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Old 24-06-15, 07:40 AM   #1
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Default Peer-To-Peer News - The Week In Review - June 27th, '15

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June 27th, 2015




Days Numbered for Illegal Downloaders as Crackdown Passes Parliament
James Law

THE Abbott Government has today passed a new law that will make illegally downloading movies and TV shows, such as Game of Thrones, much more difficult.

The law is designed to block Australians from accessing sites that house pirated content, such as KickassTorrents.

The new anti-piracy legislation, which cleared Parliament today with bipartisan support, empowers copyright holders to apply to the Federal Court to block overseas websites that offer content that infringes copyright.

The federal government says Australians need to be reminded that if they take too much from creative industries, such as film or music, without giving back, they will jeopardise content.

The legislation is a win for Hollywood studios and record companies, which will now be able to apply directly to the court for an injunction to disable access to the sites without having to establish whether the carriage service providers, which house the sites, are liable for the offending content.

Torrenting sites, such as The Pirate Bay, and streaming services, such as Project Free TV, are likely to be blocked.

The power to block offending sites would only apply to those operated outside of Australia.

The Bill states that the copyright holders would need to meet and “intentionally high threshold test” so that only sites that “flagrantly disregard the rights of copyright owners” are blocked.

The crackdown is designed to be an efficient way to “disrupt the business models” of infringing sites.

SO, WILL IT ACTUALLY WORK?

The same type of torrent blocking system has been in the UK since 2011 with little success. Some of the most popular torrenting sites in the world, including The Pirate Bay and Kickass Torrents, have all been blocked, but people keep finding ways to download content.

Typically, within hours of a site being put on the block list by an internet provider, hundreds of mirror sites that offer the same content pop up for users to access. Then, by the time those sites are blocked or taken down, there are more to replace them. It’s a never-ending circle.

UK residents have also worked around blocks by using proxy websites, which stop the internet service providers (ISPs) from thinking they are actually visiting those websites.

As a result, proxy sites have also been blocked.

However, The Pirate Bay, the world’s biggest torrenting site, now uses a new service to host the site, which stops most ISPs from being able to block it. The new service effectively hides the information about The Pirate Bay from internet providers, making it harder for them to block access to their main site.

James Brandes from ORGZine, a UK digital rights magazine, says: “Not only is the block policy fundamentally failing, but it raises important censorship.”

‘A SIGNIFICANT NEW CENSORSHIP POWER’

Consumer advocacy group Choice slammed the reforms last week, saying they amounted to an “industry-run internet filter” that would “limit access to international websites that offer consumers a greater range of more affordable products and services”.

“At its heart, this is about protecting uncompetitive local industries who have failed to provide timely and affordable content and services,” Choice campaigns manager Erin Turner said.

Ms Turner said the reform wasn’t about just stopping access to torrenting sites. It was also designed to stop Aussies from using virtual private networks (VPNs), which can allow Australians to circumvent geoblocks in order to access overseas streaming services.

Many Aussies use VPNs to access the US version of Netflix because it offers more content than the recently launched Australian version.

“We know both sides of politics are under a lot of pressure from big rights holders to support this new law and it looks like they have given in,” Ms Turner said.

The Greens submitted a report criticising the Bill, saying that it would give a “significant new censorship power” to the court and copyright holders.

At the same time, the submission questioned the effectiveness of the crackdown.

“There is a substantial weight of evidence showing that it will be relatively easy to evade the Bill’s provisions, that it does not contain appropriate safeguards, and that it may result in legitimate online sources being blocked,” The Greens submission read.

“Most importantly, there is also a significant weight of evidence showing that the Bill will not meet its aims, as it does not address the underlying cause of online copyright infringement: The continual refusal of offshore rights holders to make their content available in a timely, convenient and affordable manner to Australians.”

The law passed the Senate today 37-13. It was opposed by The Greens, David Leyonhjelm, Glenn Lazarus and Ricky Muir.

— With AAP
http://www.news.com.au/technology/on...-1227393966197





NZ ISPs Back Down on Anti-Geoblocking Support

Geoblocking question unresolved after New Zealand lawsuit ends
Jeremy Kirk

A tool to watch regionally restricted video content will no longer be offered in New Zealand, ending a lawsuit that could have clarified the legality of such services in the country.

GlobalMode allowed people to watch video content that is restricted by IP address, or geoblocked. The service uses a DNS (Domain Name System) trick to make it appear its users are in the country where the content is authorized to play.

ByPass Network Services of New Zealand developed GlobalMode, and it was offered by several companies, including CallPlus, which runs the ISPs Slingshot, Orcon and Flip.

Major New Zealand media companies SKY, TVNZ, Lightbox and MediaWorks filed a lawsuit in April, arguing that skirting geoblocks violates the distribution rights of its media clients for the New Zealand market.

Companies contend there's little incentive to buy content from other providers if their customers already have access to it online.

On Wednesday, the parties announced a confidential settlement in which GlobalMode will no longer be offered in New Zealand as of Sept. 1. The lawsuit will be dropped, CallPlus said in a statement.

At least two other ISPs stopped offering GlobalMode after the law firm representing the media companies signaled its intention to file suit.

Copyright law in New Zealand doesn't specifically ban the use of VPNs or unblocking services to watch overseas content. But it's a complex area of law, and fighting a lawsuit could have resulted in a years-long, expensive legal battle.

ByPass Network Service officials couldn't immediately be reached for comment.

Global Mode runs within an ISP's DNS infrastructure, which translates a domain name into an IP address that can be called into a browser. If someone in New Zealand navigates to Hulu.com, the DNS request is resolved so that it appears the person is in the U.S.

The process is seamless to end users, and they don't have to install any software. ByPass developed a network-level switch that lets ISPs use Global Mode at scale for all of their subscribers.
http://www.computerworld.com.au/arti...cking-support/





Now You Can Really Cut the Cord: Pirate TV Service Now Has 500 Free TV Channels
Zach Epstein

The biggest barrier for cord cutters today remains the same as it was a month ago and a year ago: live TV. Eliminating your standard pay TV subscription means relying on on-demand services such as Netflix and Hulu, which are both fantastic solutions for streaming TV shows and movies. But with only a few exceptions such as HBO Now and WatchESPN that are only available to a limited number of people who subscribe to certain services, cord cutters cannot watch most live broadcasts.

