Indian High Court Orders ISPs to Block 1,129 Sites to Protect One Movie From Piracy

The High Court of Madras has handed down an injunction ordering dozens of ISPs to block 1,129 sites to protect a single movie that goes on worldwide release today. ‘Nerkonda Paarvai’ is marketed as a legal drama, which is perhaps fitting considering that the order handed down describes the respondents – the ISPs – as being involved in recording, camcording, and distributing content displayed in theaters.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and more. We also have VPN reviews, discounts, offers and coupons.

Blocking orders to prevent the distribution of copyright content are commonplace in several regions around the world.

In India, however, blocking injunctions are regularly handed down to protect specific movies, oftentimes before those movies are even released.

That is also the case with the movie ‘Nerkonda Paarvai’, a legal drama set to hit big screens worldwide today. In anticipation of this release, copyright holder Bayview LLP headed off to the Madras High Court, seeking a pre-emptive injunction to prevent the movie from being spread to the public for free via the Internet and other means.

The High Court hasn’t published the full details of the application, meaning that the list of sites set to be targeted hasn’t yet been revealed in public. It almost certainly contains one, if not many domains, operated by the notorious torrent site Tamilrockers, but the rest remain open to speculation.

What we do know is that a total of 39 Internet service providers were named as defendants in the order handed down this week by Justice Krishnan Ramasamy in the Madras High Court. The Judge acknowledges that the Bayview LLP production has been the subject of significant investment and is set to be released on more than 2,000 screens worldwide.

While it’s not uncommon to list ISPs as defendants in such cases, often noting that they play an unwitting role in the distribution of infringing content, the wording in the Judge’s order, which cites the plaintiff’s case, seems to go considerably further. Whether that’s entirely intentional is open to question.

“The learned counsel for applicant contended that the various cable and internet services provided by various persons (respondents 1–9) across the world are involved in activities of recording, cam-cording and reproducing the audio songs, audio-visual clips, audio-visual songs and full cinematographic films that are screened in theatres and then copying/reproducing them through various medium including but not limited to CDs, DVDs, VCDs, Blu-ray Discs, computer hard drives, pen drives etc.,and distribute the same for selling at a meager sum to the general public without any leave or authorization of the production houses/copyright holders/right holders such as the applicant herein,” the order reads.

Citing the above and referencing the application, the Judge said that in his opinion a prima facie case had been made for him to award a preliminary injunction which will continue until August 20, 2019.

The order, obtained by TorrentFreak, is available here (pdf). The full list of ISPs is detailed below.

1) BHARAT SANCHAR NIGAM LIMITED
2) Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd.
3) Bharati Airtel Ltd.
4) Vodafone Idea Ltd. (Formerly Idea Cellular Ltd.)
5) Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd.
6) Atria Convergence Technologies Pvt. Ltd.
7) Hathway Cable and Datacom Ltd.
8) Tata Docomo
9) Asianet Satellite Communications
10) Tikona Digital Networks Pvt. Ltd.
11) You Broadband And Cable India Ltd.
12) Reliance Communications Infrastructure Ltd.
13) Rail Tel Corporation of India Ltd.
14) Shyam Spectra Pvt. Ltd.
15) Sify Technologies Ltd.
16) AT And T Global Network Service India Pvt. Ltd.
17) Peak Air Pvt. Ltd.
18) Knet Solutions Pvt. Ltd. (Cherrinet)
19) Limras Eronet Broadband Services Pvt. Ltd.
20) SITI Networks Limited
21) Andhra Pradesh State Fibre Net Ltd.,
22) Raaj Internet (I) Pvt. Ltd.
23) Joister Infoserve Pvt. Ltd.
24) GTPL Hathway Ltd.
25) Ready Link Internet Service Ltd.
26) Nettlinx Limited
27) Excitel Broadband Pvt. Ltd.
28) Southern Online Bio Technologies Ltd.
29) Dawn Supports Pvt. Ltd.
30) Thalainagar Digital Cables (P) Ltd.
31) Cable Cast New Media Pvt. Ltd.
32) C32 Cable Net Pvt. Ltd.
33) Team 5 Network
34) SND Satellite Vision
35) Kerala Communicators Cable Ltd.
36) Asianet Digital Network Pvt. Ltd.
37) DEN Networks Ltd.
38) Starvision Cable TV Network
39) Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI)

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and more. We also have VPN reviews, discounts, offers and coupons.

