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Nubia is expanding its Red Magic 6 line of gaming phones with a new model that’s a little smaller and a little cheaper, but still a high-performance phone that offers a lot of bang for the buck. The new Red Magic 6R is launching first in China, …
Nubia is expanding its Red Magic 6 line of gaming phones with a new model that’s a little smaller and a little cheaper, but still a high-performance phone that offers a lot of bang for the buck. The new Red Magic 6R is launching first in China, where it sells for ￥2,999 ($470) and up, but the […]
The post Red Magic 6R is a gaming phone with a 144 Hz AMOLED display and Snapdragon 888 appeared first on Liliputing.
Put down your pitchforks—it looks like the DMCA warning was bogus.
u/NateNate60 received this (heavily redacted) DMCA infringement warning. We don't have email headers, so we can't 100% verify it actually came from Comcast. [credit: u/NateNate60 ]
This week, Redditor u/NateNate60 got a nasty surprise in his inbox—a DMCA infringement warning from his ISP, Comcast Xfinity. The notice warned him that Comcast had "received a notification by a copyright owner, or its authorized agent, reporting an alleged infringement of one or more copyrighted works."
The strange thing about this warning was the "infringed work" in question: Ubuntu 20.04, which is free to redistribute by any means desired. Adding insult to injury, the hash listed on the notice is the same one associated with Canonical's own torrent for Ubuntu 20.04.2—u/NateNate60 was getting dinged for torrenting an unmodified copy of an open source operating system.
Typically, DMCA infringement warnings are sent as a result of an ISP customer using BitTorrent to acquire media or software illicitly. While the customer is attached to the swarm, their public IP address is advertised—this allows other members of the swarm to request pieces of the files being torrented from that user.
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Put down your pitchforks—it looks like the DMCA warning was bogus.
u/NateNate60 received this (heavily redacted) DMCA infringement warning. We don't have email headers, so we can't 100% verify it actually came from Comcast. [credit: u/NateNate60 ]
This week, Redditor u/NateNate60 got a nasty surprise in his inbox—a DMCA infringement warning from his ISP, Comcast Xfinity. The notice warned him that Comcast had "received a notification by a copyright owner, or its authorized agent, reporting an alleged infringement of one or more copyrighted works."
The strange thing about this warning was the "infringed work" in question: Ubuntu 20.04, which is free to redistribute by any means desired. Adding insult to injury, the hash listed on the notice is the same one associated with Canonical's own torrent for Ubuntu 20.04.2—u/NateNate60 was getting dinged for torrenting an unmodified copy of an open source operating system.
Typically, DMCA infringement warnings are sent as a result of an ISP customer using BitTorrent to acquire media or software illicitly. While the customer is attached to the swarm, their public IP address is advertised—this allows other members of the swarm to request pieces of the files being torrented from that user.
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An anti-piracy company cited as the sender of a DMCA notice targeting an entirely legal copy of Ubuntu says that its notice sending system was spoofed. The notice was reportedly sent via Comcast to warn a Reddit user that he’d breached copyright law but the explanation from OpSec Security only raises even more questions as to how something like this could possibly happen.
From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.
Yesterday we reported that Reddit user NateNate60 had received a DMCA notice, apparently from Comcast, declaring that he’d breached copyright law by downloading and sharing a legal copy of Ubuntu.
“We have received a notification by a copyright owner, or its authorized agent, reporting an alleged infringement of one or more copyrighted works made on or over your Xfinity Internet service,” the posted notice reads.
“The copyright owner has identified the IP address associated with your Xfinity Internet account at the time as the source of the infringing works,” it continues, adding that NateNate60 should search all of his devices connected to his network and delete the files mentioned in the complaint.
According to the Xfinity notice, the sender was OpSec Security so to find out more we contacted the anti-piracy company for an explanation. That came in late last night and while it provides some answers, it also raises even more questions.