Now, however, there’s a pirate TV service that aims to change that — and as of Monday, it’s home to well over 500 channels of free streaming content.

We first covered cCloud TV back in late May, when the service burst onto the scene and made a name for itself by allowing people to stream pay TV channels including HBO, ESPN, AMC, TBS, Showtime and more to their computers, smartphones and other devices. The pirate TV service has hit a few speed bumps since then, but now it’s back with a vengeance.

The team of developers behind cCloud TV confirmed to BGR on Monday morning that the service is now home to more than 500 channels. While the exact number of streaming TV feeds fluctuates as old streams are taken offline and new ones are added, cCloud TV was home to more than 540 different channels at the time of this writing.

In other words, cCloud TV now offers more channels than many pay TV packages.

Not all channels on cCloud TV are pirated cable and satellite TV channels. For example, the site has added several premium commercial-free radio stations as well as a number of movie channels. Hundreds of pay TV channels are available as well, and the cCloud TV team continues to add new features and support for new devices.

As we noted in an earlier report, one of the most exciting features planned for cCloud TV is a cloud-based DVR service, considered by many to be the Holy Grail.

While cCloud TV has been forced to change its URL a number of times due to copyright claims, the service currently resides at this link.
https://bgr.com/2015/06/22/free-stre...-movies-shows/





Google Launches Free Streaming Service Ahead of Apple Music Debut
Yasmeen Abutaleb

Google Inc launched a free version of its music streaming service on Tuesday, as it sought to upstage the debut of Apple Inc's rival service next week.

Google Play Music has offered a $9.99 per month subscription service for two years but Tuesday's launch is the first free version of the streaming service. It is available online and will be available on Android and iOS by the end of the week, Elias Roman, Google product manager, said.

Apple said earlier this month it would launch a music streaming service on June 30 for $9.99 per month along with a $14.99 per month family plan, with a free three-month trial.

As with other streaming services, such as Spotify and Rhapsody, Google Play Music curates playlists. Users can tailor playlists based on genre, artist or even activity, such as hosting a pool party or "having fun at work."

"We believe this is a play that will expose a lot of people to the service," Roman said in an interview.

Unlike Google's subscription music service, the free service will carry ads, be unavailable offline and exclude certain songs.

Roman said millions of people look at Google Play Music each month but are not ready to pay for a subscription. By offering a free version of the service, he said, the search engine hopes more people will be compelled to pay for an upgraded version.

Ted Cohen, managing partner of TAG Strategic, a digital entertainment consultancy, said the timing of Google's launch was strategic.

"It's a smart time to do it with all the attention around Apple," Cohen said. "If they did it absent the Apple service, it wouldn't be the same story."

Google declined to say how many subscribers it has but said they more than doubled in 2014 from the previous year. But rivals Pandora, Spotify and Beats Music had far more mobile downloads than Google Play Music in 2014, according to data from analytics firm App Annie.

(Reporting by Yasmeen Abutaleb)
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2015/0...0P31WA20150623





Comcast Ordered to Unmask Anonymous Online Newspaper Commenter

Commenter who likened candidate to a child molester is being sued for defamation.
David Kravets

The person who commented online on a local newspaper's site that a political candidate was a child sexual predator cannot remain anonymous, the Illinois Supreme Court ruled Thursday.

The attorney for the anonymous commenter on a Freeport (Ill.) Journal Standard article said he was mulling an appeal to the US Supreme Court. But it would be a tough sell. Most of the nation's state courts have ruled that when it comes to defamation, online anonymity is out the door. (Comcast had refused to release the IP address account information, demanding a court order. Litigation ensued.)

The anonymous defendant claimed that there were insufficient facts to support a claim of defamation to begin with, so the identity shouldn't be unmasked over the 2011 comment. When trying to unmask an anonymous online commenter for defamation, there must be enough evidence to justify that whatever was said online was defamatory, the court said.

The flap concerned a candidate named Bill Hadley who was running for a seat on the Stephenson County board. The online comment, from somebody going by the online handle "Fuboy," likened the candidate to Jerry Sandusky, the Penn State football coach who was convicted of a series of child molestation charges in 2012. Fuboy also said that the candidate lived across the street from an elementary school named Empire.

Here's the comment at issue: "Hadley is a Sandusky waiting to be exposed. Check out the view he has of Empire from his front door."

The commenter's attorney claimed that no defamation took place because it is not a crime to have the last name of Sandusky—that a reader of the comment would be unable to discern the defamatory meaning of the comment without the benefit of "extrinsic facts."

The state Supreme Court did not agree (PDF):

In short, at the time of Fuboy’s comment, numerous men were testifying to the abuse they allegedly suffered at the hands of Sandusky when they were young boys. The general public was mindful of the fact Sandusky was accused of sexually abusing young boys. Stating that Hadley was “a Sandusky” while the scandal dominated the national news, coupled with the reference to Empire Elementary School, conveyed the idea that Hadley was a pedophile or had engaged in sexual acts with children and, thus, had committed criminal conduct.

Unless the US Supreme Court intervenes and sets aside the ruling, the candidate, who won the election, said he would forge ahead with his defamation suit against the commenter by acquiring the person's identity.

"For three and a half years I've been trying to get the name, the identity of this person," Hadley told the Chicago Tribune. "It'll be a huge victory for me, but it's practically broke me financially."

The Illinois Press Association issued some advice to online commenters: "There are folks who go through life thinking that the Internet provides permanent anonymous protection. This case makes clear that that's not true."

In case you're wondering, the Communications Decency Act protects online news outlets from claims of defamation for comments posted by their readers.
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2...per-commenter/





How Government Stifled Reason's Free Speech

Yes, the feds can compel magazines and websites to cough up user information about obviously non-threatening trolls, while barring them from even acknowledging it.
Nick Gillespie & Matt Welch

For the past two weeks, Reason, a magazine dedicated to "Free Minds and Free Markets," has been barred by an order from the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York from speaking publicly about a grand jury subpoena that court sent to Reason.com.

The subpoena demanded the records of six people who left hyperbolic comments at the website about the federal judge who oversaw the controversial conviction of Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht. Shortly after the subpoena was issued, the government issued a gag order prohibiting Reason not only from discussing the matter but even acknowledging the existence of the subpoena or the gag order itself. As a wide variety of media outlets have noted, such actions on the part of the government are not only fundamentally misguided and misdirected, they have a tangible chilling effect on free expression by commenters and publications alike.

