Most BitTorrent users being monitored by copyright agencies, study finds

[Arizona Hot]

All BitTorrent pirates here that were bothered by the results of this article, reply with "Arghh!"

[attachthumb=#]

[4wd]

Go to ScanEye and click Check IP - see what it says you've torrented, (copyrighted stuff via public trackers only, AFAICT).

It picked up the one *cough* Linux ISO *cough* that I downloaded 3 months ago - imagine my horror when it turned out to be a movie 

Of course, if you use private trackers, encryption, etc then you'll understandably get not much.  If you use a VPN provider that dynamically allocates your gateway IP then you might get a list of files that others or yourself have torrented via that IP.

[Stoic Joker]

Go to ScanEye and click Check IP - see what it says you've torrented, (copyrighted stuff via public trackers only, AFAICT).

Okay, that's a bit more than just a little spooky.

[mahesh2k]

Demonoid has few uploaders who used to keep tracking link and when people used to download from these type of uploaders, they used to get notice from the ISP. I remember comment from one of the seeder with this problem. I guess it was some old off the shelf documentary which was uploaded and shared. And now demonoid operators are behind the bars.

[f0dder]

Of course, if you use private trackers, encryption, etc then you'll understandably get not much.  If you use a VPN provider that dynamically allocates your gateway IP then you might get a list of files that others or yourself have torrented via that IP.

Encryption will help against MITM snooping, but won't stop tracking you when the observers partake in the same swarm as you. Private trackers might take a little more effort to monitor (but how hard is it getting an invite to those places?), but might also be more interesting to target than the public trackers. VPN? Gotta trust the provider not to sell out their logs (and trust the ones that claim they don't keep logs) :-)

My IP is clean ^_^

[Carol Haynes]

The irony is that to track behaviour they are breaking the law!!!

[40hz]

[attach]

[f0dder]

The irony is that to track behaviour they are breaking the law!!!

Which law?

You can spy on a torrent swarm without downloading anything from it.

[kyrathaba]

My IP is squeaky-clean.

Mine as well...

[Carol Haynes]

The irony is that to track behaviour they are breaking the law!!!

Which law?

You can spy on a torrent swarm without downloading anything from it.

To be in the swarm monitoring they must be downloading illegal material too

Plus there must be some privacy issues (internationally) if they are potentially using it to personally identify people.

[40hz]

Plus there must be some privacy issues (internationally) if they are potentially using it to personally identify people.

I don't know how it works in other places, but over here you can scream about privacy until you're blue in the face if such privacy would interfere with preventing or stopping an illegal activity. On paper it might make for a compelling argument. But in a courtroom your rights to privacy get very short shrift if you're being charged with a crime. Most judges and jurors simply don't want to hear it. Especially in cases where  "invasion of privacy" is offered as your primary defense argument against the charges being brought.

It's very difficult to get evidence thrown out of court despite how easy TV 'cop shows' make it out to be.

[f0dder]

To be in the swarm monitoring they must be downloading illegal material too

Nope.

And you don't even need to grab the .torrent if you've got it's infohash. Then you can simply ask the tracker for some peer IPs... you can then contact the peers and do normal bittorrent protocol communication to see which blocks they have, use extensions to get even more peers, etc. But you don't need to ever get any actual file data.

Of course, if you want to verify the a peer has the data it says it has, you'd need to retrieve blocks and check if their hashes match, which requires the hashblocks from the .torrent file.

[Stoic Joker]

To be in the swarm monitoring they must be downloading illegal material too

Is it still illegal to DL something if you own it, or are authorized by the legal owner to ascertain its availability?

Hacking is illegal ... Unless it is being done at the request of the targeted networks owner.

[4wd]

My IP is squeaky-clean.

Mine as well...

Just in case you don't get to see an example of its other output.

[wraith808]

Mine is clean as well... 

[Renegade]

I also have a clean IP address!

I guess quite a few of us have VPN subscriptions~!

Just kidding~! (Or not? )

Maybe I only use my VPN subscription to help organize my War of 1812, 200th Anniversary Celebrations?

[40hz]

I guess quite a few of us have VPN subscriptions~!

Just kidding~! (Or not? tongue )

Actually, I do have VPN subscriptions. Plus access to a dozen more through client owned networks I do work for.

But oddly enough, I have never downloaded a movie, game, or song I didn't specifically pay to download.

I'm such a Boy Scout about some things. Pretty sad huh?

[kyrathaba]

I'm such a Boy Scout about some things. Pretty sad huh?

Not sad: admirable!