Demonoid.com has allegedly been taken offline by the Canadian Recording Industry Association (CRIA).
Both the tracker and the website have been unresponsive for nearly 24 hours now. As of now it is still unsure what exactly happened, but the popular Dutch news site nu.nl reports that the CRIA is responsible for the downtime.
Click for more on Demonoid Torrent Tracker Shut Down by CRIA »
Apple has your unlocked iPhone in their crosshairs. However, this appears to have broken a key warranty law relevant to SIM unlocks.
The Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act, a law decades old, states that Apple cannot void a warranty for a product with third-party enhancements or modifications to their product. The only exception to this rule is if Apple can determine that the modification or enhancement is responsible damaging the product in question. While Apple has the opportunity to make further exemptions, we will explain how the exemptions Apple has made do not fully apply to this case.
Click for more on Apple May Be Breaking the Law With Policy On iPhone Unlocks »
The big record and movie companies are paying professional hackers, saboteurs and ddosers to destroy the site.
Thanks to the email-leakage from MediaDefender-Defenders we(TPB) now have proof of the things we’ve been suspecting for a long time; the big record and movie labels are paying professional hackers, saboteurs and ddosers to destroy our trackers.
Click for more on ThePrirateBay files charges against media companies »
The 802.11n standard is imperiled because the Commonwealth Science and Industrial Research Organization has refused to submit a Letter of Assurance, promising not to sue those who implement the standard.
The realization that CSIRO holds essential patents, and has failed to provide a Letter of Assurance as required by the IEEE, could prevent the standard ever being finalized. This means that anyone who implements, or is implementing, 802.11n is at risk of being sued by CSIRO, and that the standard is very unlikely to be approved. As the internal memo, addressed to 802.11 Chair Stuart J Kerry, makes clear:
Click for more on 802.11n May Never Happen Due to Patent Concerns »
For the first time in the U.S., a company is being taken to court for a GPL violation.
The SFLC (Software Freedom Law Center) announced on Sept. 20 that it had just filed the first ever U.S. copyright infringement lawsuit based on a violation of the GNU General Public License (GPL) on behalf of its clients. The group’s clients are the two principal developers of BusyBox. BusyBox is a small-footprint application that implements a lightweight set of standard Unix utilities. It is commonly used in embedded systems, and is open-source software licensed under the GPL version 2.
MPAA is trying to convince major ISPs to do content filtering. Now, merely wanting it is one thing, but the more important point is that “AT&T has agreed to start filtering content at some mysterious point in the future.”
It’s no secret that US content owners want the “middlemen” of the Internet economy to better police their networks and services for material that infringes copyright. The problem, from a legal perspective, is that ISPs like AT&T and Comcast and content hosts like YouTube have the explicit legal go-ahead not to do this; they operate in a tranquil Caribbean “safe harbor” that exempts them from the crushing responsibility to filter and analyze every bit of content passing through their control.
AT&T says NO to software unlocking…
So, as you may have seen, earlier this morning at 3AM local time UniquePhones (the team behind iPhoneUnlocking.com, who’ve claimed to have the second proper iPhone SIM software hack) got a threatening call from AT&T’s legal team urging them to not release their software — or else. Now, we can understand why any smallish business wouldn’t exactly want lawyers repping AT&T (and Apple) breathing down their necks for a potentially market-shifting discovery — which is why the company is now officially holding the release of their SIM unlock solution indefinitely while they assess their legal position. Fair enough, but we still haven’t even had a chance to verify their solution does unlock iPhones.
Click for more on iPhone SIM unlock software iefinitely delayed »
Sk0t, an ex-administrator of the EliteTorrents BitTorrent tracker, who uploaded the latest Star Wars movie got arrested, pleaded guilty to ‘conspiracy to commit copyright infringement’ and ‘criminal copyright infringement’ and got jail and home confinement. As part of his home confinement, he agreed to install some tracking software on his computer. The problem is He’s an Ubuntu Linux user and the government doesn’t have any tracking software for Linux. So he’s been told that he must use Windows for the term of his confinement.
A low-rent recidivist con man who targeted eBay customers was jailed for two years on Tuesday. Phillip Shortman, 20, from Cwmbran near Newport in south Wales, was sent to a young offenders’ institution following a conviction for ripping off consumers to the tune of £14,000 and breaching the terms of his probation. Shortman was given an eight-month suspended sentence in January after he was convicted of buying thousands of pounds in stolen fuel cards. He was also found guilty of another £45,000 eBay fraud in 2005, an offence that earned him a year in a detention centre.
This time around the married father-of-two ran bogus auctions for items including 2006 Ryder Cup tickets, a Sony camcorder, and hi-tech mobile phones. He also obtained goods including a £250 laptop and computer parts without payment. Shortman responded to requests for payment for the laptop by sending abusive emails to the seller.
Click for more on Serial eBay fraudster jailed for two years »
Yet another lawsuit here. John Stottlemire is the DVD Jon of coupon-clipping by remove the limitation from coupon.com, and it’s getting him in trouble. Ironically, his original motivation was to get a job at coupon.com.
The California man is on the working end of a federal copyright lawsuit after posting code and instructions that allow shoppers to circumvent copy protection on downloadable, printable coupons — the type used by General Foods, Colgate, Disney and others to sell everything from soap to breakfast cereal.
