Stansted Airport, near London. The dogs' sense of smell is up to 10,000 times more sensitive than humans and can smell a disc through several layers of wrapping.
Use of the dogs slashes the time needed to isolate suspicious packages, Leviten said.
Pirated or Genuine?
But the dogs can't distinguish between pirated discs and genuine ones. Investigators examine packages to try to determine which should be opened for inspection.
The number of pirated discs imported into the U.K. has fallen dramatically in the past 18 months due to increased enforcement by HM Revenue and Customs, Leviten said. However, prices for equipment to create illegal discs have fallen, meaning more operations are within in the U.K., Leviten said.
The dogs could also be used for warehouse inspections undertaken by FACT, which employs piracy investigators throughout the U.K.
FACT and the MPAA are working with law enforcement and customs officials on how the dogs will be incorporated into future enforcement efforts, Leviten said.
I suggest a DDOS strategy. Put a DVD-R in every package you send via Fedex.
They are already plenty of bomb-sniffing and drug-sniffing dogs. I doubt that this two-dog detail constitutes proof that the UK searches for DVDs first before all contraband.
What's next ..... j walkers?
this is stupid.
So the DVD of the cousin judy's wedding is going to be stopped?
How do they know a CD of ripped music is not the LEGALLY OWNED complilation of a personal collection.
Why are they allowing a private entity to to do police work?
How many other companies would like such special access to pursue their product?
How about t-shirt sniffing dogs?
How about fake sneaker sniffing dogs?
How about fake Louis Vitton sniffing dogs?
How about we keep border patrol sniffing for bombs and drugs and leave the free market to worry about cousin Judy's wedding DVD.
On the US side at least, it is the job of Customs to check for counterfeit items entering the country. Any company can register with Customs so that couterfeits of its products will be seized at the point of entry. They siezed almost a hundred million dollars worth of stuff last year.
I saw the headline and checked to see if it was Scrappleface or from the Onion.
The MPAA better not ever train dogs to sniff intrusive, paranoid assholes. Of if they do, never have the trainers bring them on site.
Can the Dogs etermine what is burned illegally and what is burned lawfully?
How are they to check? are they going to check your data? isn't that invasion of privacy?
An excellent use of money, that I am positive could not possibly be better spent anywhere else. Way to go MPAA.
/sarc
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