Month: November 2016

Wann bekommt mein Heimatort endlich Glasfaser? Schnell eine Antwort auf Fragen wie diese zu finden, ist oft nicht so einfach. Mit dem Projekt "Wann kommt was?" will Golem.de das ändern und wird dabei von Google unterstützt. Basis ist eine Mischung aus Maschinenlernen und Computerlinguistik. (Golem.de, Internet)

Compared to many other countries around the world, pirating movies and TV-shows is hugely popular in the Netherlands.

Up to a third of the population is estimated to download or stream copyrighted content without paying for it.

This high percentage is not surprising as the Netherlands has traditionally been a relative safe haven for pirates. Downloading movies without permission was not punishable by law until two years ago and individual uploaders were not targeted legally either.

This has now changed, with local anti-piracy group BREIN announcing the first settlement in a new torrent piracy crackdown.

Over the past months the group has used elaborate tracking software to monitor the IP-addresses of torrenting pirates. With help from ISPs, they can then obtain the identity of the account holder tied to these infringements.

This week the elaborate tracking effort resulted in the first settlement. The person in question was accused of sharing 12 episodes via BitTorrent and agreed to pay 400 euros for each, for a settlement of 4,800 euros in total.

According to BREIN director Tim Kuik, this is just the start of a broad crackdown, noting that hundreds of thousands of other uploaders are at risk.

“We intend to work our way up to larger numbers. We will not shirk from addressing hundreds or thousands or even more,” Kuik informs TorrentFreak.

The anti-piracy group remains vague on how the personal details of the uploader were obtained in this case. Previously, various residential ISPs refused to hand over information without a valid court order.

In this ‘trial’ case no court order was issued, so BREIN likely targeted a hosting provider or other intermediary which cooperated voluntarily.

“Most hosting providers disclose identity details voluntarily, it is only most of the access providers that say they require a court order,” Kuik tells us.

“In the clear and serious matter at hand, BREIN used a combination of information obtained from an intermediary voluntarily and further investigative work,” he adds.

The anti-piracy group is not willing to share the name of the intermediary which shared the personal details, but several hosting providers have proven to be rather cooperative in copyright infringement cases.

According to Dutch case law, Internet providers must cooperate when there are serious copyright infringement allegations. However, thus far this has been untested on a larger scale where thousands of IP-addresses of multi-person households are harvested.

If BREIN goes ahead with its large-scale crackdown, this issue will likely be fought out in court. Ultimately, that will determine how easy and effective the campaign will be.

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

Binatone hat die komplett kabellosen Ohrhörer Vervelife Music Edition vorgestellt. Sie ergänzen die Verveone-Headsets, bieten allerdings eine schlechtere Ausstattung. Das führt zu einem geringeren Anschaffungspreis. (Headset, Bluetooth)

Die Bundesnetzagentur weiß manchmal selbst nicht genau, welche Telekommunikationsprovider Vorratsdaten speichern müssen. Für bestimmte Anbieter gelten die Anforderungen jedoch nicht. (Vorratsdatenspeicherung, Datenschutz)

Die US-Mobilfunkprovider müssen in wenigen Jahren die Ortung von Notrufen in Gebäuden garantieren. Das US-Startup Nextnav will mit Funksignalen und Luftdrucksensoren dieses Ziel erreichen. Doch die Technik lässt sich noch für ganz andere Zwecke nutzen. (Navigationssystem, WLAN)

Elektroautos seien ein Irrweg und Wasserstofffahrzeuge besser für die Umwelt, heißt es oft. Stimmt nicht, sagen Forscher der Uni Stanford und der TU-München. (Elektroauto, GreenIT)

Ohrhörer sollen einem Patent von Apple zufolge nicht nur Musik abspielen, sondern mit Sensoren auch Körpertemperatur und Puls des Trägers sowie dessen körperliche Aktivitäten messen. Auch eine einfache Gestenerkennung soll möglich sein. (Kopfhörer, Sound-Hardware)

Ein Software-Update für das Tesla Model S soll das Fahrzeug innerhalb von 2,4 Sekunden auf knapp 100 km/h beschleunigen. Die Option wird jedoch versteckt. (Elektroauto, GreenIT)

Auf der SC16-Messe haben AMD und Intel mehrere Ankündigungen für High Performance Computing gemacht: Die ROCm-Plattform (Radeon Open Compute) unterstützt nun Polaris-Grafikkarten, und Intel aktualisiert die Broadwell-EP-Chips. (Supercomputer, Prozessor)

It may be less than a year old, and many people still don't even have a TV capable of getting the best out of the format, but over a million Ultra HD Blu-ray movie discs have already been sold in the U.S.

While not all studios have embraced the 4K disc format, notably Disney, and while Sony's updated PS4 Pro failed to include the ability to play these discs, over 80,000 standalone disc players have already been sold. Microsoft's Xbox One S console, which retails for $299, also includes full Ultra HD Blu-ray playback.

This makes Ultra HD Blu-ray sales better than standard Blu-ray's at the same time in its life cycle, although it's worth noting that Blu-ray, at that time, was up against competing disc format HD DVD.

Pricing wise, Ultra HD Blu-ray's initial price may be even lower than Blu-ray's at launch, but with $25 million in revenue coming from the 1 million discs sold, it's easy to work out the average price of discs (for the maths challenged, that's $25 per disc package).

For viewing hardware, shipment of Ultra HD TVs is expected to be up 80% this year, with penetration expected to reach 16% of all US households. The lower than expected entry price point for Ultra HD TVs may be responsible for the fast uptake.

According to industry sources who spoke to The Digital Bits, Disney is expected to start releasing titles on Ultra HD Blu-ray market next year. This could mean extremely popular titles, such as The Avengers series and Star Wars: The Force Awakens, all finding a new home on UHD Blu-ray.

[via The Digital Bits]