Torrentfreak: “Wiziwig: Poor Legal Options Turn People into Pirates” plus 1 more

Wiziwig: Poor Legal Options Turn People into Pirates

Posted: 03 Jan 2015 03:22 AM PST

Until our report yesterday it’s likely that Wiziwig, a streaming portal covering just about every spectator sport around, had flown under the radars of many readers. And that’s surprising.

The site is ranked #1,546 worlwide by Alexa and is the 239th most-popular site in the UK. On Thursday the term ‘wiziwig’ was the 8th most popular search on Google.co.uk, ahead of official sports broadcaster BT Sport. But the popularity wasn’t based on good news. Citing changes in Spanish law, Wiziwig had been forced to close just hours earlier.

In the wake of the closure TorrentFreak caught up with the operators of this hugely popular site to find out about events leading up to its shutdown. Interestingly it’s what didn’t happen on the site’s first day offline that topped the discussion.

Among dozens of other sports, Wiziwig carried links to live soccer games and as a result became somewhat of a magnet for companies such as the UK’s Premier League. New Year’s Day is a traditionally big date for UK soccer so coinciding with the first day of Wiziwig downtime, the site’s operators stood back and watched what happened.

“What we noticed Thursday, and that’s what we’ve always been thinking, is that the Premier League has only been focusing on Wiziwig lately to take down streams, like those from [P2P streaming service] Sopcast for example,” Wiziwig told us.

“If we added a Sopcast link for a game in the Premier League, then quickly that link was made inaccessible. On Thursday all Sopcast channels kept working all day, without any been taking down during the early kickoff, 3pm game and late game. Coincidence?”

The idea that the soccer league had been using Wiziwig to find streams and have them taken down at source was confirmed when matches streamed from other sources also remained up.

“Same applied with Veetle links, as when those previously appeared on Wiziwig they were quickly taken down. If we didn’t add them they were working all game long, while people could find them easily in Veetle. That also applied to several other links.”

Aside from changes in Spanish law where the site was based, Wiziwig also reminded us of two serious events in the UK earlier in the year. In April the operator of sports streaming site Nutjob.eu was arrested by officers from the Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit. That was followed by a September raid on the operator of the Coolsport streaming service.

When all things were considered (Wiziwig’s Twitter account was shutdown by a complaint in December) the team felt that the timing was right to call it a day. But even though Wiziwig is no more, other sites are bound to try and fill the gap the portal has left in the market. These, Wiziwig’s operators say, wouldn’t even exist if more effort was put into getting official services to consumers.

“We’ve seen in the past several years that people don’t get the right options to watch the sports and games they want to watch. Many sports events, and many games, aren’t available worldwide. The Leagues or competitions often don’t provide the right options for people to watch games in a legal way, which is also what we’ve seen from many replies on Twitter and Facebook,” Wiziwig explain.

“People want to subscribe to some games, some PPV events, and don’t want long contracts. In many countries there are no options to watch specific sports events and competitions. So not just the big sports/leagues, but also for smaller events.

“Then people decide to watch the online streams. A good example is the 3pm soccer games in England which aren’t shown on UK TV due to an old law designed to keep stadiums full. If the leagues fail to provide such options then websites like Wiziwig and [illicit] streams will always exist,” Wiziwig adds.

With the site closed the team are now turning their attention to GetYourFixtures, a TV guide for sports with links to only official streams.

“GetYourFixtures’ aim is to provide people with the correct TV info for all sports events, and if there isn’t a TV channel showing it then they want to give people the options to watch it officially online.

“Maybe leagues and competitions will wake up and start working on providing decent PPV options, letting people pay for just a single game, a flexible way of watching sports. On TV, mobile or tablet: wherever they are, either free and supported with advertisements when there isn’t any TV coverage/legal pay option, or just for small fees. They should work together,” Wiziwig concludes.

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

Canadian ISPs and VPNs Now Have to Alert Pirating Customers

Posted: 02 Jan 2015 10:27 AM PST

After years of public and private discussions, Canada started implementing a new copyright law in recent years.

The law introduced great improvements in terms of fair use and non-commercial file-sharing, and also adopts a "notice-and-notice" policy for ISPs that goes into effect today, January 2nd.

Under the new law Internet providers are required to forward copyright notices they receive from rightsholders to their customers. Providers who do not comply, including VPN services, face damages up to $10,000.

The notice scheme creates a safe harbor for Internet providers, protecting them from copyright holder lawsuits. For Internet subscribers the effects are limited to warnings, which is less draconian than the “strikes” systems other countries have implemented.

University of Ottawa professor Michael Geist, who has been a critical follower of the copyright law changes, notes that despite its modesty people should be wary of the negative consequences these notices may have.

“I think they’re generally a good solution – proven effective when used informally and far less draconian than takedown systems. That said, there is the danger of potential abuse that will be need to be monitored,” Geist tells TF.

Among the most prominent concerns are the so-called settlement schemes where copyright holders ask pirating subscribers to pay a fee. These have become relatively common in the U.S. and are now expected to expand into Canada.

One of the companies that helps rightsholders to collect settlements is CEG TEK, and they are already gearing up to enter the Canadian market.

"We have been conducting tests in the Canada market and see positive results with ISPs. We look forward to a full-scale launch in the new year," CEG TEK’s COO Kyle Reed informs TF.

These settlement notices are a “significant concern” according to Professor Geist. He says that the law currently doesn’t prohibit copyright holders from sending them in, but that subscribers’ identities are shielded.

“The law does not preclude the inclusion of a settlement demand, though Canada has a cap on liability for non-commercial infringement and the sender of the notice obviously does not know the identity of the subscriber,” Geist tells TF

“ISPs would seemingly be required to send these notifications, but there is nothing in the law that would stop them from advising subscribers on the context of these notices,” he adds.

The new notice-and-notice system also has a great impact on VPN providers. The new law requires them to identify pirating customers so they can forward the infringement notices.

To be able to do so the companies have to retain access logs for a minimum of six months. This mandatory data retention is expected to lead to a customer exodus as it makes it impossible for providers to guarantee people's anonymity, a key feature of any VPN service.

As we pointed out before, the new law requires VPN providers to implement an extensive logging and notice policy to deal with takedown notices. This will prove to be quite costly or simply impossible, especially for smaller companies that are sometimes run by individuals.

Many VPN providers assign shared IP-addresses to their customers, so even if they wanted to there is no option to accurately identify a copyright infringer. For these companies the only option will be to shut down, or move the company outside of Canada.

During the months to come it will become apparent what impact the notice-and-notice system will have on businesses and customers.

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