Month: November 2016

Der Bundesrat will schärfer gegen die Betreiber von Botnetzen vorgehen. Doch die Pläne der Länder gehen der Bundesregierung zu weit. (Security, Malware)

Apple hat sowohl bei den Adaptern für die Schnittstelle USB-Typ-C als auch bei den Thunderbolt-3-Displays massive Preissenkungen angekündigt. Die LG-Displays werden um 25 Prozent günstiger und auch beim Zubehör lässt sich viel Geld sparen, allerdings nur zeitweilig. (Apple, Display)

Many countries around the EU have taken a hostile stance towards those sharing content without permission. However, evidence suggests that the further east a pirate operates, the less likely he is to get in trouble.

As a result, pirates have free reign in a number of countries but as of this week, Croatia can be crossed off that list. Authorities there have just arrested their very first Internet pirate and it’s all over local media.

According to reports, police swooped on a 31-year-old resident of Rijeka, Croatia’s principal seaport and its third-largest city. Matej Kalanj was arrested following claims he’d been operating pirate site Filmovita since 2014.

While Filmovita may not be a huge player on the world stage, the site is extremely popular locally and is currently Croatia’s 47th most popular overall. The site’s Facebook page has more than 165,000 members.

Local authorities claim that Kalanj published more than 1,250 movies with subtitles online. Via his site and promotion via Facebook, he earned around $89,000 in ad revenue, mainly from foreign companies.

Overall it’s claimed that the 31-year-old caused damages of more than $592,000 to local rights holders, although no evidence to back that up has been released. Vlaho Hrdalo, a lawyer from Zagreb, informs TF that despite the large numbers involved, a prosecution may not be straightforward.

“Croatia has a very special formulation in its Criminal Code which regulates that the prerequisite of an existence of a piracy-related felony is that there was excessive damage to the copyright holders,” Hrdalo explains.

“However, the prosecution will have problems proving that since they are claiming damage was done to local distributors. Furthermore, the site was not on a Croatian domain (.hr) but an international one (.com), which is why they will have to go to extreme lengths to prove it.”

In addition to the infringement charges, Kalanj is also accused of unlawfully accessing the Internet via a modem operated by a third person, believed to be a neighbor with insecure WiFi. Hrdalo says that this too could be on shaky ground.

“The site operator supposedly used his neighbor’s internet connection so that his IP address wouldn’t show up. Even if that is so, this doesn’t fall within the scope of Article 266 [Croatian Criminal Code] which says that a felony exists if someone gains unauthorized access to a ‘computer system or computer data’. Using other people’s WiFi does not represent the use of a ‘computer system or computer data’ and connecting to other people’s routers is certainly not a felony,” he explains.

Also under investigation is a woman in her late twenties, believed to be Kalanj’s wife. She stands accused by the District Attorney of money laundering offenses. It’s alleged that together with Kalanj, the woman tried to hide the source of the site’s advertising revenue by shifting money between bank accounts.

Perhaps surprisingly given Croatia’s previous lack of interest in prosecuting pirates, authorities have chosen to detain Kalanj in advance of his trial.

The detention was ordered to stop potential witnesses being influenced and further infringement, a move that has prompted local media to compare Kalanj with alleged KickassTorrents founder, Artem Vaulin. The woman, on the other hand, has been released.

For reasons that have not been made public, the arrest of the Filmovita’s alleged operator hasn’t affected the site itself. Despite being targeted by Croatia’s hi-tech crime unit, it remains operational through its usual URL.

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

Wir haben diese Woche zwei Dinge gelernt: Traue nie einem Browser-Addon und höre nie auf, an das Unerwartete zu glauben! Sieben Tage und viele Meldungen im Überblick. (Golem-Wochenrückblick, Glasfaser)

The U.S. Copyright Office has applied new DMCA exemptions to allow security researchers to find flaws in car computers, medical devices and smart home appliances.

Under DMCA, circumvention of DRM is strictly prohibited, where circumvention is defined as "descramble a scrambled work, to decrypt an encrypted work, or otherwise to avoid, bypass, remove, deactivate, or impair a technological measure, without the authority of the copyright owner".

Originally introduced to help Hollywood prevent people from ripping DVDs, the scope of this controversial provision of the DMCA didn't limit itself to home movie pirates, but instead, has been used (and some say abused) to prevent genuine security research.

