Posted: 19 Dec 2014 05:07 AM PST

The Pirate Bay raid last week was a landmark incident which disrupted the BitTorrent ecosystem.

Many people have been looking for Pirate Bay alternatives in recent days. While there is nothing that can match the old Pirate Bay, there are plenty of copies available.

Earlier this week the TPB crew said that it would be a good thing to have clones of the site all over the Internet, and it appears that the Isohunt.to team heard this message loud and clear.

The same team that previously resurrected isoHunt launched a copy of TPB on Oldpiratebay.org last week, and now they’re opening up its code to the public.

The initiative, properly named The Open Bay, opens up the source to their Pirate Bay clone. This means that in a few simple steps anyone can have a copy of the Pirate Bay installed on his or her own domain.

“We, the team that brought you Isohunt.to and oldpiratebay.org are bringing you the next step in torrent evolution. Open Pirate Bay source code,” Isohunt.to says.

According to the people behind “The Open Bay” there’s a lesson to be learned from the isoHunt and Pirate Bay shutdowns. Instead of a few big players, the torrent community itself should be a swarm of copies.

“We want to change the torrent landscape which has been frozen for 10 years. We need to push it ahead,” Isohunt.to tells TF.

“The Open Pirate Bay source code will give absolutely anyone with minimal knowledge of how the Internet and websites work and some basic hosting, the opportunity to create a pirate bay copy on his own domain.”

To do so, the Isohunt.to team offers code and scripts and a large database dump with instructions to get it up and running on a simple shared hosting account. In addition, they put all files in a GitHub repository so people can create improved copies of their copy.

We have to emphasize that the term Pirate Bay “copy” should be used loosely here. The standard release includes oldpiratebay.org’s theme and a database dump of roughly 8 million torrent links, while Pirate Bay only had around 3 million.

The difference is explained by the fact that The Open Bay database also includes files that originated from KickassTorrents and Isohunt.to. The original Pirate Bay code or descriptions are not there, and it’s not possible to upload or comment either.

Finally, it may go without saying but people should keep in mind that hosting a Pirate Bay copy comes with a legal risk.

Whether the surge in Pirate Bay copies is really a good development is open to debate, but we’ll examine this topic in an upcoming article.

For those who want a local copy of The Pirate Bay’s archive for historical purposes there’s a safer option. A recent dump of the files database, complete with all original pirate bay IDs, torrent descriptions and hashes is available here.

Torrent savvy people who know how magnet links work can even use the latter as a local Pirate Bay search engine, with the help of notepad.

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

Google & MPAA Publicly Slam Each Other Over Piracy

Posted: 19 Dec 2014 01:34 AM PST

Even after running for weeks, the fallout from the Sony hacking fiasco is showing no signs of waning. In fact in some areas it appears that matters are only getting worse.

Earlier this month a TF report revealed how the MPAA (with a SOPA defeat still ringing loudly in its ears) is still intent on bringing website blocking to the United States.

The notion that Hollywood was intent on reintroducing something so unpopular didn’t sit well with critics, but that was only the beginning. A subsequent article in The Verge revealed a campaign by the MPAA to attack “Goliath” – a codeword for Google – by “convincing state prosecutors to take up the fight” against the search giant.

The MPAA budgeted $500,000 for the project with costs potentially rising to $1.175 million. The Hollywood group subsequently called on SOPA-supporting Mississippi State Attorney General Jim Hood to attack Google, which he did.

The New York times has a copy of the letter he sent to the search giant – worryingly it was almost entirely drafted by the MPAA’s lawfirm Jenner and Block.

After a week of “no comment” from Google, the company has just broken its silence. In a statement from SVP and General Counsel Kent Walker, Google questions the MPAA’s judgment over its SOPA-like aims and apparent manipulation of an Attorney General.

“Almost three years ago, millions of Americans helped stop a piece of congressional legislation—supported by the MPAA—called the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). If passed, SOPA would have led to censorship across the web. No wonder that 115,000 websites—including Google—participated in a protest, and over the course of a single day, Congress received more than 8 million phone calls and 4 million emails, as well as getting 10 million petition signatures,” Walker writes.

“We are deeply concerned about recent reports that the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) led a secret, coordinated campaign to revive the failed SOPA legislation through other means, and helped manufacture legal arguments in connection with an investigation by Mississippi State Attorney General Jim Hood.”