Yesterday, after preparing an extensive legal brief, Reason asked the US Attorney's Office to join with it in asking that the gag order - now moot and clearly an unconstitutional prior restraint - be lifted. This morning, the US Attorney's Office asked the Court to vacate the order, which it did. We are free to tell the story for the first time.

On May 31, Nick Gillespie published a post at Reason.com's Hit & Run blog discussing Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht's "haunting sentencing letter" to District Court Judge Katherine Forrest, and the judge's harsh response. Gillespie noted that Forrest "more than threw the book" at Ulbricht by giving him a life sentence, which was a punishment "beyond even what prosecutors...asked for."

In the comments section of the post, six readers published reactions that drew the investigative ire of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York. In a federal grand jury subpoena dated June 2, the U.S. District Court commanded Reason.com to turn over "any and all identifying information" we had about the individuals posting those comments.

This is the first time Reason.com has received such a subpoena from any arm of government.

From press accounts of similar actions at other news publications and social media sites, we know that it is increasingly common for the federal government to demand user information from publications and websites while also stifling their speech rights with gag orders and letters requesting "voluntary" confidentiality. Exactly how common is anyone's guess; we are currently investigating just how widespread the practice may be.

The federal government's command for information—and request for silence—ironically came just days after the Supreme Court, in Elonis v. United States, strongly limited the scope of what counts as a true "threat" online. In that case, the Court voided the conviction of Anthony Elonis, who had published on Facebook rap lyrics depicting violence against his estranged wife and as a result been sentenced to 44 months in prison for making threats. The Court ruled that context needs to be taken into account when evaluating the true nature of the threatening actions being described. "Federal criminal liability," the justices wrote, "generally does not turn solely on the results of an act without considering the defendant’s mental state."

Unfortunately, that precedent is mostly irrelevant in our case. In America, grand juries have almost limitless ability to investigate whatever they want, regardless of whether that investigation has any chance of producing a constitutionally permissible conviction. Grand juries are widely regarded as playthings of ambitious prosecutors, who famously are able to indict "ham sandwiches"—at least, as long as those sandwiches aren't police officers accused of brutality.

U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara subpoenaed all of the identifying information we had about the authors of such comments as, "Its (sic) judges like these that should be taken out back and shot." And, "Why waste ammunition? Wood chippers get the message across clearly. Especially if you feed them in feet first." This last comment is a well-known Internet reference to the Coen brothers' movie Fargo.

The subpoena also covered such obviously harmless comments as: "I hope there is a special place in hell reserved for that horrible woman," and "I'd prefer a hellish place on Earth be reserved for her as well."

The comments are hyperbolic, in questionable taste–and fully within the norms of Internet commentary.

It's worth stressing that, under established legal precedent, Reason.com (like any other website) is generally not legally responsible for reader comments posted at our site. Still, the chilling effect on Reason and our commenters is tangible. It takes time, money and resources to challenge, or even simply to comply with, such intrusive demands.

The original subpoena, received late on Tuesday, June 2, did not come with a gag order. However, it came with a letter from Bharara and Assistant U.S. Attorney Niketh Velamoor requesting that we refrain from informing any other parties about the subpoena so as to "preserve the confidentiality of the investigation," and that we notify his office in advance if we intended to do so, even though it also said that we were under "no obligation" to keep the subpoena confidential.

We had three options: We could 1) abide quietly with the subpoena, 2) attempt to quash it, and/or 3) alert the commenters named in the subpoena.

Option 1, quietly abiding, was a non-starter for us.

As for Option 2, our chances of prevailing in that sort of legal challenge—given the extremely wide-ranging authority of federal grand juries, and the precedents set in cases such as In re Grand Jury Subpoena No. 11116275, 846 F. Supp. 2d 1 (D.D.C. 2012), involving an anonymous poster on Twitter—was in practical effect, virtually nil.

In the Twitter case, an anonymous poster moved to quash a grand jury subpoena to Twitter that arose from online postings of a sexual nature about then-congresswoman Michele Bachmann. In that case, Twitter received the subpoena and notified the anonymous poster about it, letting him know that the company would comply with the subpoena unless he filed a motion to quash. The court denied his motion, holding that the poster's First Amendment right to comment anonymously must yield to the government's "compelling interest" in knowing his identity.

So we decided, against the government's request but well within our legal rights, to choose Option 3: notify and share the full subpoena with the six targeted commenters so that they would have a chance to assert their First Amendment rights to anonymity and defend themselves legally against the order.

At about 10:30 am ET on Thursday, June 4, our attorney Gayle Sproul (of Levine, Sullivan, Koch, & Schulz) called Velamoor to discuss the subpoena. The call did not go well. Sproul asked Velamoor to consider scaling back the scope of the subpoena by omitting the more benign commenters. Velamoor said simply, "No." Then Sproul informed him that we would be notifying our commenters about the subpoena to give them the chance to defend their rights to remain anonymous, and that we would not comply with the subpoena as it related to any commenters who moved to quash the subpoena before our compliance deadline. Sproul explained to him that there is case law firmly establishing that these commenters have the right to speak anonymously, and that we would withhold the information of anyone fighting the subpoena. Velamoor disputed that any such free speech rights exist. He asked that we delay notifying the commenters so he could get a court order prohibiting us from disclosing the subpoena to them. We refused. Sproul pointed out that we were perfectly within our rights to share the subpoena given the law and the wording of his own letter. Velamoor then suggested that Reason was "coming close" to interfering with the grand jury investigation. The call ended abruptly.

Immediately following that conversation (at about 11:00 am ET on June 4), Reason Publisher Mike Alissi sent the subpoena to the six email addresses associated with the user accounts for the comments identified in the subpoena. The email stated:

I am unhappy to report that Reason has received the attached grand jury subpoena from the US District Court/Southern District of New York demanding that we provide all identifying information that we have for several commenters who posted comments in a recent Reason.com thread about the Silk Road case. I am writing you because your email address is associated with one or more of the comments at issue.

