Piracy police arrest Nottingham man, 20

[Bald Bouncer]

A man who allegedly ran a service that provided roundabout access to pirated films and music files has been arrested by City of London Police.

The 20-year-old from Nottingham is believed to have been running a proxy server that connected to addresses banned by service providers in the UK.

Several popular proxy sites have been taken down in the past few days, but no connection has been made to the arrest.

The police have placed warning notices on the sites concerned.

The operation was carried out by the Intellectual Property Crime Unit (Pipcu), and supported by the UK's Federation Against Copyright Theft (Fact).

Pipcu announced last week it had started placing banner advertisements on websites believed to be offering pirated content illegally.

The messages, which appear instead of paid-for ads, ask users to close their web browsers.

The film and music industries have consistently pushed for court orders to ban access to piracy sites in the UK, and many popular torrent sites are now blocked by the major UK internet service providers (ISPs).



Several popular piracy sites now feature a warning from the police

However, the sites continue to operate outside the UK, and surfers often find ways to circumvent the ISPs' restrictions, using proxy servers or other identity-disguising services.

The sites taken down by City of London Police do not offer pirated content themselves, but rather offer tools that allow users to connect to illegal services such as the Pirate Bay and similar torrent sites.

"Internet users have sought ways to continue to access the sites by getting round the blocking put in place by the ISPs," said Kieron Sharp, director general of Fact.

"This operation is a major step in tackling those providing such services."​​

Det Ch Insp Andy Fyfe, head of Pipcu, said the operation highlights how it is "working in partnership with the creative and advertising industries" on targeting "every aspect of how copyrighting material is illegally being made available to internet users".

He added: "We will come down hard on people believed to be committing or deliberately facilitating such offences."

The man was questioned at a local police station before being released on bail.

Source: BBC

[tronads]

It will be interesting to see what the guy gets charged with. I don't believe there is any such crime as running a proxy server, which it seems is all this poor guy is doing.

[Bald Bouncer]

It will be interesting to see what the guy gets charged with. I don't believe there is any such crime as running a proxy server, which it seems is all this poor guy is doing.

Was also my thoughts on it, as far as I am aware there is a civil action requiring ISP's to block certain sites so am a bit lost as to the criminal offence angle, I have no doubt they will have turned his place upside down and found something they can charge him with anyway.

Reading it again I suspect they will go with conspiracy to defraud and or facilitating a criminal action.

[evilsatan]

This sounds pretty ridiculous, hopefully common sense will prevail but the way the system is rigged I won't be counting on it.

[tronads]

Also interesting that the police are placing ad's on there....surely they are then actually funding the criminal activity, ie helping to facilitate.
I wonder also why they don't seem to have named the chap....maybe they already know there will be no charges following this arrest.

[Bald Bouncer]

Also interesting that the police are placing ad's on there....surely they are then actually funding the criminal activity, ie helping to facilitate.
I wonder also why they don't seem to have named the chap....maybe they already know there will be no charges following this arrest.

Relates to this story - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-28523738



The City of London police has started placing banner advertisements on websites believed to be offering pirated content illegally.

The messages, which will appear instead of paid-for ads, will ask users to close their web browsers.

The move comes as part of a continuing effort to stop piracy sites from earning money through advertising.

Police said the ads would make it harder for piracy site owners to make their pages look authentic.

"When adverts from well known brands appear on illegal websites, they lend them a look of legitimacy and inadvertently fool consumers into thinking the site is authentic," said Detective Chief Inspector Andy Fyfe from the City of London Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit (Pipcu).

"This new initiative is another step forward for the unit in tackling IP crime and disrupting criminal profits.

"Copyright infringing websites are making huge sums of money though advert placement, therefore disrupting advertising on these sites is crucial and this is why it is an integral part of Operation Creative."

Sunblock
The initiative will make use of technology provided by Project Sunblock - a firm used by major brands to stop adverts appearing alongside questionable content such as pirated material or pornography.

Many websites - including those offering pirated content - will use syndication networks to place advertisements on their pages.

Brands use the syndication networks like a wholesaler, and so may not be clear what sites their advert will eventually appear on.

Project Sunblock detects the content of websites to prevent brands' ads appearing where they do not want them.

When a website on Pipcu's Infringing Websites List (IWL) tries to display an advert, Project Sunblock will instead serve the police warning.

Neither the police or Project Sunblock are paying the website in question to display the police message.

Piracy battle
In the past, some have raised concerns about Pipcu's process in adding a website to the IWL.

Ernesto Van Der Sar is the editor of Torrentfreak, a news site that covers issues around online piracy. When Pipcu announced its intentions in March this year, Mr Van Der Sar said he worried about the implications.

"As with all blocklists there is a serious risk of overblocking," he said.

"Without proper oversight, perfectly legal sites may end up losing good advertising opportunities if they are wrongfully included."

The battle against online piracy has seen content creators attempt many different strategies in order to stem the flow of illegal downloading.

In the UK, the courts have ordered internet service providers to block almost 50 different websites offering pirated content, either by direct download or through peer-to-peer sharing.

While effective in lowering the traffic of these sites, filtering is a flawed prevention method - many internet users are adept in using different technologies to circumvent the court-imposed restrictions.

This latest attempt looks to hit the owners of these websites in a more painful way - by stopping advertising revenues from coming in.

[Ganty]

Hanging's too good for this cunt. Who the fuck does he think he is trying to provide anonymity to people surfing the web?!

[blacksheep]

Fairly sure this is a civil matter not a legal one - yet again its who you know that can pull the right strings. Hey I've done similar to get info on people etc but this is another level so bit hypocritical for me to comment on the civil side the criminal side is just a farce.