Posted: 02 Sep 2014 04:59 AM PDT

boxed The Tribler client has been around for more nearly a decade already, and during that time it's developed into the only truly decentralized BitTorrent client out there.

Even if all torrent sites were shut down today, Tribler users would still be able to find and add new content.

But the researchers want more. One of the key problems with BitTorrent is the lack of anonymity. Without a VPN or proxy all downloads can easily be traced back to an individual internet connection.

The Tribler team hopes to fix this problem with a built-in Tor network, routing all data through a series of peers. In essence, Tribler users then become their own Tor network helping each other to hide their IP-addresses through encrypted proxies.

“The Tribler anonymity feature aims to make strong encryption and authentication the Internet default,” Tribler leader Dr. Pouwelse tells TF.

For now the researchers have settled for three proxies between the senders of the data and the recipient. This minimizes the risk of being monitored by a rogue peer and significantly improves privacy.

“Adding three layers of proxies gives you more privacy. Three layers of protection make it difficult to trace you. Proxies no longer need to be fully trusted. A single bad proxy can not see exactly what is going on,” the Tribler team explains.

“The first proxy layer encrypts the data for you and each next proxy adds another layer of encryption. You are the only one who can decrypt these three layers correctly. Tribler uses three proxy layers to make sure bad proxies that are spying on people can do little damage.”

Tribler’s encrypted Tor routing

Today Tribler opens up its technology to the public for the first time. The Tor network is fully functional but for now it is limited to a 50 MB test file. This will allow the developers to make some improvements before the final release goes out next month.

There has been an increased interest in encryption technologies lately. The Tribler team invites interested developers to help them improve their work, which is available on Github.

“We hope all developers will unite inside a single project to defeat the forces that have destroyed the Internet essence. We really don't need a hundred more single-person projects on 'secure' chat applications that still fully expose who you talk to,” Pouwelse says.

For users the Tor like security means an increase in bandwidth usage. After all, they themselves also become proxies who have to pass on the transfers of other users. According to the researchers this shouldn’t result in any slowdowns though, as long as people are willing to share.

“Tribler has always been for social and sharing people. Like private tracker communities with plenty of bandwidth to go around we think we can offer anonymity without slow downs, if we can incentivize people to leave their computers on overnight and donate,” Pouwelse says.

“People who share will have superior anonymous speeds,” he adds.

Those interested in testing Tribler’s anonymity feature can download the latest version. Bandwidth statistics are also available. Please bear in mind that only the test file can be transferred securely at the moment.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

UK Police Make Third ‘Pirate’ Streaming Arrest

Posted: 01 Sep 2014 11:56 PM PDT

Set up in the summer of 2013, the City of London Police’s Intellectual Property Crime Unit has quickly grown to become one of the world’s most active anti-piracy operations.

The unit employs a wide range of strategies, from writing to domain registrars and threatening them, to working with advertisers in order to strangle the revenues of ‘pirate’ sites.

PIPCU also relies on old-fashioned police work to deal with sites that fail to heed their warnings to tow the line. This has resulted in several arrests in the UK and the closure of dozens of domains, torrent site proxies in particular.

With key partner the Federation Against Copyright Theft and its members including the Premier League and BSkyB, piracy of TV-destined content has become an area of interest to PIPCU, particularly that involving live sports.

Early Monday, more than 200 miles away from their London base, officers from PIPCU arrested a man in Manchester in the north of England. Police say the 27-year-old is believed to have operated a series of websites which offered access to subscription-only TV services.

PIPCU say that the domains were sports-focused, so given the premium pay TV landscape in the UK it seems probable that they infringed the rights of BSkyB and possibly the Premier League. Police are yet to confirm the details.

While there are no figures available on site visitor numbers, police are using the term “industrial” to explain the size of the operation they shut down yesterday. A reported 12 computer servers streaming global sports were reportedly seized and their operator taken to a local police station for questioning.

"Today's operation is the unit's third arrest in relation to online streaming and sends out a strong message that we are homing in on those who knowingly commit or facilitate online copyright infringement,” said PIPCU chief DCI Danny Medlycott last evening.

"Not only is there a significant loss to industry with this particular operation but it is also unfair that millions of people work hard to be able to afford to pay for their subscription-only TV services when others cheat the system."

PIPCU have not released the names of the sites in question so it’s impossible to assess their significance at this point. However, police are often quick to seize the domains of sites they close down so it’s expected that signs of that will begin to surface during the next few days enabling a more detailed assessment of the shutdown.

As pointed out by DCI Medlycott, yesterday’s arrest is the third involving a streaming site operator in the UK. Although the sites were not revealed by police at the time, TorrentFreak previously revealed that the operator of BoxingGuru.co.uk, boxingguru.eu, boxingguru.tv and nutjob.eu was arrested during April in the north of England.

In May, PIPCU had the domain of the Cricfree.tv streaming portal suspended but its operator was able to bring the site back under a new domain.