Please be aware that we must provide the information that is being demanded by June 9 at 10 am eastern. Please let us know no later than Monday, June 8 at 5 pm eastern if you have filed any motion(s) with the Court opposing the grand jury subpoena. Our attorney has notified the US Attorney's Office that we are notifying you about this subpoena.


Later that day, at approximately 5:35 pm ET, Velamoor sent Reason a gag order he had later secured blocking us from discussing the subpoena or the order itself with anyone outside of Reason, other than our attorney.

The gag order was accompanied by this email:

Mr. Alissi,

Regarding this subpoena, I spoke to someone who said she was an attorney representing Reason in connection with this subpoena. The attorney indicated that Reason intended to notify the individuals referenced therein about the subpoena. The attorney further refused to provide me any time to take steps to protect the confidentiality of the investigation.

I have obtained the attached Court Order prohibiting Reason from notifying any third party about the subpoena.

Please forward the Order to the attorney and any other individuals who should be aware of it.

Thank you

Niketh V. Velamoor
Assistant United States Attorney
Southern District of New York
One Saint Andrew's Plaza
New York, NY 10007


(Sproul had identified herself and provided contact information to him.)

Since receipt of the gag order on June 4, and until this moment, Reason has not spoken with any outside parties about the subpoena or the gag order. We originally intended to publish the subpoena as part of a Reason.com story about it after the reply deadline; unfortunately, the gag order put those plans on ice.

Having already suggested that Reason might have interfered with a grand jury investigation, Velamoor contacted Sproul on the afternoon of Friday, June 5, in response to a letter from her explaining the commenters' constitutional rights and laying out the timeline of Reason's notification to them. Velamoor told her that he now had "preliminary information" suggesting that Reason was in violation of the court order. Sproul said we were not and asked for further information. Velamoor refused to give any specifics, saying simply that he was "looking into it further."

So as of this point in the saga, Reason had been subpoenaed, we had been vaguely—and falsely—accused by a United States Attorney's office of actions verging on obstruction of justice and contempt of court, and we were now told that we were being investigated further.

None of the six commenters informed us that they would be filing motions to oppose the U.S. Attorney's subpoena. Therefore we complied with the subpoena on the deadline of June 9.

Providing the subpoena to the commenters before the gag order was issued is what presumably enabled it to become public. That has had the effect of bringing to light what these compulsory grabs for information look like, launching a wide number of conversations about a grand jury process in which the government can target individuals, platforms, and publications for data about users.

(For a relatively comprehensive list of coverage of the matter go to this post at the legal blog Popehat, which published the first article on the subpoena and its implications.)

Reason's experience needs to be understood in a larger context. Especially since the 9/11 attacks, there has been a mounting conflict between the values of free speech and constitutional due process, with government making increasing demands–often under threat of punishment–for all sorts of information from innocent citizens. Coupled with the rise of a secretive and pervasive surveillance state, this tension means that Americans have no way of knowing just how unfree their speech really is.

While it is impossible to fully ascertain the frequency of information requests from local, state, and federal law enforcement, there is every reason to believe websites are subjected to thousands of demands each year. It is also not clear how other websites interpret the type of letter requesting "voluntary" confidentiality that Reason received. How often is that letter sent along with subpoenas? And how often does it achieve its intended effect of securing silence? In other words, does it have the same effect as a gag order?

In 2013, for instance, Mother Jones reported that Google, Facebook, Twitter, and Microsoft have between them received "tens of thousands of requests for user data from the US government annually," covering hundreds of thousands of accounts. Using corporate transparency reports, the magazine estimated that the companies complied with the demands between 72 percent and 89 percent of the time, and that it's impossible to know how many of those requests were filled without the affected users ever knowing their information had been targeted.

Also confusing the discussion about these orders is that different categories of cases have different rules and procedures, with some granting more power to targets than others. "Unlike grand jury subpoenas, subpoenas for commenter information in civil cases and in public criminal prosecutions are easier for websites to deflect. The information sought there may be truly tangential and the parties may be willing to negotiate," Sproul told Reason. "But, as in this case, when a grand jury subpoena targets specific information that it contends is necessary to an investigation and can demonstrate the link, any fight is going to be a seriously uphill battle."

Regardless of the legal details, the growing government demand for user data and our own experience with court-enforced silence on a self-evidently ridiculous investigation raise important questions about free speech and the abuse of power.

Reason's unmoderated comment space is rare among comparable publications and has, over the years, developed into a forum that is by turns exciting, intellectually advanced, outlandish, cringe-inducing, and more foul-mouthed than any locker room this side of the Crab Nebula. It is something to be celebrated as a voluntary community that can be engaged or ignored as the spirit moves you (we say that as writers whose work and physical shortcomings rarely escape unscathed from any thread). However trollish many of our commenters can be, they have created a sphere of free speech that delivers on one of the great promises of the Internet, which is unbridled expression, dialogue, and argument.

We took risks by creating an autonomous zone in which our readers are left to their own devices. Some of the risk is reputational—how many other serious outlets allow anonymous commenters to run riot as we do? Some of the risk is legal, as in the current situation.

One further note about anonymity in our comment threads. Commenting on our site requires registration using a working email address (which is hidden from public view unless a commenter chooses to have it displayed). We also log IP addresses. We do both of these things in order to fight spammers and trolls–people who have shown enormous determination in their efforts to disrupt the discussion.

Our commenters are generally a tech-savvy bunch. It is likely that those who have a desire for a very high degree of anonymity are taking control of that themselves, using anonymous email addresses and tools to prevent us from logging IPs connected to them.

But Reason.com is not the dark web. Many of our regular commenters voluntarily display either personal website information or their email addresses. In fact, three of the six commenters subject to this very subpoena voluntarily displayed public links to personal blogs at Blogger as part of their comments, one of which further links to a Google+ page. Raising the question: How can the government view these so-called "threats" as so nefarious when people posted them in such a non-anonymous fashion?

Due in part to the government's secrecy and possible gag orders or requests for "voluntary" confidentiality, we don't know whether Google or other media outlets have been subpoenaed in this particular case. Judge Forrest's sentencing and comments in the Silk Road trial have drawn widespread criticism in corners of the Internet that value privacy and oppose the ruinous drug war. The potential number of critical comments subject to the District Court's low bar for investigative compulsion is enormous. Now multiply that number by the number of controversial court cases, and you could quickly get to the point where federal courts were doing nothing but investigating online trolls. Surely there are more pressing tasks, ones that don't involve suppressing the speech of journalistic outlets known to be critical of government overreach.