Then, in what can only be a huge embarrassment for the MPAA and the Attorney General, Walker turns to the letter AG Hood sent to him in 2013.

“The MPAA did the legal legwork for the Mississippi State Attorney General.
The MPAA then pitched Mississippi State Attorney General Jim Hood, an admitted SOPA supporter, and Attorney General Hood sent Google a letter making numerous accusations about the company,” Walker explains.

“The letter was signed by General Hood but was actually drafted by an attorney at Jenner & Block — the MPAA's law firm. As the New York Times has reported, the letter was only minimally edited by the state Attorney General before he signed it.”

The Google SVP ends with a shot at the MPAA and questions its self-professed position as an upholder of the right to free speech.

“While we of course have serious legal concerns about all of this, one disappointing part of this story is what this all means for the MPAA itself, an organization founded in part ‘to promote and defend the First Amendment and artists’ right to free expression.’ Why, then, is it trying to secretly censor the Internet?” Walker concludes.

Without delay, Google’s public comments were pounced upon by the MPAA who quickly published a statement of their own. It pulls no punches.

"Google's effort to position itself as a defender of free speech is shameful. Freedom of speech should never be used as a shield for unlawful activities and the internet is not a license to steal,” the statement begins.

“Google's blog post today is a transparent attempt to deflect focus from its own conduct and to shift attention from legitimate and important ongoing investigations by state attorneys general into the role of Google Search in enabling and facilitating illegal conduct – including illicit drug purchases, human trafficking and fraudulent documents as well as theft of intellectual property.”

And, in a clear indication that the MPAA feels it acted appropriately, the Hollywood group lets Google know that nothing will change.

“We will seek the assistance of any and all government agencies, whether federal, state or local, to protect the rights of all involved in creative activities," the MPAA concludes.

The statements by both Google and the MPAA indicate that in this fight the gloves are now well and truly off. Will ‘David’ slay ‘Goliath’? Who will get hurt in the crossfire?

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

Torrent Site Fenopy Shuts Down Quietly

Posted: 18 Dec 2014 12:52 PM PST

A few days ago Fenopy.se stopped responding, leaving tens of thousands of regular users without one of their favorite torrent sites.

The downtime wasn’t related to Pirate Bay’s troubles. Instead, the site’s domain name had simply expired.

TF talked to Fenopy’s owner who says that the expiration was not an accident, but planned a long time ago. The site’s owner decided that it was time to move on, and let the site vanish.

“Fenopy was being operated by an Artificial Intelligence that I created back in 2011 and was on autopilot during the past 2 years. The domain just expired few days ago.” he says.

Fenopy gained a lot of visitors in 2006 when it was the first full-fledged torrent site with a “modern” looking design and nifty web 2.0 features.

In recent years the site’s traffic went down considerably, not in the last place because of various ISP blockades.

The owner of Fenopy gave us the following statement which is food for thought, discussion, and much more.

—

On Liberty of Knowledge:

I wanted to talk about the values of sharing in this statement.

But shame on us. For taking the greatest invention of our era, The Internet, and turn it into a marketing and surveillance web; all for feeding our greed and controlling the information.

Inside every artist, scientist, priest, student, politician and every man, is a will. Will to be heard and be remembered. From the dawn of time, we shared and reasoned our perceptions of our surroundings with one another. We documented them in inscriptions, fables, and books. Gathered them in our most sacred places; from Hanging Gardens of Babylon to Library of Alexandria. So everyone could access the knowledge of us freely to grow out of nonage.

The Internet could become our global library of knowledge. The path was by giving every information to everyone for the sake of giving. What we saw was an Internet owned and operated by enterprises. We need enterprises, but we also need to realize that each enterprise function to protect self-interests and profits. So we decided to guard the knowledge and reveal it; allowing everyone access, without forcing them to go through guardians who would conceal it. We made mistakes too, but at least we tried.

Power heard and acknowledged. It forced my brothers at The Pirate Bay to exile from their fatherlands. They found love and friendship in the people of the new lands.

Our brothers – Aaron, Gottfrid, Fredrik, and Peter – have fulfilled their mission. They sacrificed their freedom to fight the greed while living a modest life in prisons and remote corners of our world.

