Month: June 2016

Earlier today we wrote about the Copyright Alliance’s critique of the US-based Public Interest Registry (PIR), which is responsible for .ORG domains.

The group called out the registry as hypocritical, as it allows “criminal” sites such as The Pirate Bay to use its service. A few hours later it turns out that this criticism didn’t come out of nowhere.

The Pirate Bay’s registrar EasyDNS reveals that the RIAA sent PIR a letter last week, urging it to suspend the Pirate Bay’s domain.

The music group lists several European court decisions against The Pirate Bay, including the criminal convictions of its founders in Sweden. It states that the torrent site is clearly operating illegally, and hopes the registry will take its domain name out of circulation.

According to the RIAA, The Pirate Bay violates PIR’s anti-abuse policy and terms of service. As such, it hopes that a court order isn’t required for the registry to take action.

“When, as in this case, there is overwhelming evidence of infringing and abusive activity on a domain, along with court orders from several jurisdictions with well-developed copyright jurisprudence, it cannot be the ‘right thing’ or ‘in the community interest’ to hold out for those decisions to be processed before the U.S. courts before taking action,” the RIAA writes.

The RIAA’s letter was sent last week and thus far PIR has not taken any steps against the domain. Instead, it forwarded the RIAA’s letter to Pirate Bay’s registrar, the Canadian-based EasyDNS.

TorrentFreak spoke with EasyDNS CEO Mark Jeftovic, who informs us that he doesn’t want to be seen as a refuge for torrent sites. However, he is committed to protecting due process, and for now he sees no reason to suspend the domain name.

EasyDNS forwarded the letter to TPB and intriguingly, the site’s operator replied that they are DMCA compliant. In addition, they waved away any concerns about malware that was distributed through third-party ads.

Infringements or not, EasyDNS says its abuse policy only covers net abuse, not copyright matters. This means that in order to get a domain suspended the RIAA would need to present a local court order, or a foreign one that’s served through the Ontario Sheriff’s Office.

“We would need some kind of legal finding here in Ontario, or a foreign legal finding that has been duly served to us via the Ontario Sheriff’s Office,” Jeftovic tells us.

Alternatively, EasyDNS says it will accept the outcome of a formal proceeding under ICANN’s rules and regulations. However, it won’t take action against a one-sided complaint.

All in all, this means that the RIAA’s letter is unlikely to achieve the result they desire. This also begs the question, what’s next?

Although the RIAA would prefer to avoid a legal case against The Pirate Bay in the United States, if only to avoid the media attention, it appears that they have few other options left than to go to court.

Court case or not, the TPB team isn’t worried. They are not tied to the .ORG domain and can easily switch to an alternative.

“TPB is more than just a domain, it’s a movement, and taking down one domain will have zero effect on our inalienable right to share culture with our peers,” TPB’s Spud17 told us earlier today.

And so the whack-a-mole game is likely to continue.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

Drive-by attacks that install the once-feared TeslaCrypt crypto ransomware are now able to bypass EMET, a Microsoft-provided tool designed to block entire classes of Windows-based exploits.

The EMET-evading attacks are included in Angler, a toolkit for sale online that provides ready-to-use exploits that can be stitched into compromised websites. Short for Enhanced Mitigation Experience Toolkit, EMET has come to be regarded as one of the most effective ways of hardening Windows-based computers from attacks that exploit security vulnerabilities in both the operating system or installed applications. According to a blog post published Monday by researchers from security firm FireEye, the new Angler attacks are significant because they're the first exploits found in the wild that successfully pierce the mitigations.

"The level of sophistication in exploit kits has increased significantly throughout the years," FireEye researchers wrote. "Where obfuscation and new zero days were once the only additions in the development cycle, evasive code has now been observed being embedded into the framework and shellcode."

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Jim Resnick

The 4C isn't perfect, but it will make you find excuses to drive it.

7 more images in gallery

Alfa Romeo's 4C Spider is a car of won'ts and nots. Aside from the fully carbon-fiber tub—like a million-dollar LaFerrari—you won't find much high-tech zootery (or is that high-zoot tech-ery?). You won't find autonomous lane-keeping, radar-fed cruise control, crash-avoidance software, or inductive charging mats. It does not have luggage space where a normal suitcase will fit. Power steering or power retractable roof? Not so much. You’d even be challenged to find basic cruise control at all, unless you look hard, because it's hidden pretty well. But, you won't care.

You will find a laser-focused sports car, nimbleness, and a big dose of driving magic it otherwise takes Ferrari money to obtain. Yes, this is the $64,000 "baby Ferrari" question that nearly no one asked for ($76,495 with options as tested). It's as simultaneously brilliant and flawed as actual Ferraris of 10 or 15 years ago. In that sense, a "best of times / worst of times" sports car. Dickensian.