Reason's guiding principle over 47 years has been to expand the legal and cultural space for free expression, as the bedrock value behind human flourishing. As libertarians who believe in "Free Minds and Free Markets," Reason takes seriously an obligation to our audience and to our critics not simply to hold on to what we've got but to increase the rights of everyone to speak openly and without figurative or literal prior restraint.

To live in a world where every stray, overheated Internet comment—however trollish and stupid it may be—can be interpreted as an actionable threat to be investigated by a federal grand jury is to live in a world where the government is telling the public and media to just shut up already. As we gather and publish more information on just how often this sort of thing happens, we pledge to always be on the side of more speech rather than less.
https://reason.com/blog/2015/06/19/g...stifles-speech





Revealed: How DOJ Gagged Google Over Surveillance of WikiLeaks Volunteer
Ryan Gallagher

The Obama administration fought a legal battle against Google to secretly obtain the email records of a security researcher and journalist associated with WikiLeaks.

Newly unsealed court documents obtained by The Intercept reveal the Justice Department won an order forcing Google to turn over more than one year’s worth of data from the Gmail account of Jacob Appelbaum (pictured above), a developer for the Tor online anonymity project who has worked with WikiLeaks as a volunteer. The order also gagged Google, preventing it from notifying Appelbaum that his records had been provided to the government.

The surveillance of Appelbaum’s Gmail account was tied to the Justice Department’s long-running criminal investigation of WikiLeaks, which began in 2010 following the transparency group’s publication of a large cache of U.S. government diplomatic cables.

According to the unsealed documents, the Justice Department first sought details from Google about a Gmail account operated by Appelbaum in January 2011, triggering a three-month dispute between the government and the tech giant. Government investigators demanded metadata records from the account showing email addresses of those with whom Appelbaum had corresponded between the period of November 2009 and early 2011; they also wanted to obtain information showing the unique IP addresses of the computers he had used to log in to the account.

The Justice Department argued in the case that Appelbaum had “no reasonable expectation of privacy” over his email records under the Fourth Amendment, which protects against unreasonable searches and seizures. Rather than seeking a search warrant that would require it to show probable cause that he had committed a crime, the government instead sought and received an order to obtain the data under a lesser standard, requiring only “reasonable grounds” to believe that the records were “relevant and material” to an ongoing criminal investigation.

Google repeatedly attempted to challenge the demand, and wanted to immediately notify Appelbaum that his records were being sought so he could have an opportunity to launch his own legal defense. Attorneys for the tech giant argued in a series of court filings that the government’s case raised “serious First Amendment concerns.” They noted that Appelbaum’s records “may implicate journalistic and academic freedom” because they could “reveal confidential sources or information about WikiLeaks’ purported journalistic or academic activities.”

However, the Justice Department asserted that “journalists have no special privilege to resist compelled disclosure of their records, absent evidence that the government is acting in bad faith,” and refused to concede Appelbaum was in fact a journalist. It claimed it had acted in “good faith throughout this criminal investigation, and there is no evidence that either the investigation or the order is intended to harass the … subscriber or anyone else.”

Google’s attempts to fight the surveillance gag order angered the government, with the Justice Department stating that the company’s “resistance to providing the records” had “frustrated the government’s ability to efficiently conduct a lawful criminal investigation.”

The Justice Department wanted to keep the surveillance secret largely because of an earlier public backlash over its WikiLeaks investigation. In January 2011, Appelbaum and other WikiLeaks volunteers’ – including Icelandic parlimentarian Birgitta Jonsdottir – were notified by Twitter that the Justice Department had obtained data about their accounts. This disclosure generated widepread news coverage and controversy; the government says in the unsealed court records that it “failed to anticipate the degree of damage that would be caused” by the Twitter disclosure and did not want to “exacerbate this problem” when it went after Appelbaum’s Gmail data.

The court documents show the Justice Department said the disclosure of its Twitter data grab “seriously jeopardized the [WikiLeaks] investigation” because it resulted in efforts to “conceal evidence” and put public pressure on other companies to resist similar surveillance orders. It also claimed that officials named in the subpoena ordering Twitter to turn over information were “harassed” after a copy was published by Intercept co-founder Glenn Greenwald at Salon in 2011. (The only specific evidence of the alleged harassment cited by the government is an email that was sent to an employee of the U.S. Attorney’s office that purportedly said: “You guys are fucking nazis trying to controll [sic] the whole fucking world. Well guess what. WE DO NOT FORGIVE. WE DO NOT FORGET. EXPECT US.”)

Google accused the government of hyperbole and argued that the backlash over the Twitter order did not justify secrecy related to the Gmail surveillance. “Rather than demonstrating how unsealing the order will harm its well-publicized investigation, the government lists a parade of horribles that have allegedly occurred since it unsealed the Twitter order, yet fails to establish how any of these developments could be further exacerbated by unsealing this order,” wrote Google’s attorneys. “The proverbial toothpaste is out of the tube, and continuing to seal a materially identical order will not change it.”

But Google’s attempt to overturn the gag order was denied by magistrate judge Ivan D. Davis in February 2011. The company launched an appeal against that decision, but this too was rebuffed, in March 2011, by District Court judge Thomas Selby Ellis, III.

The government agreed to unseal some of the court records on Apr. 1 this year, and they were apparently turned over to Appelbaum on May 14 through a notification sent to his Gmail account. The files were released on condition that they would contain some redactions, which are bizarre and inconsistent, in some cases censoring the name of “WikiLeaks” from cited public news reports.

Not all of the documents in the case – such as the original surveillance orders contested by Google – were released as part of the latest disclosure. Some contain “specific and sensitive details of the investigation” and “remain properly sealed while the grand jury investigation continues,” according to the court records from April this year.

Appelbaum, an American citizen who is based in Berlin, called the case “a travesty that continues at a slow pace” and said he felt it was important to highlight “the absolute madness in these documents.”

He told The Intercept: “After five years, receiving such legal documents is neither a shock nor a needed confirmation. … Will we ever see the full documents about our respective cases? Will we even learn the names of those signing so-called legal orders against us in secret sealed documents? Certainly not in a timely manner and certainly not in a transparent, just manner.”