Yesterday’s arrest appears to be PIPCU’s first since the arrest of a UK-based torrent site proxy operator in early August.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Popcorn Time Installed on 1.4 Million Devices in The U.S.

Posted: 01 Sep 2014 01:25 PM PDT

popcorn The Popcorn Time app brought BitTorrent streaming to the masses earlier this year.

The software became an instant hit by offering BitTorrent-powered streaming in an easy-to-use Netflix-style interface.

While the original app was shut down by the developers after a few weeks, the project was quickly picked up by others. This resulted in several popular forks that have gained a steady user-base in recent months.

Just how popular the application is remained a mystery, until now. TorrentFreak reached out to one of the most popular Popcorn Time forks at time4popcorn.eu to find out how many installs and active users there are in various parts of the world.

The Popcorn Time team was initially reluctant to share exact statistics on the app’s popularity across the globe, but they’re now ready to lift the veil.

Data shared with TorrentFreak shows that most users come from the United States where the application is installed on more than 1.4 million devices. There are currently over 100,000 active users in the U.S. and the number of new installs per day hovers around 15,000.

“At the beginning of August there were between 17-18K installations a day on all operating systems and last weekend there were somewhere between 13-15K a day,” the Popcorn Time teams informs us.

The application has a surprisingly large user base in the Netherlands too, as Android Planet found out. The country comes in second place with 1.3 million installs. That’s a huge number for a country with a population of less than 17 million people.

Brazil completes the top three at a respectful distance with 700,000 installed applications and around 56,000 active users.

The United Kingdom just missed a spot in the top three. The Popcorn Time fork has been installed on 500,000 devices there, with 30,000 active users and 4,500 new installs per day.

Australia, which generally has a very high piracy rate, is lagging behind a little with 93,000 installs thus far, and “only” 6,500 active users.

The statistics above only apply to the time4popcorn.eu application. While it’s probably the most used, other forks such as popcorntime.io also have a large following to add to the total Popcorn Time user base.

The team behind time4popcorn.eu, meanwhile, says that it will continue to add new features and support for more operating systems. They are currently finishing up the first iOS version which is expected to be released in a few days.

Aside from the technical challenges, the developers keep motivated by the large audience they’ve gathered in a relatively short period.

“We really love and appreciate all our devoted users from all over the world, and we want to emphasize to them once more that this is only the beginning of the beginning. We have so many awesome plans for the future,” they stress.

As long as there are no legal troubles down the road, this user base is expected to grow even further during the months to come.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

Hustler Hustles Tor Exit-Node Operator Over Piracy

Posted: 01 Sep 2014 08:07 AM PDT

Faced with the growing threat of online file-sharing, Hustler committed to "turning piracy into profit" several years ago.

The company has not been very active on this front in the United States, but more so in Europe. In Finland for example Hustler is sending out settlement demands for hundreds of euros to alleged pirates.

A few days ago one of these letters arrived at the doorstep of Sebastian Mäki, identifying the IP-address through which he offers a Tor exit-node. According to Hustler the IP-address had allegedly transferred a copy of Hustler’s “This Ain’t Game Of Thrones XXX.”

The letter is sent by lawfirm Hedman Partners who urge Mäki to pay 600 euros ($800) in damages or face worse.

However, Mäki has no intention to pay up. Besides running a Tor exit-node and an open wireless network through the connection, he also happens to be Vice-President of a local Pirate Party branch. As such, he has a decent knowledge of how to counter these threats.

“All we can do at the moment is fight against these trolls, and they are preying on easy victims, who have no time nor energy to fight and often are afraid of the embarrassment that could follow, because apparently porn is still a taboo somewhere,” Mäki tells TorrentFreak.

So instead of paying up, the Tor exit-node operator launched a counter attack. He wrote a lengthy reply to Hustler’s lawyers accusing them of blackmail.

“According to Finnish law, wrongfully forcing someone to dispose of their financial interests is known as blackmail. Threatening to make known one’s porn watching habits unless someone coughs up money sounds to me like activities for which you can get a sentence.”

Mäki explains that an IP-address is not necessarily a person and that Hustler’s copyright trolling is likely to affect innocent Internet users. Because of this, he has decided to report these dubious practices to the police.

“I am also concerned that other innocent citizens might not have as much time, energy, or wealth to fight back. Because your actions have the potential to cause so much damage to innocent bystanders, I find it morally questionable and made a police report.”

Whether the police will follow up on the complaint remains to be seen, but Hustler will have to take its hustling elsewhere for now. They clearly targeted the wrong person here, in more ways than one.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and anonymous VPN services.

PirateBay

Torrentfreak: “Tribler Makes BitTorrent Anonymous With Built-in Tor Network” plus 3 more

Torrentfreak: “Tribler Makes BitTorrent Anonymous With Built-in Tor Network” plus 3 more