Brein Successfully Targets a Plex Customer Selling Access to His Pirated Media LibraryByBill Toulas-April 25, 2019.033 Brein succeeded in tracking down a pirate who provided access for a fee to his pirated Plex library. PayPal has possibly disclosed the pirate’s identity which the pirate used to receive payments. Brein wants to transmit the message that no one, no matter how small their offense may seem, will fly under their radar. A Plex user who advertised his library on Reddit caught the attention of Brein the Dutch anti-piracy watchdog who monitored the user and demanded a payment of 750 per day of non-compliance and another 500. The Plex consumer acknowledged Brein’s request and charged the sum while he also publicly admitted his misconduct and confirmed that through Usenet and torrent sites he had downloaded the material on sale. Plex is a client-server media player and software suite that allows users to upload content to a wide range of devices and organize and display content. The website does not test or filter what content is posted by its users so pirates use it seamlessly. Unlawfully downloaded content can be shared or even sold using the site as a user can share his / her library with others by “inviting friends” Generally these pirated-content shares are kept between friends but not a small one either is the number of cases of people trying to make money out of sharing rich libraries that brim with pirated films. The library held about 5700 movies and 10,000 TV shows in the case of the specific Plex user caught in the Brein net. The user had been asking for money to allow access to this library and PayPal was the chosen payment platform. Now though no specifics have surfaced about how Brein tracked the pirate, the evidence points to PayPal being the one who gave the identity information. Plex flat-out denies any involvement in this aspect by claiming that they do not have access to the contents of user files and that disclosure of identities is contrary to their Service and Privacy Policy terms. Brein clarifies that they do not target Plex users directly, but only those who openly promote the sharing of personal libraries that obviously contain pirated content. Brein’s director back in February had confirmed that casual downloaders are not that group’s priority. Instead the Dutch copyright protection firm would expect a knock from persistent uploaders and seeders. It seems from this latest news that Brein goes beyond the P2P monitoring process of picking out pirates who try to make some money out of it on every network. The Buckeye Cyber-Espionage Group used equation group tools before leaking
ByBill Toulas-May 7, 2019.034 Before leaking the Shadow Traders, the Buckeye hackers used equation group tools. At least a year before the publication, the cyber criminals were attacking companies from around the globe.
Genetic Privacy Risks
.041.041 Even if the company’s official policy of digitally storing the genetic information is privacy-friendly, it may not be appropriate. As one thing, organizations keeping our information are regularly hacked by hackers. On top of that there is business ethics that make money out of your dna. What about the state pressuring companies to turn their genetic material over? Life insurance companies could use genetic data for profiling customers. But what is most troubling is that a business will change its policies. Remember when “Don’t be bad” was Google’s motto? Until we live in a world which has any kind of social fairness, we need a lot of legal changes to happen. Genes and Intellectual Property
Of course the last major question is who owns the intellectual property of our genes? This is something of a hazy material. Your genes are special to you, and determine basically who you are. Large-scale at least. But legal discussions on genetic patents are ongoing right now. Would you patent your sequence, or just common genes? Are we to be owed anything when using our genes for profit? Nobody has the answers yet but sooner rather than later we need to work it out.
Genetic Privacy Risks
.041.041 Even if the company’s official policy of digitally storing the genetic information is privacy-friendly, it may not be appropriate. As one thing, organizations keeping our information are regularly hacked by hackers. On top of that there is business ethics that make money out of your dna. What about the state pressuring companies to turn their genetic material over? Life insurance companies could use genetic data for profiling customers. But what is most troubling is that a business will change its policies. Remember when “Don’t be bad” was Google’s motto? Until we live in a world which has any kind of social fairness, we need a lot of legal changes to happen. Genes and Intellectual Property
Of course the last major question is who owns the intellectual property of our genes? This is something of a hazy material. Your genes are special to you, and determine basically who you are. Large-scale at least. But legal discussions on genetic patents are ongoing right now. Would you patent your sequence, or just common genes? Are we to be owed anything when using our genes for profit? Nobody has the answers yet but sooner rather than later we need to work it out.