The 32-year-old, who has recently collaborated with Intercept co-founder Laura Poitras to report revelations about National Security Agency surveillance for German news magazine Der Spiegel, said he plans to remain in Germany “in exile, rather than returning to the U.S. to experience more harassment of a less than legal kind.”

“My presence in Berlin ensures that the cost of physically harassing me or politically harassing me is much higher than when I last lived on U.S. soil,” Appelbaum said. “This allows me to work as a journalist freely from daily U.S. government interference. It also ensures that any further attempts to continue this will be forced into the open through [a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty] and other international processes. The German goverment is less likely to allow the FBI to behave in Germany as they do on U.S. soil.”

The Justice Department’s WikiLeaks investigaton is headed by prosecutors in the Eastern District of Virginia. Since 2010, the secretive probe has seen activists affiliated with WikiLeaks compelled to appear before a grand jury and the FBI attempting to infiltrate the group with an informant. Earlier this year, it was revealed that the government had obtained the contents of three core WikiLeaks staffers’ Gmail accounts as part of the investigation.

Google, the Justice Department, and the U.S. Attorneys Office had not responded to requests for comment on this story at time of publication.
https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2...investigation/





DPS Admits Wrongly Crediting TrapWire Terror Alert System for Arrests
Dave Lieber

I reported something to you about the Texas Department of Public Safety that is in error.

DPS told me that its TrapWire super-surveillance detection system set up by former FBI and CIA agents to find terrorists is a success.

How do we know?

DPS told me, and by extension you, and also members and top staffers of the Texas Legislature that TrapWire resulted in 44 arrests.

Turns out that’s not true.

DPS is the one that made the boo-boo. And it’s a big one.

The Watchdog learned this week that the actual number of arrests resulting from the secret system that cost taxpayers millions of dollars is none.

Zero.

DPS compounds this mistake by stalling for a month The Watchdog’s open records request for verification of the 44 arrests. We received nothing but requests for more time.

We learned the truth on unaffiliated watchdog.org’s website. Reporter Steve Miller wrote, “Texas DPS retracts TrapWire arrests claim.”

DPS answered his request for information, but not ours. Why? The Watchdog doesn’t know.

This week I requested an interview with DPS Director “Colonel” Steven McCraw to ask about this. My request was not acknowledged.
More puffery

If only this one exaggeration of success were an isolated incident for DPS. But it’s not. The agency, which received hundreds of millions of dollars more for crime-fighting and border security from the 2015 Legislature, is on the receiving end of criticism in newspapers in Houston, El Paso and Austin for a pattern of brags that ring false.

This week Austin American-Statesman reporter Jeremy Schwartz reported that DPS falsely claimed drug seizure numbers actually handled by federal officers as part of its own statistical haul. More puffery.

DPS puffs up its stats the way Donald Trump puffs his hair.

The agency’s credibility is in tatters. Whether you’re running a tiny police department or, like DPS, one of the largest law enforcement agencies in the nation, you can’t make up stuff to look good.

DPS does.

‘Mistakes are made’

DPS spokesman Tom Vinger to The Watchdog: “First and foremost, we categorically reject any inference that this was an intentional attempt to mislead. Unfortunately, mistakes are made from time to time, and that’s exactly what happened here.

“We are working as quickly as possible to correct this and provide you with accurate information. In attempting to answer a specific question in good faith, there was an internal miscommunication that led to misinterpretation of the data provided — and as a result, the information provided to you was not properly represented.

“Again, DPS is responsible for — and apologizes for — the error.”

Deep irony here. When DPS sent a warning letter to state legislators about my coming story (“Is DPS ‘surveillance detection’ just plain spying?”), McCraw’s right-hand man, Robert “Duke” Bodisch, warned that my story could be inaccurate. He also bragged on the 44 phantom arrests.

“This column has the potential,” he wrote about my story, “to significantly misrepresent the facts about this program despite the information provided to the DMN.”

It was you, Duke, not me.

Remember this is the second time this happened to The Watchdog. Last month I told you how I asked DPS last year to tell us how many millions of dollars were spent to create the department’s system to collect full sets of fingerprints from every Texas driver.

DPS responded it didn’t have the information “on such a tight deadline.”

A year later, I saw a draft answer to my question. The total was $51 million for various contracts. But DPS never sent me that answer. A lawyer found the draft in an open records request and showed me.

I conclude that DPS didn’t want you to know how much it spent to create the fingerprinting system.

Turns out to be a waste because Gov. Greg Abbott signed House Bill 1888 this week requiring DPS to return to collecting only one thumbprint.

Dubious distinction

DPS recently received national attention when a journalism group, Investigative Reporters and Editors, nominated DPS as one of the most secretive government agencies in the nation.

An expert on relationships between state governments and the media says DPS displays “straight up evasion” when dealing with the press and public.

“They’re avoiding the conversation,” says Chris McCollough, who teaches at Columbus State University in Georgia.

“The role that public information officers are supposed to fill between state agencies and the public is in question here. You’re supposed to operate from an honest position.”

DPS runs “a severe risk of permanently damaging its reputation,” he warned. “It also appears they are not paying attention to what’s going on in the national stage when we talk about issues of surveillance and gathering information about people without having a tangible reason for doing so.”

DPS explains that its secret TrapWire system “captures behaviors and looks for patterns and trends” of potential criminals before they commit a crime.

You don’t need a secret multimillion-dollar system to figure out what’s going on with police puffery and secret-keeping at the top levels of DPS. The patterns and trends are quite clear.

Staff writer Marina Trahan Martinez contributed to this report.
http://www.dallasnews.com/investigat...om-arrests.ece





WiFi Offloading To Skyrocket

Carriers will offload a four-fold increase in mobile data traffic to WiFi networks by 2019, Juniper Research predicts.
Pablo Valerio

Carriers in North America and Western Europe will be responsible for over 75% of the global mobile data being offloaded in the next four years, Juniper said. The amount of smartphone and tablet data traffic on WiFi networks will will increase to more than 115,000 petabytes by 2019, compared to under 30,000 petabytes this year, representing almost a four-fold increase.

WiFi offloading, also called carrier WiFi, has become pervasive as many big cellular carriers and ISPs have deployed large numbers of WiFi hotspots in cities using the existing infrastructure of their customers’ homes and businesses. This enables carriers to offload the saturated bandwidth on 3G and LTE networks.

