Sweden's Latest Attack on Pirate Bay Might Actually Work, But...
Swedish authorities are planning to charge Pirate Bay executives with aiding and abetting piracy this week, in the latest attempt to shut the site down. A Pirate Bay spokesperson ridicules the charges as "idiotic" and says he and other fingered executives don't even know where the company's servers are running (they're not in Sweden).
We enjoy Pirate Bay's pluck, and we think Hollywood et al have almost no chance of killing off file sharing, but we doubt the "We don't even know where the servers are" defense will stick. If Sweden starts hurling executives in jail and confiscating property, we expect it will soon be determined where the servers are.
Knowing where the servers are may not legally allow Sweden (or anyone else) to shut down Pirate Bay, as an offshore location may be outside Sweden's jurisdiction. But again, we suspect that a particularly aggressive form of prosecutorial pressure might result in Pirate Bay electing to shut the service down.
As Peter Kafka has noted, however, this won't stop the next file-sharing service from immediately taking hold. The Inquirer puts it this way:
Pirate Bay Hits 10mm Users and 1mm Downloads
Hollywood Readies Attack on the Pirate Bay, But Can't Win the Piracy War
We enjoy Pirate Bay's pluck, and we think Hollywood et al have almost no chance of killing off file sharing, but we doubt the "We don't even know where the servers are" defense will stick. If Sweden starts hurling executives in jail and confiscating property, we expect it will soon be determined where the servers are.
Knowing where the servers are may not legally allow Sweden (or anyone else) to shut down Pirate Bay, as an offshore location may be outside Sweden's jurisdiction. But again, we suspect that a particularly aggressive form of prosecutorial pressure might result in Pirate Bay electing to shut the service down.
As Peter Kafka has noted, however, this won't stop the next file-sharing service from immediately taking hold. The Inquirer puts it this way:
[F]ilesharing isn't stoppable, it evolves faster than the monolithic morons trying to stop it. As a word of advice to the Swedish prosecutors and their backers, why not try something that you might succeed at, like herding cats, pushing piles of sand uphill with a rake, and reducing global warming by sorting greenhouse gases out of the air with a hammer.See Also:
Pirate Bay Hits 10mm Users and 1mm Downloads
Hollywood Readies Attack on the Pirate Bay, But Can't Win the Piracy War
"Bottem line" : non of you know anything about a computer.. "uuuuuhh.. can't get it of my computer , it must be a virus..." It's just so simple to remove the toolbar..
BTW. TPB will never shut down.. 'cause the law is on "the bad guys" side... d;
The offending file name is dotxcfg.exe
It disguises itself as a file that is needed. That's why it took so long to find.
This is the first time after boot up that I don't have to 'remove' stardoors.com from my list of sites that allows pop ups. Every day I had do it and every day it shows back up on the list the next time I bootup. YAY!
Two hours with PlumChoice support last night and two more hours this morning still hasn't completely fixed the problem. I got a Vundo virus/trojan that still allows pop-ups from starsdoor.com. No matter how many times I remove it from my allow popup list, it reappears after every reboot.
I also got two help and support icons on my desktop that direct me to starsdoor.com that I cannot delete.
This is a really bad Trojan and I don't want anyone reading your denial of a toolbar on that site to come away thinking the site is clean because it's not.
Feel free to contact me directly at joeponcakia@yahoo.com
What really differentiates TPB from other search engines? The technology is the same. Google can be used to look for torrent files just as easily as TPB can.
Also, for what it's worth, I just went to TPB and signed up for an account (there are, in fact, many perfectly legal files that people are sharing). There is no "toolbar" or any other kind of malware. I don't know what site you went to, but it probably wasn't TPB.
If everyone is so worried about whether or not something is stealing, why do it at all? It's because it's not stealing, it's diversification of culture.
The bottom line: the case has never been made in favor of the RIAA/IFPI or the MPA. Every time we ask to see their actual data, or to describe the methodologies used to collect and arrive at their numbers, we are ignored, referred to an infinite loop between the organization and the company who did the actual research, or otherwise completely prevented from discovering the truth.
If they wanted the truth known, they would have made these items available. There is no logical reason for withholding this information unless they have something to hide. And just what would that be?
Getting viruses through file sharing is completely preventable. The bottom line is: Don't run an exe unless you _know_ what it is. If there is any doubt, scan the freaking file for Christs sake.
If you are downloading any sort of media, such as music or movies, you simply cannot get a virus. mp3s and mpegs are safe - there is no way to package any sort of malware in them. Oh, also, don't use Internet Explorer. That's just asking for trouble...
Bottom line...I've downloaded one hell of a virus that I can't get rid of. I type this on my wife laptop. Mine is dead.