They are the heroes of our generation, the martyrs of the digital era, the liberators of our knowledge in art, science, and humanities. They broke the constructs of ownership and freed themselves even from their lands. Like all of us, they made mistakes too; yet they fought for a human reason.

May the death of these websites, the libraries of our modern age, be a lesson for future generations, that path to liberty starts with courage.

I finish this eulogy with Immanuel Kant:

“Enlightenment is man’s emergence from his self-imposed nonage. Nonage is the inability to use one’s own understanding without another’s guidance. This nonage is self-imposed if its cause lies not in lack of understanding but in indecision and lack of courage to use one’s own mind without another’s guidance. Dare to know! (Sapere aude.) “Have the courage to use your own understanding,” is therefore the motto of the enlightenment.”

This, once liberated us from Dark Ages in Europe. Hope it will liberate all of us again.

With peace
Breathe in union

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

Paulo Coelho Wants to Give The Interview Away Using BitTorrent

Posted: 18 Dec 2014 09:33 AM PST

As has become customary in the past few weeks, the so-called Guardians of Peace hackers contacted TorrentFreak on Tuesday advising us of the latest release from their Sony hack.

The tone on this occasion was different. Threats of destroying Sony’s business had given way to suggestions of 9/11 style attacks on locations daring to show the now-controversial movie The Interview. Under increasing pressure, last evening Sony decided to pull the film.

“In light of the decision by the majority of our exhibitors not to show the film The Interview, we have decided not to move forward with the planned December 25 theatrical release,” Sony said in a statement.

While it’s believed the US government will officially point the finger at North Korea today, not everyone is scared of being associated with the movie. In fact, BitTorrent-loving, Pirate Bay-supporting, best-selling author Paulo Coelho is interested in buying the rights – and then some.

In a message to Sony this morning, Coelho – who offered to testify for the defense in The Pirate Bay trial of 2009 – laid down his offer.

“I offer @SonyPictures 100k for the rights of ‘The Interview’ I will post it free on my blog,” the author announced.

Speaking with TorrentFreak, Coelho confirmed that if successful he’ll make the movie available for free using BitTorrent. But what made him want to get involved in the controversy?

“As a writer, freedom of information /distribution is important for me. You can’t bend to threats,” Coelho told TF.

“Worse, you can’t give an excuse that [Sony] decided to pull the plug fearing ‘terrorist attacks’. It is my understanding that what they really fear are email leaks.”

While the amount offered by Coelho is small beans against a movie that could end up costing Sony $100m (hack costs not included), it’s being offered by an individual who knows all about leveraging file-sharing to his benefit.

In 2007 Coelho sold in excess of 100 million books and since its release his novel The Alchemist has shifted more than 165 million copies. Extraordinary writing talent aside, Coelho is unusual in that he embraces piracy and is more than happy to let people download his work for free.

In an earlier interview with TorrentFreak the Brazilian said that he wanted people to have the opportunity to 'try' his books for free, but some of his publishers wouldn't agree to that right away. So, taking matters into his own hands, Coelho put his books onto BitTorrent and hosting sites to achieve his aims.

"The ultimate goal of a writer is to be read. Money comes later,” he said.

In fact, BitTorrent distribution is helping Coelho’s sales today more than ever before.

“Adultery, my new book, broke all records this year, and I believe that one of the reasons was there being many copies on P2P sites,” the author says.

Coelho concluded his offer to Sony Pictures this morning by suggesting he should be contacted via the company’s Brazil division. Whether a response will be forthcoming will remain to be seen, but in any event it seems unlikely that The Interview will remain dark forever.

Although Sony has reportedly killed its theatrical and VOD releases and has “no further release plans" for the movie, in the piracy world forbidden fruit is always the sweetest. File-sharers are now very keen indeed to get their hands on the movie, which is known to be available in DVD screener format.

Should that leak – and copies usually do – then there will be absolutely nothing that anyone can do about that, North Korea included. It won’t land on The Pirate Bay of course, but Coelho doesn’t think that will be too much of a problem.

“Thanks isoHunt,” he concludes.

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

PirateBay

Torrentfreak: “The Open Bay: Now Anyone Can Run A Pirate Bay ‘Copy’” plus 3 more

Torrentfreak: “The Open Bay: Now Anyone Can Run A Pirate Bay ‘Copy’” plus 3 more