Figures for 2013 put the total number of Wi-Fi hotspots owned by mobile operators worldwide at 6.5 million. That number is forecast to grow 62% by 2018 to 10.5 million.

The Juniper report stresses that small cells -- femtocells, or low-power cellular base stations typically designed for use in a home or small business -- will account for an increasing share of the data offloaded.

"With WiFi-integrated small cells, seamless data services can be extended to non-cellular devices as well, such as cameras and WiFi-only tablets, offering operators the opportunity to develop new revenue streams," wrote Nitin Bhas, head of research at Juniper Research.

WiFi offloading currently offers a good solution to cellular data bottlenecks, but operators cannot rely solely on residential customers to carry the bulk of the data.

“Operators need to deploy [their] own WiFi zones in problematic areas or partner with WiFi hotspot operators and aggregators such as iPass and Boingo,” Bhas added.

The capacity of the 2.4GHz band is reaching its limit. Studies at the University of Twente in The Netherlands have demonstrated that the growing number of WiFi devices using unlicensed bands is seriously affecting network efficiency. Capacity is compromised by the number of simultaneously active devices, with transmission speeds dropping as much as 20% of the nominal value. With the number of IoT and M2M applications using WiFi continuously rising, that could become a serious problem soon.

Most residential customers are using the default WiFi router supplied by the ISP, which is commonly a basic 802.11n device working on 2.4 GHz. One solution ISPs have used is to start shipping 802.11ac WiFi routers, enabling their customers to switch to the less crowded 5 GHz band.

For mobile operators, WiFi has moved from being a threat -- an enabler of additional competition in the hands of wireline carriers or startups -- to a significant opportunity to meet the demands of their customers in a high quality yet cost effective way.
While the report suggests that 50% of the world's data traffic being offloaded will be in the US and Western Europe, it also points out that developing markets, such as India, are experiencing a significant surge in mobile data usage, with some carriers doubling it year over year.

Because those countries lack a robust wired telecom infrastructure (both on landlines and fiber), it's much more difficult for their carriers to offload data to WiFi. In many developing markets, most consumers do not have any landline and rely exclusively on cellular data for internet access.
http://www.networkcomputing.com/wire...d/d-id/1321007





Major Internet Providers Slowing Traffic Speeds for Thousands Across US

Study finds significant degradations of networks for five largest ISPs, including AT&T and Time Warner, representing 75% of all wireline households in US
Sam Thielman

Major internet providers, including AT&T, Time Warner and Verizon, are slowing data from popular websites to thousands of US businesses and residential customers in dozens of cities across the country, according to a study released on Monday.

The study, conducted by internet activists BattlefortheNet, looked at the results from 300,000 internet users and found significant degradations on the networks of the five largest internet service providers (ISPs), representing 75% of all wireline households across the US.

The findings come weeks after the Federal Communications Commission introduced new rules meant to protect “net neutrality” – the principle that all data is equal online – and keep ISPs from holding traffic speeds for ransom.

Tim Karr of Free Press, one of the groups that makes up BattlefortheNet, said the finding show ISPs are not providing content to users at the speeds they’re paying for.

“For too long, internet access providers and their lobbyists have characterized net neutrality protections as a solution in search of a problem,” said Karr. “Data compiled using the Internet Health Test show us otherwise – that there is widespread and systemic abuse across the network. The irony is that this trove of evidence is becoming public just as many in Congress are trying to strip away the open internet protections that would prevent such bad behavior.”

The study, supported by the technologists at Open Technology Institute’s M-Lab, examines the comparative speeds of Content Delivery Networks (CDNs), which shoulder some of the data load for popular websites. Any site that becomes popular enough has to pay a CDN to carry its content on a network of servers around the country (or the world) so that the material is close to the people who want to access it.

In Atlanta, for example, Comcast provided hourly median download speeds over a CDN called GTT of 21.4 megabits per second at 7pm throughout the month of May. AT&T provided speeds over the same network of ⅕ of a megabit per second. When a network sends more than twice the traffic it receives, that network is required by AT&T to pay for the privilege. When quizzed about slow speeds on GTT, AT&T told Ars Technica earlier this year that it wouldn’t upgrade capacity to a CDN that saw that much outgoing traffic until it saw some money from that network (as distinct from the money it sees from consumers).

AT&T has strongly opposed regulation of its agreements with the companies that directly provide connectivity between high-traffic internet users and their customers. Cogent, Level3 and others have petitioned the FCC to make free interconnection to CDNs a part of the conditions for the proposed merger between AT&T and DirecTV.

“It would be unprecedented and unjustified to force AT&T to provide free backbone services to other backbone carriers and edge providers, as Cogent et al seek,” said the company in a filing replying to the CDNs’ suggestion, part of a brief opposing the merger. “Nor is there any basis for requiring AT&T to augment network capacity for free and without any limits. Opponents’ proposals would shift the costs of their services onto all AT&T subscribers, many of whom do not use Opponents’ services, and would harm consumers.”

FCC chairman Tom Wheeler has taken an aggressive regulatory tack when it comes to mergers in the telecommunications sector. “History proves that absent competition a predominant position in the market such as yours creates economic incentives to use that market power to protect your traditional business in a way that is ultimately harmful to consumers,” he told industry leaders at the Internet and Television Expo last month.

The dispute over traffic speeds comes as the telecoms and cable industry readies legal challenges to the net neutrality rules. Most telecoms are content letting their lobbyists, notably trade associations Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association (CTIA) and USTelecom, sue the FCC over net neutrality rules, but AT&T has been one of the few companies to sue the FCC directly.
http://www.theguardian.com/technolog...traffic-speeds





Here’s the First Official Net Neutrality Complaint to the FCC
Brian Fung

Remember last week, when we learned that a San Diego-based company would be filing a net neutrality complaint against Time Warner Cable?

Well, that complaint just dropped. In a filing with the Federal Communications Commission on Monday, Commercial Network Services (CNS) claims that it's being charged unjust rates to deliver its streaming Web cam video to consumers.

CNS wants Time Warner Cable to carry its traffic for free. But TWC is telling CNS's chief executive, Barry Bahrami, that his company doesn't qualify for what's called a "settlement-free" deal.