In a response from OpSec Marketing Communications Manager Amanda Hershey, the company explained that the notice was malicious and was sent to damage its reputation.
“OpSec Security’s DCMA [sic] notice sending program was spoofed on Wednesday, May 26, 2021 by unknown parties across multiple streaming platforms,” Hershey explains.
“The content in question all appears to be Ubuntu Linux ISO. We have incontrovertible evidence that proves these DMCA notices were not perpetrated by or originated with OpSec Security.”
Why OpSec references “multiple streaming platforms” is unclear. People do not ‘stream’ Ubuntu packages, they download them – in this case via torrents distributed by Ubuntu’s own tracker. And while OpSec says it has “incontrovertible evidence” that shows the DMCA notices were not sent by the company, it is yet to reveal details in public.
“OpSec’s enforcement efforts are occasionally spoofed by a third party in an attempt to damage OpSec’s reputation. These attempts are easily identifiable, and easily disproven,” the company explains.
While the security company says that third parties are “spoofing” its system, it does not explain how that was possible. And, at least in this case, the bad DMCA notice was apparently not “easily identifiable”, since it clearly managed to cause confusion. So how did this happen?
In our initial report we noted that it’s not impossible for someone to fake a DMCA notice. In this case, however, it is difficult to dovetail events on the ground and the statement from OpSec because a certain amount of more difficult-to-acquire information would be needed to be this targeted.
Firstly, NateNate60 says he did download the content in question after obtaining a torrent directly from Ubuntu’s own tracker. That would, of course, expose his IP address both to the tracker and everyone else sharing the content. However, in order to send the DMCA notice via email (whether that was from Comcast or a spoofed email address purporting to be Comcast), anyone obtaining NateNate60’s IP address would necessarily need his email address too.
This raises the question of how that email address was obtained. OpSec Security wouldn’t ordinarily have it, neither would the alleged malicious party, but Comcast clearly would. That’s how DMCA notices sent to ISPs work. The sender doesn’t know the contact details of the alleged infringer so they ask someone who does to forward the notice, in this case, Comcast.
So, if we take OpSec’s statement at face value, at least in theory a third-party could’ve tricked Comcast into sending the notice after “spoofing” OpSec’s “notice sending program”. This raises more questions.
If these allegedly malicious efforts to undermine OpSec’s reputation are “easily identifiable, and easily disproven”, how was Comcast not put on alert? And if this has happened before as the company claims, why hasn’t the loophole been closed?
In any case, the allegedly malicious third-party would also need to know how to contact Comcast in a convincing manner, in order to masquerade as OpSec. It’s not easy to determine how that could be achieved without knowing how OpSec usually communicates with Comcast. This could be explained if OpSec’s system had been hacked or illegally accessed in some way, but the company does not use that terminology, instead going with the term “spoofed”, i.e imitated, not compromised.
Furthermore, even if we adopt the scenario that Comcast didn’t send the email and it was a spoofed fake, how did the sender a) discover NateNate60’s IP address, b) the exact time he downloaded the torrent, and c) manage to match that IP address to his email address? It sounds like a lot of effort simply to tarnish OpSec’s name, especially since there was no guarantee that NateNate60 would ever publish the notice online.
While OpSec’s statement is helpful to an extent, it clearly raises even more questions. We have put these questions to the security company and will publish an update when it responds. In the meantime, OpSec says the matter is now being escalated.
“We are notifying the appropriate authorities about this incident,” OpSec says.
Ubuntu owner Canonical says it has launched its own investigation.
Thanks for reaching out! Our legal team is aware of this and is investigating, and we will keep people updated.
— Ubuntu (@ubuntu) May 26, 2021
From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.
Google does not yet know the cost of the 10- to 30-year construction project.
Google's rendering of "The Meander," which will be "a central social gathering place with shops and local food." I assume there are office buildings in there somewhere.
Google has gotten approval to build a "multi-billion dollar megacampus" in San Jose, California, just 10 miles away from the other giant campus the company is building in Mountain View. CNBC reports that city officials approved Google's "Downtown West" project on Tuesday night.