Throw the lightweight little Alfa (2,487 lbs/1,128 kg) around a track or your own favorite set of switchbacks, and you quickly discover why this car is here on Earth. The Alfa snicks and sticks everywhere, making you a driving champion mentally. This is a Michael Schumacher maker for your mind.

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(credit: T-Mobile)

T-Mobile USA's latest promotion, announced today, is an unusual one. Millions of customers will be able to become part owners of the company with a gift of one full share of T-Mobile US (TMUS) common stock.

The "Stock Up" promotion is "something no other publicly traded company has done before," T-Mobile's announcement said.

“At T-Mobile, we already wake up every day working for our customers—so I’ve decided to make it official and turn T-Mobile customers into T-Mobile owners by offering them stock," T-Mobile CEO John Legere said in his usual understated manner.

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Remote functions via Wi-Fi, but easily hacked. (credit: Mitsubishi)

According to research firm Forrester, 35 percent of Americans—few of them Ars readers, we think—want Internet connectivity in their next vehicle. The car and tech industries are busy trying to make that happen. New cars increasingly come with their own LTE modem (and monthly bill), enabling remote apps that can give you a vehicle diagnostic or unlock your doors from the comfort of your phone or smartwatch. This is usually done in the cloud with plenty of thought given to security we're told—except in cases where there's no security at all.

But Mitsubishi's Outlander hybrid does things a bit differently, as the people over at PenTestPartners recently discovered. Instead of fitting the Outlander with a cellular modem for connectivity, you access its remote functions by connecting to the car's own Wi-Fi network. No monthly data plan needed, at the cost of connectivity only within range of the vehicle. Oh, and apparently Mitsubishi did a really bad job securing things.

The outfit bought its own Outlander to investigate the car's security, finding the pre-shared key easily crackable and the default SSID too formulaic. Once connected to a vehicle, one can play with the lights or climate control—similar to the Nissan exploit. But the researchers also discovered they could lock or unlock the doors remotely, and, perhaps more seriously, they were also able to disable the car's alarm.

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Microsoft’s vision for a unified operating system meant delivering a more Windows-like experience to the Xbox One. Soon it will become even more like a Windows 10 PC, but the Xbox is also returning the favor. Windows 10 PCs will soon be a bit more Xbox-like.

Paul Thurrott has taken a look at two upcoming preview releases that Microsoft has in the pipe. The first is the Anniversary Update, which is heading not just to Windows 10 PCs this summer but also to the Xbox One.

Continue reading Xbox becoming more like a Windows PC, PCs more like an Xbox at Liliputing.

Cortana managing an Xbox party. (credit: Microsoft)

At some point today, a new wave of Xbox One preview updates will be rolled out to Xbox Ones that are registered in the preview program. This new version of the Xbox One software uses the unified OneCore Windows platform, and with that come two big new features: Cortana integration and apps for the Xbox.

Cortana-powered voice control was initially promised for last year's update, but the feature slipped. Cortana will subsume existing Xbox voice functionality, such as starting apps and navigating the interface. She'll also be used for more complex scenarios. For example, you'll be able to ask her to invite a particular friend to a party when they come online. As ever, Cortana is subject to various restrictions: she only speaks English (US and UK variants), French, Italian, German, and Spanish, so those are the only markets in which she'll work at first.

The Xbox Store has a new look. (credit: Microsoft)

With this update, the Xbox—just like Windows 10 PCs, Windows 10 phones, and even some Android devices—will be able to respond to "Hey, Cortana." We would hope that at some point Microsoft will add some kind of smarts to the system so that if it knows that I'm using the Xbox, my PC and phone should probably ignore the "Hey, Cortana" rather than having three devices spring to life and try to respond to my commands.

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Undoubtedly the lion’s share of copyright infringement lawsuits filed in the United States concern file-sharing activity, something which inevitably pits large entertainment corporations against Joe Public. David versus Goliath, it now seems, is heading to YouTube channel near you.

Late Friday, TorrentFreak received a tip linking us to a YouTube video posted on Channel Criswell. In it a visibly shaken and somewhat bewildered young man tries to keep his composure while delivering what is clearly upsetting news.

“A couple of hours ago I received a court summons in the post. The reason I’m being sued is for the Stanley Kubrick video that I uploaded in February. I don’t know what to do,” said Channel Criswell operator Lewis Bond.

“I thought all this was over and done with and we could move on and no-one would have to take any legal action. But apparently I am being sued for copyright infringement and the people that have filed this lawsuit against me are after the maximum damages, which if I’ve read it correctly can be up to $150,000. And this….this would ruin me,” he choked.

To understand the nature of this case it’s first necessary to examine Lewis’ work. Watching just a couple of minutes of the video embedded below should leave readers in no doubt that his work is documentary in nature, with masses of commentary and criticism throughout. Lewis Bond is a talented man.