"TWC is acting as gatekeeper and degrading our ability to exercise free expression," Bahrami writes in the complaint. "TWC’s management policy is restricting the open exchange of Internet traffic."

TWC has said that its behavior is consistent with industry standards and that it's confident the FCC will reject Bahrami's claims.

It's unclear how much traction Bahrami will get with the commission. His argument is that Time Warner Cable has violated the FCC's rules against paid prioritization, or the tactic where Internet providers charge a fee to selectively speed up certain Web sites. That behavior was labeled illegal under the FCC's net neutrality rules.

But that part of the FCC's rules only cover the so-called "last mile" between a consumer's device and his Internet provider. It doesn't address the part of the Internet where Time Warner Cable and Bahrami are having their dispute. So the FCC could find that, in fact, TWC hasn't broken any rules after all.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...-warner-cable/





Taylor Swift Accused of 'Double Standards' by Photographer
BBC

Taylor Swift told Apple artists should be compensated for their music

A photographer has accused Taylor Swift of "double standards" in her row with Apple over music streaming.

Apple Music performed a U-turn over payment policy a day after the pop star threatened to prevent the US firm from streaming her album 1989.

Swift had argued that Apple withholding payments during a three-month trial period was not fair for artists.

But photographer Jason Sheldon said the singer herself did not "play fair" when it came to image rights.

Some of the claims he has made in an open letter to Swift have been disputed by representatives of the 25-year-old singer.

In it he wrote: "If you don't like being exploited, that's great - make a huge statement about it, and you'll have my support. But how about making sure you're not guilty of the very same tactic before you have a pop at someone else?

"With all due respect to you too Taylor, you can do the right thing and change your photo policy. Photographers don't ask for your music for free. Please don't ask us to provide you with your marketing material for free."

'Give work away'

Mr Sheldon, who runs the Walsall-based Junction 10 agency, said he and other photographers had been called to hand over some rights to their images from Swift's live concerts.

To cover a performance in March 2011 at Birmingham's LG Arena, Mr Sheldon said he had to sign a permission form that granted Swift's management company long-term rights to reuse the images and prevented him from featuring them after the initial coverage.

"I can't use it in my portfolio, feature it on my website and even the original newspaper couldn't reuse it," Mr Sheldon said.

"What's more, they can give my image to my clients for press purposes. It's giving my work away for free."

He said the photo authorisation form included a section that gave the management firm "perpetual worldwide right to use (and to authorise others to use) any or all of the photographs for any non-commercial purpose".

Mr Sheldon said clauses such as this were becoming more common in photo agreement forms.

He said it was Swift's stance with Apple that "jarred" - with her "lambasting" the firm over using music for free, when her management firm was "guilty of doing the same thing with photos".

'Same rules'

In a statement, a spokesperson for Swift said: "The standard photography agreement has been misrepresented in that it clearly states that any photographer shooting The 1989 World Tour has the opportunity for further use of said photographs with management's approval.

"Another distinct misrepresentation is the claim that the copyright of the photographs will be with anyone other than the photographer - this agreement does not transfer copyright away from the photographer.

"Every artist has the right to, and should, protect the use of their name and likeness."

Mr Sheldon said he had seen a 2015 version of the same contract that was even more strict, although he had not applied for one.

"I fully agree with Taylor Swift's stance against Apple, but it's about her playing by the same rules she wants to live by," he said.
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-birmingham-33232244





‘How Music Got Free’ Tells the Real Story of Internet File Sharing

A new book by Stephen Witt, ‘How Music Got Free,’ details how file sharing really started in the music industry.
Gillian G. Gaar

“I haven’t purchased an album with my own money since the turn of the millennium,” observes author Stephen Witt — apparently without a twinge of guilt — in the introduction to his new book, “How Music Got Free.”

Online file sharing made that possible for Witt, who will speak on the subject of “The Music Industry’s Perilous Future” on Wednesday, June 24, at Town Hall.

Witt says he downloaded nearly 15,000 albums during his time at college, storing his cache on six 20-gigabyte hard drives.

The ability to download what you want, whenever you want, free of any charge or penalty, is, of course, a key reason why the music industry has been caught up in a struggle to survive. The Internet’s effect has been staggering. In 1994, more than 40 albums sold at least a million copies on release; in 2014, that figure dropped to just two (Taylor Swift’s “1989” and the “Frozen” soundtrack).

After the Internet, writes Witt, there was no longer any need to be a music “collector.” When you went online, “the music was simply there.” For free.

But Witt’s book is more than just a simple history — or defense — of file sharing, a development most people associate with Napster, but which, according to Witt, involved a much more wide-ranging — and fascinating — story.

“How Music Got Free” examines the subject from three angles: the development of the MP3 sound file (used on iPods and other devices); the life and crimes of the man Witt calls the “Patient Zero of Internet music piracy,” who leaked hundreds of compact discs from the record plant where he worked; and how the music industry ignored the changing technology, then scrambled to catch up with it.

One of the ironies Witt uncovers is that the MP3 was long considered a poor relation in the sound file family. The Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG), the organization that sets standards for consumer audio and video products, had opted to push the rival format, MP2, instead. But just as the MP3 was on the verge of being retired by its creators, its software was pirated and leaked online. Music fans thus had the tools they needed to convert CDs to MP3 files and share them with a worldwide Internet audience.

But it’s the story of “Patient Zero” — Bennie Lydell “Dell” Glover — that’s the most fascinating. Glover, an employee at PolyGram’s CD manufacturing plant in Kings Mountain, N.C., was well positioned to get his hands on upcoming albums by popular acts such as Lil Wayne, Dr. Dre and Eminem, then leak them weeks before the official release date. Glover didn’t leak music for profit, but simply because he could. The descriptions of the elaborate subterfuge he utilized to smuggle out his booty gives Witt’s narrative the air of a crime thriller.

Witt might have done better to make Glover’s story the main one, instead of alternating chapters on each topic, which breaks up the momentum. Not only is Glover’s the most compelling saga, it’s also the real key to how music “got free.”

The new technology that made this easier to do only reinforced the notion that recorded music wasn’t something worth paying for anymore — which has been bad news for artists, as well as record companies.
http://www.seattletimes.com/entertai...-file-sharing/

















Until next week,

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