Google's sales pitch describes the development as a "mixed-use urban destination" built around the Diridon Station transit hub. When the project is completed, Google will own an 80-acre chunk of land that will have 7.3 million square feet of office space, 4,000 housing units, 15 acres of "parks, plazas, and green space," and 500,000 square feet dedicated to "retail, cultural, arts, education, hotels and more." One thousand of the 4,000 houses will be designated as "affordable" housing. Google’s San Jose development director, Alexa Aren, described the project as “much less the corporate campus” and more like “a resilient neighborhood.” It sounds like it's essentially going to be a Google Town that employees can live and work in.
The campus has been in the works for four years. Google came up against opposition from Santa Clara County, which was concerned about building heights, and from NHL team the San Jose Sharks, whose SAP Center is about to be engulfed in Google's construction project. The Sharks were concerned about parking, but Google and the team worked out a deal just before the campus was approved. Santa Clara was overruled by the city council's unanimous vote. Concern about building heights is pretty much the cause of all the housing problems in Silicon Valley. As the world's biggest tech hub, the area could support giant skyscrapers, but local politics prevent them from being built. San Jose is the most populous city in the US with no buildings of 300 feet (91 m) or higher. The tallest building is only 22 floors.
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With a list price of $900, the Asus ZenBook 13 UM325 is already one of the most affordable laptops available with an OLED display. But B&H is currently selling the laptop for $54 off, which makes it an even better deal. Here are some of the day…
With a list price of $900, the Asus ZenBook 13 UM325 is already one of the most affordable laptops available with an OLED display. But B&H is currently selling the laptop for $54 off, which makes it an even better deal. Here are some of the day’s best deals. Windows PCs Asus ZenBook 13 UM325 […]
The post Daily Deals (5-27-2021) appeared first on Liliputing.
Bislang verdienen Plattformen auch mit Desinformationskampagnen Geld. Das soll nach dem Willen der EU-Kommission aufhören. (Fake-News, Google)
Die Kurve geht weiter steil nach oben: Nvidia konnte Umsatz und Gewinn drastisch steigern, was primär an der Gaming-/Mining-Sparte liegt. (Nvidia, Wirtschaft)
Die Kurve geht weiter steil nach oben: Nvidia konnte Umsatz und Gewinn drastisch steigern, was primär an der Gaming-/Mining-Sparte liegt. (Nvidia, Wirtschaft) Two shareholder votes and one court ruling hint at a sea change for oil and gas.
What comes up might go back down. (credit: Pete Markham)
Yesterday was a bad day to be an oil company.
First, a court in the Netherlands ruled that Royal Dutch Shell needs to slash its emissions more than it had planned in order to meet Paris Agreement targets. The court ordered the oil supermajor to cut carbon pollution by 45 percent by the end of the decade.
Next, shareholders of ExxonMobil elected at least two board candidates—and possibly a third—put forth by activist investors who want the company to rein in its sprawling oil and gas operations and invest more in clean energy.
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We are seeking reporters of a most intelligent nature!
Enlarge (credit: Aurich Lawson | Getty Images)
We're excited to announce that Ars is hiring! We need a pair of brilliant reporters, one to cover Consumer Technology and the other to report on Innovation. Both are senior roles requiring experience, demonstrated skills, and maybe a battle scar or two. Also, you must be eligible to work in the United States, and you must be comfortable working from home, as these are remote positions.
To apply, please use the links below. All applications must go through the Condé Nast Careers website, but feel free to email us at jobs@arstechnica.com if you have specific questions.
The role will work with the Ars Technica team to produce daily content, including informed news and analysis, in the consumer technology field. We’re looking for a subject matter expert in one or more of the following areas:
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Bislang verdienen Plattformen auch mit Desinformationskampagnen Geld. Das soll nach dem Willen der EU-Kommission aufhören. (
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