For example, security researchers, sometimes referred to as "white hat hackers" may need to attempt to circumvent existing digital security measures in order to locate flaws before hackers of the black hat variety find the same flaws and take advantage of it for their own nefarious use. Device manufacturers, wanting to avoid public embarrassment about flawed security measures (some of which may lead to recalls), also abuse the circumvention provision to prevent researchers from doing their job. Many researchers are now afraid to tackle certain subjects, or to publicly present their findings, for fear of DMCA led copyright lawsuits.

This chilling effect may have contributed to an epidemic of hacking and malware attacks on devices ranging from smart light bulbs to security cameras, especially now with more and more devices now having public facing Internet connectability.

As a result, digital rights groups, and even the FTC, have stepped in to ask the U.S. Copyright Office to grant more exemptions to allow security researchers to do their work without fear of reprisals, and this week, the Copyright Office granted these exemptions.

The exemption now permits the circumvention of security measures as long as it is done in "good faith".

The FTC was delighted with the decision, saying the new exemptions are "a big win for security researchers and for consumers who will benefit from increased security testing of the products they use." 

The EFF also welcomed the new exemptions, saying the changes "will promote security, innovation, and competition – and also help the next generation of engineers continue to learn by taking their devices apart to see how they work."

The exemptions will be available for a two-year period, after which they will be reviewed for possible extension.

[via PCMag, DarkReading, IPWatchdog]

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As one of the largest online file-sharing services, 4shared is closely watched by copyright holders whose work is made available on the site.

The site itself has a DMCA takedown procedure in place so rightholders can remove files directly, but Google also receives its fair share of takedown notices for the site.

Over the past several years the search engine has received a mind-boggling 50 million takedown requests for 4shared URLs. Most of these, 35 million, were submitted during the past year alone.

The popular file-hosting site tops Google’s list of most reported domain names at the moment, way out in front of rapidgator.net and uploaded.net, which are in second and third place respectively.

Over 50 million takedown requests

While it may look like 4shared is the piracy kingpin of the Internet, over the years the service has taken various measures to decrease infringing activity.

For example, the site uses advanced fingerprinting technology to scan for pirated music files based on a unique audio watermark. When infringing files are found they are removed from public view.

Interestingly, leading music industry groups RIAA and IFPI haven’t shown much interest in this tool thus far.

“We tried communicating with RIAA and IFPI, especially because of their possible participation in our music identification system,” 4shared’s Mike Wilson previously told TorrentFreak.

“We did not receive any assistance, so we started with music ID by ourselves and in just one year it helped to reduce the number of copyright complaints by 16 times, while the volume of stored information is actually still growing.”

Instead of working with 4shared directly the music industry group are taking their complaints to Google, resulting in the 50 million milestone this week.

On top of that, the RIAA also reported 4shared to the U.S. Government, listing it as one of the prime pirate sites on the Internet, and scolding the fingerprinting system they apparently aren’t using themselves.

“4shared remains one of the most popular cyberlocker sites in the world. It is also the source of a staggering volume of infringing files,” RIAA wrote adding: “Clearly their audio fingerprinting is at the very least ineffective.”

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

Acer’s 13 inch Swift 7 laptop is super-slim, super-lightweight, and super-quiet, thanks to a fanless design. It’s a stylish laptop with one of the best keyboards of any Acer laptop I’ve tested, and it also features a wide, comfortable touchpad below the keys.

There must be a catch, right? Well, there is… kind of.

The Acer Swift 7 is a premium laptop that sells for about $1050, which makes it fairly expensive for a Windows laptop.

Continue reading Acer Swift 7 ultraportable notebook review at Liliputing.

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The Asus Transformer line of 2-in-1 tablets have been offering a hybrid Windows tablet/notebook experience for years. But up until recently most Transformer tablets have been relatively low-cost devices.

Earlier this year Asus introduced several new models, including an entry-level 10.1 inch model called the Transformer Mini… but also including a premium 12.6 inch device called the Transformer 3 Pro.

Now the Transformer 3 Pro is available for purchase in the US.

Continue reading Asus Transformer 3 Pro tablet now available for $1500 (Core i7, 16GB RAM, pen input, keyboard cover) at Liliputing.