Throughout the five minute video in which Bond reports his plight, the young filmmaker never refers to the people behind the lawsuit by name. However, we have ascertained that the claimants are US-based Serendip LLC and their claim has nothing to do with Kubrick himself.

In a complaint filed in a New York District Court back in March, Serendip LLC explain that they own the copyrights to music created by composer Wendy Carlos. Among other works, Carlos wrote the soundtracks for both A Clockwork Orange (1971) and The Shining (1980). The complaint involves the former.

“The three pieces of music at issue in this action were used in the soundtrack of the motion picture ‘A Clockwork Orange’, entitled ‘Title Music From A Clockwork Orange’, ‘March From A Clockwork Orange’ and ‘William Tell Overture’,” the company explains.

“Unbeknownst to, and without permission or license from, Serendip, Defendant Lewis Bond made derivative works of music and sound recording works by Wendy Carlos in the soundtrack of a video, entitled ‘Stanley Kubrick – The Cinematic Experience.’

“On or about February 20, 2016, with the purpose, inter alia, of monetizing the video for his own benefit, Defendant uploaded the video with user name Channel Criswell to YouTube.com and linked to the YouTube video on Twitter.com and Patreon.com.”

Serendip describe the video (embedded above) as a “mélange of brief snippets taken from Stanley Kubrick’s motion pictures” alongside an “aggregate of about 3 minutes of music taken from the three tracks listed in the complaint.

The publisher says that the music used by Bond represents “substantial portions” of the tracks “ranging from 18% of a piece of 7 minutes duration to 45% of a piece of 2 minutes 20 seconds duration.”

There is absolutely no mention of a fair use exception in the lawsuit filed by Serendip however there is a subtle hint that the company might believe that Bond’s commentary on Kubrick’s work not only stopped short of musical analysis, but also presented Carlos’ work out of context.

“With the exception of about 5 seconds of the ‘William Tell Overture’, the music is not synced to picture as in the soundtrack of ‘A Clockwork Orange’, but instead is used behind many unrelated snippets from various Kubrick movies and the video shorts. At no time, does the video commentary discuss the music or its context as displayed in the video,” the lawsuit reads.

According to the publisher it sent a takedown notice to YouTube back in February and the platform responded by disabling the video. In response, Bond reportedly filed a counter-notice, which YouTube passed on with a note that “Serendip must file a federal court action within 10 business days or YouTube may reinstate the video to YouTube.com.”

From this point it’s clear that Bond felt that Serendip had overstepped the mark and according to the publisher he expressed those concerns several times in public. In summary, however, Serendip feel they are absolutely entitled to sue the YouTuber, describing his actions as “willful, intentional, and purposeful, in disregard of and indifferent to Serendip’s rights.”

In addition to an injunction the publisher is also pressing for statutory damages of up to $150,000 per infringement plus attorneys fees.

Only time will tell how this case will play out, but by picking on the easiest of soft targets Serendip is unlikely to endear itself with the Internet masses. The Ludovico technique sickened Alex whenever he heard his beloved Beethoven. This lawsuit might sadly do the same for fans of the brilliant Clockwork Orange.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

She's got legs... she knows how to use them (to land on a nearby rooftop after swinging down a zipline)

The first Mirror's Edge solved a seemingly unsolvable problem in gaming: effortless first-person running and jumping. Usually, in 2D or 3D, a good third-person camera is needed to let the player see around corners, above and below ledges, past gaps, and even behind and to the side of the character in a way that allows for smooth planning of jumps and moves two or three steps ahead of time. In first person, by contrast, you often can’t see where you need to be until you’re already up in the air, getting ready to hopefully land somewhere safe.

Mirror’s Edge figured out this problem with a clever system of environmental cues that gave back some of the preternatural knowledge taken away by the perspective. Objects highlighted in bright red against the game’s stark white backgrounds showed you precisely where you should plan to jump, grab, or slide safely without having to worry about what you can’t see beyond the horizon. Combined with a set of fast, smooth parkour moves, protagonist Faith felt like an unstoppable super-powered force, cutting swiftly and precisely through dangerous environments mere mortals couldn’t tread.

Mirror’s Edge Catalyst doubles down on this “Runner’s Vision” conceit, adding a paint-like red line that darts in front of your vision to show you exactly where to wall run, ledge grab, or spring jump. Sometimes, the game goes so far as to show an outline of a person doing the precise parkour move you need to move on. It’s subtle enough to not be annoying but clear enough to stand out among the game’s gleaming, techno-utopian environments.

At its best, Catalyst’s version of Runner’s Vision gives you that same feeling of being a superpowered badass that can’t be stopped by walls, fences, or even towering changes of elevation. Following that red line quickly becomes second nature, giving a sense of effortless flow and seeming mastery that’s rare when traversing first-person environments.

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