Studie: Uber und Lyft verschlechtern den Stadtverkehr

Die Ridesharing-Dienste wie Uber und Lyft werden gelegentlich als eine Lösung für den Verkehrsinfarkt der Städte bezeichnet. Das Gegenteil ist der Fall, wie eine US-Studie zeigt, die von den Unternehmen selbst unterstützt wurde. (Verkehr, Studie)

Die Ridesharing-Dienste wie Uber und Lyft werden gelegentlich als eine Lösung für den Verkehrsinfarkt der Städte bezeichnet. Das Gegenteil ist der Fall, wie eine US-Studie zeigt, die von den Unternehmen selbst unterstützt wurde. (Verkehr, Studie)

Noise Cancelling Headphones 700 im Test: Boses bester ANC-Kopfhörer sticht Sony vielfach aus

Bose schafft mit seinen neuen Noise Cancelling Headphones 700 eine fast so gute Geräuschreduzierung wie Sony und ist in manchen Punkten sogar besser. Die Kopfhörer haben uns beim Testen aber auch mal genervt. Ein Test von Ingo Pakalski (Bose, Test)

Bose schafft mit seinen neuen Noise Cancelling Headphones 700 eine fast so gute Geräuschreduzierung wie Sony und ist in manchen Punkten sogar besser. Die Kopfhörer haben uns beim Testen aber auch mal genervt. Ein Test von Ingo Pakalski (Bose, Test)

Studie: Apple Watch könnte Demenz erkennen

Apple und der Pharmakonzern Eli Lilly untersuchen, ob die Apple Watche frühe Anzeichen von Demenz erkennen könnte. Dann könnte die Smartwatch nicht nur EKGs anfertigen und den Puls messen, sondern weitere medizinische Tests vornehmen. (Smartwatch, Appl…

Apple und der Pharmakonzern Eli Lilly untersuchen, ob die Apple Watche frühe Anzeichen von Demenz erkennen könnte. Dann könnte die Smartwatch nicht nur EKGs anfertigen und den Puls messen, sondern weitere medizinische Tests vornehmen. (Smartwatch, Apple)

Skype und Cortana: Bei Microsoft hören Menschen bei Telefonsex mit

Microsoft lässt Sprachbefehle für seinen digitalen Assistenten Cortana von Menschen auswerten. Auch Skype-Telefonate werden von Menschen analysiert – dabei können diese sogar Telefonsex lauschen. (Cortana, Google)

Microsoft lässt Sprachbefehle für seinen digitalen Assistenten Cortana von Menschen auswerten. Auch Skype-Telefonate werden von Menschen analysiert - dabei können diese sogar Telefonsex lauschen. (Cortana, Google)

$13,000 NES cartridge found at the bottom of a Safeway sack

Seattle shop brokers surprise sale: “We could’ve gotten that for, like, 20 bucks.”

SEATTLE—In the decades since 1991's Nintendo World Championship tournament, its unique prize for participants—a competition-class cartridge with timed versions of classic games Super Mario Bros., Rad Racer, and Tetris—has become a sought-after collector's item. It's among the few "holy grail" games for high-end NES collectors, with an apparent grand total of less than 200 in the world. It represents a golden era when Nintendo could host a tournament that captivated a nation (and followed the two-hour commercial of a film that was The Wizard).

Hence, the discovery of any Nintendo World Championship cartridge is a newsworthy event for a certain class of retro-gaming enthusiast. But this week's discovery of a new copy, brokered by Seattle retro-gaming shop Pink Gorilla Games, might be the weirdest one yet.

"You wouldn't believe this," Pink Gorilla co-owner Cody Spencer told Ars Technica in his shop's storage room on Wednesday, after a whirlwind 24 hours concluded with the game's sale to a collector. "It's like anybody's dream come true, when they hear about rare and valuable video games."

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Disney Surprised By Fox Studio Operating Loss

Disney boss Bob Iger has expressed his surprise at how recently acquired Fox Studios has underperformed in the latest set of fiscal results.Fox posted a whopping $170 million operating loss, totally opposite to the $180 million in operating p…



Disney boss Bob Iger has expressed his surprise at how recently acquired Fox Studios has underperformed in the latest set of fiscal results.

Fox posted a whopping $170 million operating loss, totally opposite to the $180 million in operating profit that was projected.

The surprising turnaround can be blamed on the X-Men movie Dark Phoenix, which underperformed at the box office. The film had a $200 million production budget but only earned $65.8 million domestically. Even with an international box office of $252 million, the movie is still considered a box office flop, given the usual calculation of a film's total budget as twice that of the production budget. 

Iger stated his disappointment with the results in a fiscal call with investors.

"One of the biggest issues we faced in the quarter was the performance of the Fox film business," Iger said. "It was well below what it had been and well below what we thought it would be when we did the acquisition."

Iger was still positive about the future of the studio though and stated his high hopes for the upcoming Le Mans '66 film Ford v Ferrari.

Disney can also afford to own an underperforming Fox given the studio's strong performances elsewhere, already having generated a record $8 billion in box office takings in 2019 alone.

[via Media Play News]

Samsung’s new Galaxy Book S laptop is built around Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8cx

The always-connected LTE laptop is a cousin to Samsung’s Galaxy Book.

Samsung unveiled a new laptop today. Driven by Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8cx ARM processor, the Galaxy Book S is a Windows 10 laptop that promises to be as portable and long-lasting as mobile devices. The company claims the device will get up to 23 hours of battery life and that it will connect to gigabit LTE wireless networks on the go.

Like other ARM laptops, the promise is that the S will be "always on" and "always connected," with a touch-to-wake, instant-on feature. The laptop weighs just 0.96kg and comes with a 13.3-inch, multi-touch display (10 points), so portability is a key part of the value proposition here.

Samsung announced the product during its Unpacked event for the Galaxy Note 10 and spent a fair bit of time talking up the performance of Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8cx. It's a 7nm system-on-a-chip that is capable of 40% faster CPU and 80% faster GPU performance than what users saw in the previously released Galaxy Book 2, according to Samsung. Like tablets and other mobile devices, the laptop is fanless and meant to run quiet.

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Intel Quartz Canyon NUC will support Xeon chips, discrete graphics

Intel’s NUC line of compact computers have included “gaming” models with discrete-class graphics baked in. But the upcoming “Quartz Canyon” model will be the first of Intel’s mini PCs with a slot that lets you add yo…

Intel’s NUC line of compact computers have included “gaming” models with discrete-class graphics baked in. But the upcoming “Quartz Canyon” model will be the first of Intel’s mini PCs with a slot that lets you add your own graphics card. But it’s not really aimed at gamers — the Intel Quartz Canyon NUC is basically […]

The post Intel Quartz Canyon NUC will support Xeon chips, discrete graphics appeared first on Liliputing.

Severe local 0-Day escalation exploit found in Steam Client Services

This trivially-exploited security allows any user root—er, LOCALSYSTEM—privileges.

Manipulated image shows cockroaches on shattered logo for streaming site Steam.

Enlarge / Breaking bugs are as described—a security flaw in Steam's client service allows easy execution of arbitrary code as LOCALSYSTEM. (credit: Aurich Lawson / Getty Images)

Earlier today, disgruntled security researcher Vasily Kravets released a zero-day vulnerability in the Windows version of the ubiquitous gaming service Steam. The vulnerability allows any user to run arbitrary code with LOCALSYSTEM privileges using just a very few simple commands.

The vulnerability lies within Steam Client Service. The service may be started or stopped by unprivileged users. This becomes a problem because, when run,Steam Client Service automatically sets permissions on a range of registry keys. If a mischievous—or outright malicious—user were to symlink one of these keys to that belonging to another service, it becomes possible for arbitrary users to start or stop that service as well. This becomes even more problematic when you realize that it's possible to pass arguments to services that run under extremely privileged accounts—such as msiserver, the Windows Installer service.

Following a <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Steam/comments/cn3303/steam_windows_client_local_privilege_escalation/ew6z042/">demonstration</a> I saw from Redditor /u/R_Sholes today, I used an unprivileged user account to write a file to C:\Windows\System32 as LOCALSYSTEM. That's game over, for those of you playing along from home.

Following a demonstration I saw from Redditor /u/R_Sholes today, I used an unprivileged user account to write a file to C:\Windows\System32 as LOCALSYSTEM. That's game over, for those of you playing along from home. (credit: Jim Salter)

The image walkthrough above follows a few simple steps:

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